Archive for the ‘News’ Category

Catalog 69 Is Now Available

Thursday, September 29th, 2011

Catalog 69 is Now Available

We are releasing our last catalog of the year. This catalog features over 30 products that we have reduced temporarily, permanently or have decided to remove from our inventory all together. Some of the merchandise included in the price reduction will be great for the upcoming holiday seasons.

This catalog of course features our Christmas holiday bag collections as well as our latest boutique shopping bags that will be perfect to give out to your customers. They will certainly remember your store with bags like these!

Make sure you take the time to look through the catalog, mark your pages and get those orders in! The holiday season will be here before you know it! Check in with us here on the blog, Facebook and Twitter for the latest news, trends and sneak peeks. You’ll be glad you did.

Halloween Retail Statistics

Friday, September 23rd, 2011

Halloween Retail Statistics

Halloween is just a little over a month away and is considered a major holiday event in the US. In terms of spending it is a precursor to what holiday spending will be like for the Christmas holiday that follows. Traditionally if Halloween spending is up then retailers will keep their fingers crossed that Christmas sales will be also. Last year in 2010 US spending was up from the previous year according to a survey that was conducted by the National Retail Federation (NRF). It was predicted that total Halloween retail sales would be $5.8 billion! Now that is a lot of candy corn!

Here are some other interesting retail statistics from the National Retail Federation.

  • 50.1% of consumers will decorate their homes and yards; second only to the winter holidays
  • Consumers will spend about $1.6 billion on Halloween decorations
  • Candy will be given to trick-or-treaters by 72.2% of consumers
  • Four out of ten people will wear a costume
  • An estimated 46.3% will carve a pumpkin

We wanted to get you excited by letting you in on some interesting retail statistics to set the tone for this upcoming season. As always, we want you to be armed with all the facts so that you can get ready for the season ahead. Halloween is a wonderful time of the year to get your creative juices flowing. It is the one time of the year that it is absolutely encouraged to be unique, fun and as over the top as you can be! Have fun with it this year. As a store owner, Halloween could be a great way to bring in new customers that will revisit your store during the Christmas holiday too. In the upcoming weeks, we will be presenting you with some product options and ideas that we know you will enjoy.

Make sure you drop us a line on Facebook and follow us on Twitter for the latest sneak peaks, retail news and trends.

Some Brief Thoughts & Retail Help from Retail Rich

Friday, September 16th, 2011

Some Brief Thoughts & Retail Help from Retail Rich

By Rich Gordon AKA Retail Rich

How Many Ideas For Growing Or Improving Your Business Have You Dismissed This Year, because your certain they won’t work or you know better? How many ideas have you dismissed mostly because they came from an employee or some crazy customer. Some of the wildest craziest ideas are the ones that have some real potential.

No faith, no creativity, no experimentation equals failure!  The fact is that the success of any new concept is at the mercy of many different variables.  It may be timing.  It may be design, promotion, the economy, location, or just the luck of the draw at the moment.  Sometimes even the slightest adjustments can make the difference between dismal failure and overwhelming success. “Failure is success turned inside-out.” (from the poem, “Don’t quit”)  Fear or discomfort seems to motivate many of us to be willing to give up something valuable in order to rid ourselves of something painful or unwanted.  It’s a bit like, “Throwing out the baby with the bathwater” when things don’t work, and it’s shortsighted.

Unless you’re just overflowing with some real genius new ideas for sales, don’t be so quick to dismiss them without turning them upside down or inside out and looking at them from different perspectives. Are you taking the time and the thought to really move your business forward?   Think about it honestly.

Making lists of why something can’t be done

is minimum wage work.

BEFORE YOU SPEAK… LISTEN

BEFORE YOU WRITE… THINK

BEFORE YOU SPEND… EARN

BEFORE YOU CRITICIZE…WAIT

BEFORE YOU PRAY…FORGIVE

BEFORE YOU QUIT…TRY

Are You The Place To Go For The Latest Products On The Market, or does your store remain a bit stale and predictable? Change is a must. Are you seen as a bit behind in what’s going on out there? Your goal should be to give customers continuing and persuasive reasons to revisit your store.  There is no room for another ordinary retailer.

A Few Thoughts To Ponder

Even at a Mensa convention, someone is the dumbest person in the room.

What disease did cured ham actually have?

If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from?

The Customer Experience Comes Only From You

Customer experience is what customers walk out of your store with that is your part of the whole business transaction.  The product came from a manufacturer.  The experience came from YOUR store and it in effect, is a story. It’s the story your customers tell their friends and relatives about the most wonderful, warm, or “over the top” experience they had while in your store with YOUR people. You have absolutely no control over what they say or how they tell the story. The experience is what they saw, heard and felt from their perspective, and that belongs to them. What YOU can do in your store is deliver the experience and the connection that makes the customer rave about you, and it’s what can make them a customer advocate for your business. Their experience in your store is your brand. It’s not what you envision or planned.

In Marketing, When Writing An Ad, A Newsletter, Or A Blog, you don’t ever want potential customers to read or listen to your ad and think, “Hurry up and get to the point.” Instead, keep your messages short, sweet and succinct, and your results will improve.

Make the mundane memorable!

©2011 Retail Redefined and retailrichez.com. All rights reserved.

Be A Great Niche Retailer

Tuesday, September 13th, 2011

Be A Great Niche Retailer

By Rich Gordon AKA Retail Rich

As a writer and retail consultant, I tend to look at specialty stores differently than other customers who walk the aisles of a store. In fact, I’m one of the few men I know that enjoy going shopping, even though I’m not necessarily shopping to buy something, I’m always looking for ideas and especially something that knocks my socks off.  When I walk into a specialty store, I find myself quickly taking in the overall concept and atmosphere, while looking for visual impact and interesting displays.  I’m looking at the merchandise assortment, lighting, inventory levels, cleanliness, signage and even how the employees are dressed. Mostly I’m interested in the customer experience and how well customers are being taken care of. But I’m always looking for something I haven’t seen before, something I can learn, something I can take away and share with my followers on line at retailrichez.com as well as clients.

What I See

Too often, what I see makes me shake my head in disbelief: I see merchandise that doesn’t even seem to belong in the store.  I see stained ceiling tiles and vents loaded with dust and dirt.  I see poor housekeeping in general. The kinds of things that really make a store look fresh and crisp.  Worse than anything, I see too many employees and even managers that seem indifferent to the customers.  It’s like they take them for granted, or they can’t be bothered to taking time with a customer to interrupt what they consider to be more important work.

On the other hand, there are times when what I see just blows me away.  It’s like the mother ship has landed.  Why is it that some stores just really seem to pop?  They’re fun, the employees are nice and helpful and everything seems to run like a top. These same stores seem to be the ones that are exceptionally well thought out, easy to move around in and often a new surprise wherever you turn.

The Best Know Their Niche

They know who their customer is, and who their customer isn’t. They know what business they are truly in and what business they’re not in!  Very little else matters! Just looking at the store you know they’re on top of every detail.  There is no doubt that these people could teach us all something. One more interesting fact:  They seem to have customers in them more so than anywhere else, especially on the days when it really counts.

Planning, Imagination and Discipline Are All Important

For any specialty retailer, large or small, great retail success can be defined as that point where well thought-out planning and imagination combine, and are supported with disciplined execution. It’s kind of like adding 3 + 3 and getting 8.

The fact is that plans and imagination are almost worthless without real discipline and follow through. So you need planning, focus and discipline. Some retailers that have the discipline and follow through may create a nice clean store, but the store isn’t always too exciting, special or cohesive without some planning and some real imagination. You’ve got to know who you are and where you’re taking your store.  There has to be some inspired creativity to be truly special!

The Best Store Owners Are Extremely Focused

We all know that as small specialty retailers, we don’t have the budget, the marketing and the strength of competing with the big boys, and they can’t always do everything their customers would like to see.  We just can’t afford to make too many mistakes or missteps. We absolutely must have focus on that “one thing”.  Remember Curly in City Slickers?

REMEMBER CURLY??   JACK PALANCE

Curly: Do you know what the secret of life is?

Curly: This is.  (holds up one finger)

BILLY CRYSTAL-MITCH: Your finger?

Curly: One thing. Just one thing. You stick to that and the rest don’t mean SQUAT!

BILLY CRYSTAL: But, what is the “one thing?”

Curly: (smiles) That’s what “you” have to find out.

I’m sure that most of us would say that it’s not one thing.  It’s a myriad of things—all critical. But if you think about it, it really does come down to one thing. . . one central question: What is the “one thing” that you do better than anybody else out there. Do you know what that is?  Do you have any one thing or more than one thing you do better than anyone else?  What is the “one thing” that your customers come to you for, before they go check out any other store?

Answering these questions with careful thought, some research, some soul searching and a clear focus is essential to a successful strategy. With a limited budget and resources, we don’t have the luxury to flounder around a whole lot, trying to figure out what we’re going to be when our store grows up. You need to find that “one thing” NOW!  And you need to do that “one thing” so consistently and so exceptionally well, that you begin to build a reputation, which in fact becomes your rock solid competitive advantage against other retailers.  It shouldn’t make any difference whether they are large or small, next door or across town.  The market (this market niche) is your focus and yours to own, period. . . end of story.

A Little More Explanation

Think and breath exactly what the core of your business is to be. Don’t let there be the slightest doubt for your people or your customers as to what your store’s focus is. You must constantly analyze everything you bring to your store in terms of whether it will add to your stores focus as well as the appeal of your core customers who love you because of that “one thing”. Store atmosphere, which includes things such as lighting, fixtures, design, smells, surfaces and touch, music and sound—all most compliment and enforce your core. Everything you do in your store, in terms of efforts, time, energy, peripheral products and services are there to support and play off your core.  There should be great synergy between your core business and these things.  If not, you may be diluting your effect or wasting time, money and energy. Any other products and distractions may be hurting you, your sales and possibly confusing your customers.  Think of these things as possibly “the dark side”.  If you can’t describe what your store is all about in a few words or one simple short sentence, you may still not be focused enough!   I’ll give you two sentences to describe what your store is all about, but you need to include who you are, what products and services you offer, and who your target customer is. The target customer should be the person that absolutely loves you. It may sound crude, but nobody else really counts for much in this objective. By the way, you need to craft this simple sentence to help you establish clear boundaries that limit the scope and range of our business to that “one thing.” Next, I would tell you to read the chapter from my book, “A Line Out The Door” on mission statements. I’m serious. Just keep in mind this won’t be a mission statement that no one understands like you’ve heard or seen before.

Metrics That Matter

I never said that finding and specifically identifying the “one thing” would be easy, but it should be a very energizing and exciting exercise or experience for you.  If you truly are focused, things become a bit more simplified, believe it or not.  It really is like jumping on an exciting train to “clarity,” and you’ve just left behind unneeded chaos and stress.  This train is helping you leave behind the old baggage of questionable product categories, customers who are only shopping you for low prices and unprofitable use of time or expenses. The fact is it’s hard to try and please everyone.  My only fear with this exercise is that many of you may be saying, “I’m already focused on my specialty.  My point is, you may still not be focused enough to be the absolutely best at your “one thing”.  Having that “one thing” should allow you to focus on the metrics that matter.  Zero in on the product information, customer preferences and all other numbers that help you do that “one thing” with a laser-guided focus.

With a new and compelling crystal clear vision of the customers you want to focus on and how you’re going to knock their socks off, you want your customers to come into your store with their mouths hanging open and exclaiming, “the mother ship has landed!  The best stores often look clean, crisp, and exciting because they actually made things cleaner, crisper and are filled with what their customers want.  They have simplified and focused. Things ARE probably simpler for them.  Find that “one thing” in your business, and build an amusement park or wonderland of nothing but your niche, for your niche customers!  They’ll love you for it!

©2011 Retail Redefined and retailrichez.com. All rights reserved.

What is a Good Retail Salesperson?

Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011

What is a Good Retail Salesperson?

by Rich Gordon AKA Retail Rich

Do you have sales-clerks OR Do you have sales-people in your store?

Lets talk first about sales clerks.  In my mind, they are there to do the normal day-to-day work in a retail establishment, which involves cleaning, putting out merchandise, ticketing it and ringing it up.  This is NOT a salesperson.  You most likely need salesclerks, but in this day and age, AND ECONOMY, you need them to be salespeople too!  If you just have employees who are waiting for someone to buy something, then you have order-takers and they should be called order-takers. . .  or maybe sales-clerks, but they ARE NOT salespeople and the real question is which do you have on your payroll? You need to understand just whom you have in your store!

A good salesperson caters to the store’s customers and works to help them in anyway possible.  They don’t ignore the customer or find a reason to avoid them, or keep them waiting while they finish up a phone call to their boyfriend.  They really do understand the importance of SERVING customers.  They don’t consider it demeaning and they don’t considerate it an interruption to their daily tasks, of which taking care of customers is the most important.

A good salesperson does not stumble they’re way through a question that a customer asks about a given product, just because they are ignorant of product knowledge. Have you ever gone into a store and asked about a product, only to have the salesperson read off the product package, as if he’s providing you a valuable service?  A good salesperson needs to know about the things he or she is selling.  Customers are likely to see through the ignorance and walk away. As a result, your store loses their trust, perhaps permanently. As a retailer, product knowledge is important depending on what you are selling.

A good salesperson strives to greet every customer by name whenever possible.  They are friendly and willing to listen.  In fact they enjoy talking to people.

A good salesperson looks professional—like they belong in your store.  They do not look like they are working a garage sale.  A professional appearance is CRITICAL to your store’s image and brand. If you think about it, appearance does matter. Whether it’s the packaging on a product you purchase, or your company’s web site, people notice how things look. Whether you like it or not people care about how things look and make judgments about you and your store based on appearance.  Looking the part, makes it easier for your customers to see who can help them, and it identifies them as the people within the store that they can count on to help.  If you tell me that Walmart doesn’t have professional looking people, you’re right.  They don’t.  But you don’t have the lowest prices in town and you don’t cater to the lowest common denominator of customer’s. . . At least I hope not!

A good salesperson looks at each customer as having a “need” or “want”.  A good salesperson wants to help discover just what that is, and believes if they can do so, the customer has the potential of buying multiple items.

A good salesperson helps the store’s management collect buyer preferences and information on each customer they work with, because they know that the more information the store has about them, the easier it will be to please the customer in the long run.

A good salesperson asks the customer if there is anything else they can help them with, and if the customer has found everything they came in for.

A good salesperson thanks the customer for their visit, and/or purchase.  At Nordstrom’s, a good salesperson will walk around the sales-counter after the transaction has been completed and hands the purchase to the customer while thanking them for their business.

A good salesperson calls customers at times (after the sale) to insure they were happy with their purchase and satisfied with their visit to the store.

Selling is a service. A Salesperson is not there to push something on the customer they don’t want.  A good salesperson is there to build trust and help the customer satisfy a want or a need with the knowledge they have about the products and the store. None of us want to be sold something.  We all do want to be serviced.

If you do NOT have salespeople on your staff, it most likely is not the fault of your employees.  You are the one who needs to make some changes.  You hired them.  If they don’t have the right personality for sales, whose fault is that?  If they have been working for you for a while and you see them doing none of the above very well, they most likely need some training and some explanation of YOUR priorities where customers are concerned. Changes in staff behavior do not occur automatically or overnight, so you will need to be persistent and consistent. As you try to make changes, give your people a sense of why you’re doing the things your doing and some idea of what lies ahead. When employees have a boss who surprises or direction suddenly without warning, they get a bit nervous.  People do like predictability and on what basis they’re being judged. If any of these issues sound like they have you and your store in their sights, I’m sorry, but YOU have some work to do!

©2011 Retail Redefined and retailrichez.com. All rights reserved.