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April's
Articles for Giftware News:
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Weather—making
the most of every season.
Originally my home was Montreal.
Last week I had to wonder if Vermont had been a wise decision.
I wondered this as I was driving home from Montreal (headquarters
of my Canadian business).
Montreal is a mere fifty miles north of the Vermont border and
Burlington, my erstwhile home is another 50 miles south. When
people ask my husband and me why we moved to Vermont, we tell
them we were trying to go south and ran out of gas. Or as we like
to say in Quebec: "GAZ!" (A little peppier don't you
think?)
Hmm... I seem to have deviated from my point here. My point was
that last week we had a crushing snowstorm in both Montreal and
Northern Vermont. And while driving from Montreal through the
blinding snow and over those ice-crusty roads, to an equally frozen
Burlington, my mind jumped immediately to—you guessed it—retail!
That old, bad for business, unpredictable devil—weather—had
reared its frosty head way too early in the season.
Freak storms aside, in retail we have to consider the winter months
and how to work them.
If you have street store locations (I do—one in New York
City, one in Burlington, Vermont, and 18 in Canada) you shiver
mentally and physically when bad weather arrives.
Ladies and Gentleman, it is not a surprise. As I tell my suppliers
in India, who complain about the difficulties of monsoon weaving—you
know what, there's one every year. Yearly Monsoon and Yearly Winter.
We have to deal. We must choose our weapons.
Many retailers—especially large ones—use bad weather
(a.k.a. bad sales) as a reason to go on sale. That is their only
weapon. If you have read my other columns you will know that for
me "sale"means failure. And for our industry, too many
sales mean death.
Let's look at how to handle low traffic by increasing UPTs.
UPTs are units per transaction, and they are, as we well know,
the way the boutique business survives. We do not survive by volume;
we survive by customer service and the number of items a single
customer leaves with.
Snowy days outside, will draw people to warmth inside. A customer
will spend longer in your store; if the heat is on and the cider
is ready, they do not want to go back out into the cold. As they
roam through your pretty things, you will have plenty to talk
about and lots to show and sell.
You need to set the mood for your customer, and indeed for yourself.
I have already chosen my mood setter for the season, it is the
Vance Kitira Candle Urn Lamp.
This is a large, winter white wax urn—in it I put an inch
of water and a votive candle (the votive is in a glass and is
included, plus extras.) Oh the glow, oh the warmth within, oh
the soft ambiance created; a shapely urn with a hidden fire—how
sexy, and intriguing. And guess what—the wax urn does not
melt (because of the water), so I will use the urn by adding new
votives all winter long.
I have taken my first step towards helping my customer linger
in my shop. I have created a seductive ambiance.
I feel deviant tonight, so I will deviate a little and tell you
that the beautiful Vance Kitira candle line was first spotted
by me at the Hitchin' Post, a very cool quilting shop in the magical
town of Sisters, Oregon.
I have recently starting licensing my fabric designs to a great
company called MODA and I was doing my own due diligence in Sisters,
Oregon. Sisters is the host of the annual Sisters outdoor quilt
show.
I have to say visiting a quilting shop showed me more than a great
candle line, it also showed me a few things about retailing that
are unusual in the Gift Industry.
Next week I will share some of these ideas with you.
So friends, retailers, people who loathe discounts—set the
mood and get ready to tell a winter tale within your shop. It's
time to build the ambiance and stoke the UPTs!
P.S. On a not so cold day—the snow melted!
April Cornell,
Burlington, Vermont |
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