Retailing is about more than just offering a bit of merchandise and expecting the consumer to jump at the chance to buy your product. No matter how much information you throw at them, the fact remains that most of the time they will take their time choosing which products are right for them – not just what’s cheapest. That said, when a special retailing season approaches like Christmas, all rules are off and your merchandise needs to reflect the best of the appropriate themes in order to sell, sell, sell.

Believe it or not, the most profitable salons make the majority of their retailing and gift voucher profit in the one to two months before Christmas.  To get a massive influx of income during the holiday season, my suggestion would be to watch the big salons and learn!  See what they do, how they do it and copy.  Note - Obviously don’t copy their promotions and adverts word-for-word…! What I mean is copy the techniques you see them using then customize them to work in your business.

For example, one of the strategies you’ll see them using that you can copy is selling gift items or impulse buys.  If your salon is currently only selling traditional beauty treatment products like facial creams or cleansers or shampoos & conditioners, why not move a little outside of that comfort zone and package some of those products with aromatherapy candles or relaxation CDs. Christmas shoppers love the thought of being relaxed and beautiful at the same time.  BUT that does not mean you can smash together two products without rhyme or reason. The products need to match in some way, complement each other, if you will.

On the flip side of that coin is if your business ONLY sells non-traditional beauty products, you could add in something more traditional to grab their attention that they’re not expecting. Yes, holistic therapy products, organic facial exfoliators and chakra recordings might be what your consumer has grown to expect if this is you, but what happens when you offer them MORE than they expect? A hike in how much you sell could be what happens because consumers love to be surprised and offered more than they bargained for especially during the Holiday season.  Maybe your customers would be interesting in home spa kits or luxury soaps?  Take a peak in the window of the big salons and see how they bundle things together and what’s in their gift baskets.

And on that note about gift baskets, it is important to visit the presentation of the products you choose during ANY holiday season. While the other 10 months of the year you can use the manufacturers bottle as your sole means of presentation, during the two months before Christmas that just doesn’t cut the mustard. Consumers want more, more, more AND they want you to show them which products are the best buy for their money. You see, items packaged for Christmas in a nice basket with a beautiful bow and a Christmas tag must be worth the money, right?

Convenience is what a salon is selling when they package products for a quick sale. If you know your facial cream works best with your facial cleanser, package the two together with a “complimentary” relaxation CD and voila, sales will skyrocket.

Now that doesn’t mean you have to discount the items to create something worth the value… How about buying in a few body sponges or fluffy towels and including them in the basket for free then selling the rest at full price?  Your client still gets great value for money, as the basket is a ready-made gift, packaged beautifully with a few freebies.  And you get full profit to maximize your Christmas income.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Rebecca Kepple specializes in helping business owners massively increase their client base and profits.  To get instant access to her free insider secrets report ‘The Top 7 Secrets for Massively Increasing Your Client Base’ visit: http://www.wellbeingbusinesssecrets.com/freebiebook.

© Copyright Rebecca Kepple 2009

Want to use this article on your site or in your newsletter?  This article may be reprinted provided no part thereof is edited in any way and this resource box is included.

When it comes to retailing your products, one of my top two favorite methods for instant results and top profits is Retail Displays. Today we will discuss how to best display your retail items and why yours could be under performing.

Most salons & clinics are familiar with retail displays. They are simply the shelving units or areas in your business that hold whatever products you sell.  This might be traditional hair or beauty retail items like moisturizers or shampoos or they might be holistic or healthcare items like aromatherapy oils, naturopathic remedies or even yoga CDs.  The question is not what to sell  - that’s simply whatever best compliments the treatments and services your salon or clinic offers - but instead HOW to sell it.

Are YOUR displays working for YOU? There is a very good chance that your retail displays are laid out in a manner that is not conducive to shopper and their shopping habits.

Did you know that the majority of customers turn to the right when they enter a store?

The placement of retail display racks is crucial to the sales you earn from those products. The retail displays located closest to whenever your clients spend most of their time while they are with you need to be your specialty items and not your core items that customers consistently buy.

Lets use a hairdressing example. The core items that you stock are the ones your clients consistently purchase the most of.  So that’s normally your most popular shampoos, conditioners & styling products.  No matter where you put these, so long as they are out in plain sight and you mention them to clients while they are there, these will sell.

But what about all the specialty items a hairdresser might sell?  Like home toners for brassy blondes?  Or grey coverage shampoos?  Or masks for the ultimate hair nourishment?  These are items that clients are unlikely to pick up unless they specifically came in looking for them.  But they are the items that they’ll be most intrigued by if they happened upon them.  So put them in their face.  Put them center front on your most prominent shelving unit.  Relegate your popular items to the bottom shelf.  Clients will still buy them but they’ll also browse your specialty items.

The result?  All your usual sales plus lots of odds & ends you wouldn’t normally sell.  This way, your clients must pass by every other display in order to find the product they are searching for. On the way, they may just pick up a few of those diversified products we talked about before.

Taking a closer look at impulse buys, there are several ways to retail those smaller cost items you sell. This does not mean the gross margin is not huge, just that the cost to the customer is not large enough to make them FEEL the difference on their bill even when you’re selling the items at full price.

For instance, a beauty salon may choose to market fingernail polish next to the till. These polishes could have a markup of 50%, which means a fantastic profit for the salon, but the total cost may only be a few dollars or pounds to the consumer. The impulse to the client when they see the latest gorgeous nail colours is to add on the fingernail polish, especially after a great manicure or pedicure, without even thinking about the price because they know it’s just a nail polish and will be cheap. But for you, it’s a 50% profit!

Presentation is another huge factor in the profitability of a retail display. If the customer sees dust and dirt, they will instantly believe these products have been left sitting for a long period of time which means NO ONE wants to buy them. Lighting is also important here. Lighting should be natural and bright enough to showcase the products on the retail display, as well as the cleanliness of the shelves.

Once the retail displays are in the right location, lighted well and sparkling clean, tell the customer more about why they NEED the product. Utilizing small product cards to explain the benefits of the products is a great way to keep the customer in the shop longer. The information card needs to offer meaty information, not a bunch of fluff that the consumer will toss out of their mind in an instant.

So, mission for this week (should you chose to accept it!) is to go into wherever your retail area is and look at it with new eyes.  How is it laid out?  Are the right products in the right places?  Do you have little information cards out?  Is it all clean? How is the lighting?  Putting some thought into your retail displays can vastly alter the sales you get.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Rebecca Kepple specializes in helping business owners massively increase their client base and profits. To get instant access to her free insider secrets report ‘The Top 7 Secrets for Massively Increasing Your Client Base’ visit: http://www.wellbeingbusinesssecrets.com/freebiebook.

© Copyright Rebecca Kepple 2009

Want to use this article on your site or in your newsletter? This article may be reprinted provided no part thereof is edited in any way and this resource box is included.