John’s Blog

There is one thing that is certain, shoppers change their shopping habits in a downturn. This is evident when you pick up the daily newspaper up or watch the news and see the bankruptcy of specific retailers. The challenge for many retailers has been to react quickly to a rapidly changing economic climate. We have seen national icon brands suffer as consumers drift towards store brands. Plus large upmarket stores

Retailers are doing it tough around the world, the lessons learned to grow a business in the good times, do not apply to the economic climate of 2009. Having said that, I do believe that retailers who analyse the market and introduce new strategies have something to smile about. The consumers’ attitudes have certainly changed. The “elite of the elite” consumers are probably riding the storm better than most. Research

As many of you will be aware, I am an advocate of Tipster marketing. Whilst driving through the snow in early February in the UK, I discovered other companies building on Tipster concepts. A large billboard from British Airways had a picture of a taxi driver on it, with the quote: “Ask a local what site to visit” and then referred to the BA Website. This is an excellent example

As a society we seem to be in a difficult situation, apart from the recession, the environment is having its impact. It is either snow blizzards in the northern hemisphere of floods and fire down under. The following article came for Saatchi and Saatchi provides a positive insight to the future. In these difficult times it is well worth a read. I hope you enjoy it. http://www.saatchikevin.com/Loyalty_Beyond_Reason_2008/

You see them in Amsterdam at the Airport, on the High Street of Balham, at Westfield Shopping centre in London, Jarlicant Garden Centre in Spain and Hares Hatch Garden Centre in Reading UK. This year full size plastic cows are the “in” thing in Europe. Do not ask me why, but they are appearing in restaurants, airports, farm shops, shopping malls and garden centres.

Many of you have emailed me about the fires in Victoria and what affect it will have on the communities and the retail industry. The best person to answer that is someone who is on the spot. Maree Planner of Grevillea Nurseries is a garden centre owner from the suburbs of Melbourne, this is her report: Hi From Melbourne, Victoria. In the last two weeks Victoria has experienced its hottest

Customer Service is a key ingredient in getting through the tough times. One of our subscribers Murray Barton sent me the following article which I think will be of interest to you. It comes from a supplies back ground which is as equally as important as a retailers view on service. I hope you enjoy the artice. http://www.industryweek.com/articles/dont_forget_your_customer_18347.aspx

Delegates at conferences often ask me who will follow the Gen Y group? A report on Channel Nine in Australia recently revealed the answer, The I Generation (the Internet generation). The under 20’s cannot remember life without the web and believe the world revolves around the computer. They will drive a new way of communicating and shopping. Be prepared.

by Murray Barton http://incommunique.blogspot.com Every-one knows that it is easier to keep an existing customer than it is to get a new one but how far does this thinking go in your business? Have you empowered staff at all levels of your business to think outside of the box in order to keep your existing customers and keep them happy? Especially in the current economic times every customer you don’t

We do not normally report on the awards in Australia, but this year the Telstra Business Woman of the year came from Fremantle, near Perth and she won the award for a product I believe a number of you would be interested in. The recipient was Leanne Wesche and the product was Safeguard a valuable product for the fruit and vegetable retailer. Safeguard Fruit & Veggie Wash Triumphing over seven

You may feel that you are in the selling business, but if your product will not sell is it the type of product that you could rent? The rental movement in the retail sector really took off in the hardware sector where the rental business is now big business for some retailers. Why get into Rental? When the consumer is becoming more price aware and wanting to spend less, especially

Colour in retailing is so important and many of you have asked how do we use colour correctly in our retail environments. We were recently talking to our brand designer and he mentioned that Voodoo Publications were some of the best books on the subject. This is a link to their website. I hope it proves valuable. http://www.colorvoodoo.com/cvoodoo5.html

Zig is recognised as one of the business guru’s in the world. He recently gave a seminar in the U.S.A. and highlighted some research on closing the sale. Only 4% of business people asked to close the sale five or more times. Research shows that they closed 60% of all deals. Persistence is worth it.

Every supermarket and farm shop sells eggs, but I have come across very little research to help you understand the category. All that has changed with an excellent report that has just been released by the American Egg marketing board. This report is available via the Retail Wire website. If you click on this link, you’ll have to sign up to their website, but you’ll find out all you need

Marketing success is about doing your research and developing a unique niche that relates to your targeted consumer. Sometimes this takes years of planning and sometimes you discover it by chance. I was recently at the Riccaton Markets, one of the bigger markets in New Zealand when I discovered one of these unique marketing gems. I often challenge retailers and suppliers to produce something that appeals to Generation X, the

Those of you who have attended my conferences may be aware of the fact that I am a great believe in “tipster marketing”. Tipster marketing is where a business identifies key people in the community who can become advocates of what you do. I recently stopped at the Quality Inn, Whanganui in New Zealand. The receptionist was in a real bubbly mood. The day before Mark and Claire Wickham of

Daphne Raj and Joe Gehrke are the owners of Teza Juice tea of Auckland, New Zealand. They have a great product, but in a recession climate, they did not have the marketing budget to get the message across using billboards and other conventional “interruption” marketing techniques. What do they do? Well, they “dared to be different” and covered their cars in artificial grass. Teza’s “grassy beast” is working. On November

In May 2008 I gave a presentation to the National Farmers Market Conference in Blenheim, New Zealand. One of the speakers was Johny Schwartz, the owner of Schwartz Restaurant in Christchurch. He was a motivating speaker and talked about two beliefs in his business. One was that there should be no waste and that as a “green” restaurateur he had a responsibility to reduce waste as much as possible and

Spotted in a South American gift shop!

The recent research carried out in the U.S.A. and reported in the I.G.C. Nursery Retailer research report indicated that “how to” guides were seeing a resurgence and the younger consumer was finding them exceptionally valuable. What in mind, I have just discovered two great “how to” leaflets. Palmers, the New Zealand Garden Centre franchisee group produce excellent full colour “Here’s How” guides. These are colourful and supported by “add on”

By John Stanley The world changed in October 2008, have you changed your business practices as well? If you plan to carry on doing things in the same way in 2009, you will be in for a shock. Every business will need to adapt to the new economy we all find ourselves in. The consumer is bound to “cocoon”. With less money in their wallet or purse they will spend

“Successful businesses do not have a manager – they have a leader” When countries move into recession, some businesses fail while others prosper. Success, in business is up to you. Successful businesses operate on the same principles. Many call it common sense, but this is, in fact, “rare sense”. If it were common sense then everyone in the world would be running a successful business. Here a few ideas that

I was recently in Augusta, West Australia. This is about as far as you can go in Western Australia going south, the next stop is Antarctica. Augusta is a small town famous for whale watching and the tallest lighthouse in Australia. I was there to do a workshop with the retailers. After the talk I took a walk around town. The Augusta Pharmacy has a great idea. I had talked

Consumers are growing their own food and the UK style allotment, a piece of land in a community dedicated to food production, is booming again. It was obvious that one opportunity was to open “The Allotment Shop” as a serious retail venture and the first one opened in late October in Kingswinford, West Midlands in the UK. The store has a 1940’s feel to it, promoting the nostalgia feel. The

That may not be the thought going through your mind after the last few weeks. Wexe2x80x99ve already talked to people in the retail industry who have informed us that next year they will only invite speakers to their conferences that are xe2x80x9cfreexe2x80x9d.xc2xa0 Do you think customers are going to attend a conference expecting ideas on how to improve their business from xe2x80x9cfreexe2x80x9d speakers? Businesses will take one of two directions