John’s Blog

The big story this month is from my wife. In 2010, Linda walked the 1000 kilometre Bibbulmun Track from Albany to Perth in Western Australia. This is the second longest walking track in the world after the Appalachian Trail in the USA. She did this solo over two months. Linda’s new book Grandy’s Long Walk, is a children’s book based on the track. It is illustrated by Viv Burrows and is

Many years ago I was travelling through South Africa and stopped at a small town where I noticed they had a small plant nursery. I went to look at what they were doing and was greeted by the plant manager. To him, I was another customer. As we walked though the nursery he picked a leaf of a plant and said “Taste it”. I chewed the plant leaf and wow,

The World Expo in Milan opened in early May 2015 . The focus of the expo is food and the advancement of food technology around the world, the theme being “Feeding the Planet, Energy for Life”. One of the features of the Expo was a supermarket of the future built by the Italian supermarket retailer Coop Apart from the 6 month Expo site, Coop Apart has 1,190 stores across all

In February 2000 Stephen Kaufer, Langley Steinart and a few friends sat in an office in the USA and invented a website that they could use to swap travel reviews. Fourteen years latter it was voted the most trusted travel website in the world. Plus it owned 24 other travel branded sites including “booking buddy”, “holiday lettings”, “holiday watchdog” and “independent traveller”. TripAdvisor is the world’s largest travel site. It

The Italian Co-op built a supermarket of the future, complete with robots checking the fruit. The one area that grabbed my attention was the point of purchase digital boards above all products which could be changed from a central office. The shopping carts were also made of degradable cardboard. I have seen these before in Italy and I am convinced we will eventually see them around the world.

I expected to see promotional posters that highlighted the importance of the farmer. In Australia and some other countries we tend to focus more on the chef as the hero. In Italy the farmer is an equal hero and something I believe needs to be promoted in other parts of the globe.  

Expos are always great places to discover the weird that can be introduced into any retail or marketing situation. The Milan Expo did not disappoint with “funky” ideas that can be adapted to other locations. These are some of my favourites.

Street Food and Food vans are getting more upmarket and this was evident at the Expo. With the arrival of purpose designed vehicles coming from manufactures.  

This is the time for community marketing. Before I left Perth I saw this been developed at two ends of the retail market. The Noodle Night Market is where small retailers in a specialised niche area can get together and create a community event over a number of evenings. At the same time Coles Supermarket, Australia’s largest supermarket group are promoting their involvement in community. Make sure your customers are

An excellent newsletter I receive is Becky McCrays Small Business Survival In the last newsletter she discussed Grand Opening’s, these are her tips… In a small town, it’s a little easier to get people’s attention than in the big city, so you don’t have to compete to be on the TV news. It also makes sense to respect the character of the town, include connections to the local community in

No not me, a lecturer in the USA who wrote “The millionaire next door.” Jurek Leon, from Terrific Trading sent me this quote. “There were many lessons Dr. Stanley taught us. One was a valuable marketing lesson that has stuck with me through the years, about avoiding activities that everyone else is doing. Dr. Stanley also told us the value in learning on the job when consulting. He would say

Phone Apps are a key marketing tool and some retail sectors are far more advanced than others. One of the slower moving retail sectors when it comes to Phone Apps is the garden retail sector. Two new Phone Apps have caught my attention in the last month. Smart Gardener.com is designed to help gardeners garden and is the most widely used App in the garden sector. Designed for American gardens

I’ve done it and I’m sure you’ve done it; we’ve walked into a shop and told a disinterested salesperson that we are “just looking thanks.” We’ve then left the store disappointed and may never go back. I recently worked with a retailer who was in financial difficulty; he believed the answer to his financial problem was getting more customers. My response to him was that he had enough customers, they

There is a lot of new ideas happening around the world. National Children’s Garden Week Congratulations to Neil Grant on launching the National Children’s Garden Week in the UK, let’s hope this is successful and other countries also pick up the idea. For more details contact Neil. Women lead the way in France Winners of the 2015 Chosen by women for women Awards Women are the main buyers in the

This newsletter starts with some PR on our business. Linda and I are finalists in two categories of the Australian Small Business Champions Awards, the Oscars for small business in Australia. We are finalists in Business Service and I am a finalist in Small Business Champion Entrepreneur. The finals are announced at an awards dinner in Sydney on 18th April. Linda and I plan to be there and will let

There are many books and articles written on retailing being theatre and that the retail floor is the stage where you can entertain your customers. The challenge is how do you keep them entertained and stop them getting bored. Plus how long can you keep them entertained before they get bored. The last thing any retailer wants is for their consumer to get bored with displays and hence stop purchasing.

I recently presented a workshop in Mandurah and visited the local coffee shop. They are promoting “Suspended Coffee.” This is something other organisations could develop. The concept comes from Italy, the idea is that a customer who purchases a coffee has the option of purchasing a second cup and donating it to someone in need who may come to the business.

Martins Family fruit farm is located in Ontario, Canada. A number of the family have been on my workshops and attended my conference sessions. These guys are real innovators. Once you have watched this video I think you will understand why. Congratulations to the Martin family and team.

Switzerland is famous for its chocolate and chocolate shops and therefore a visit to Zurich was an opportunity to look at the chocolate shops and what can be la earned from these retailers. Chocolate is either a commodity purchase or an experience and this is as true in Switzerland as it is anywhere else. The interesting aspect is when you look at the chocolate retail experience. These retailers have created a

Field Visual Merchandising Strategy: Developing a national in-store strategy using a merchandising service organisation, by Paul J Russell, is a brand new book focused on merchandising strategies for the field visual merchandisers to the apparel industry. I enjoyed this book for two reasons. Firstly it is focused on the clothing retail sector, but the ideas can be adapted to any retail sector. Secondly it is full of very practical ideas. This is

A few years ago retailers discovered the value of wooden boxes as a merchandising tool. Now it is pallets that are becoming more familiar as a merchandising prop. Last month my village of Nannup held a brilliant music festival. This is put together by a group of dedicated volunteers. Apart from the excellent artists, the set up has to be done on a budget. Pallets came into their own again

Article by John Denton on preparing businesses ‘ready for sale’ because a business that’s ready for sale, is well worth keeping! As much as we would like to sometimes, we just cannot change history. Although, some business owners still try to turn the clock back! What do I mean by that? Well, every day in business we are creating a history of the business’ performance. Every single thing that happens in

Jim Bradley contacted me and suggested I should read a book on coffee shops written by two authors from Northern Ireland. “Wake up and Smell the Profit…to Make More Money in your Coffee Business” by John Richardson and Hugh Gilmartin is a one of the most practical books I have read in a long time. If you are in the fast food or coffee shop sector of the market or

I am a great believer that retail clustering offers so many opportunities in the future. Last month I visited Torvehallerne in Copenhagen. It is called Copenhagen’s new designer pantry. It is a covered market with a farmers market on the outside. It has live jazz sessions, food and coffee outlets and independent retailers selling fresh food and food related kitchen equipment. On a snowy Tuesday morning, this was the only