Helping the Garden Industry Thrive
Twenty-six Mailorder Gardening Association members recently participated in a Secret Shopper Survey to evaluate and benchmark their ordering systems. Tom Beddows of THB Direct performed the survey and reported the results at last week’s Mailorder Gardening Association conference. Boy, do we as an industry have some work to do!
A number of Tom’s findings represent significant missed income opportunities. For instance, for the telephone orders placed: (Click on the headline for more…)
Today’s post is promotional suggestion sparked by, of all things, the Dutch post office. Let me explain. (Click on the headline for more…)
I just got an email from a cataloger who had recently returned from the ACCM catalog conference in New Orleans. He reported with dismay that attendance had dropped significantly, down to about 500 from around 2,000 just a couple years ago.
What I found interesting was this particular cataloger is the quintessential example of doing what so many companies do –
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I just returned from a productive trip to the Hardware Show in Las Vegas. I knew from the barrage of “discounted rooms still available” emails leading up to the show that it would be smaller than previous years. But — perhaps because most of our clients are doing so well — I wasn’t prepared for it being down by roughly half.
Nearly all the exhibitors I spoke with reported a profitable year – even those who aren’t riding the vegetable gardening boom. While many were unsettled because their sales haven’t followed a typical pattern this year, their numbers were nevertheless up. Two things seemed to be primarily responsible for their success. (Click on the headline for more…)
A hat tip to Stephen Lett of Lett Direct for this suggestion mentioned in one of his old Catalog Success columns: Include a special “new buyer” welcome in every package sent to first-time buyers. What better way to make newcomers feel appreciated, and for a tiny cost, too.
