We Ask, You Answered
GDA Staff -- Gifts and Dec, 3/3/2011 6:19:12 AM
How were your Christmas sales?
Tara Riceberg
TWEAK 99
Los Angeles
December was awesome! This was my second year as a $99 store so it's hard to compare to when my product was more expensive. Also, I had crazy press this season - LA Times, Apartment Therapy named my shop one of the top 10 pop-ups of 2010, Daily Candy, Urban Daddy, CBS online, Angeleno Magazine and KTLA morning news and NBC LA evening news!
What I feel made my shop a success was creating value for customers. I don't believe there is value in spending less. Value is getting more for your money. All my gifts are pre-wrapped and I only select items that are fun and functional. My best items this season were the $12.99 phone wrist holder, the $7.99 iPlunge and custom cashmere fingerless gloves for $99.99. As a buyer I was more drawn to the silly, inexpensive items this season. It was challenging for me to find things I loved in the $50-$99 price point. Also, when customers could find amazing gifts for under $20 they were motivated to spend and spread holiday cheer.
Marsh
a Dautch
JENSS DECOR
Amherst, NY
Thankfully our Christmas sales were up in all our stores. We were hit with bad weather the first of December, but made it up the rest of the month. We did a lot of cable TV advertising which helped. We also had a ladies' wish lists night, which we had catered, served champagne and had a spa do hand massages, free gifts for filling out the list, etc. We invited our best customers for part and advertised it to the public later in the evening. The customers then filled out wish lists with a contact name that we followed up with. The next day we could see results. We narrowed our assortments to our best sellers so there wasn't much left of holiday, so our margins were better this year as well.
Our customers keep coming back because of our assortment and free giftwrap. We also had a television personality come in who had never been in the store before - yikes! He was so impressed that he did a show from the store showcasing our unique merchandise the very next day. All of this helped make a successful season.
Debbie Dusenberry
CURIOUS SOFA
Prairie Village, KS
Christmas sales were very good in 2010. Almost equal to 2009 which was our best ever, ironically. We premiered our holiday decor on October 28th: it always helps fourth quarter sales to get it out early. I stayed on top of what was selling in November (decor) and December (gift and accessories) and kept replenishing furiously! It has been interesting to see how consumers are buying now; merchandise must either be unique or affordable. I was never one for carrying kitschy, stocking stuffer type products, but lately that is what customers want.
On December 15th I announced that I'm closing my store. I had to get as many dollars as I could from Christmas sales before going public. Beginning December 26th, all inventory will be 25 percent off, then progress to 75 percent off over the next three weeks. Knowing a big sale was coming, for the first time I purchased more discounted Christmas goods from vendors during December. It proved to be great filler when everything was selling down, and I still made a good percentage from it.
We would love your feedback!
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