How large is your store’s trading area? Do you try to reach beyond your local community?

When we first started our business, we really thought we were just local. But soon we found that we were drawing on a [San Francisco] Bay Area base, which is about 115 miles from us. Since we moved to Carmel, we pull from all the way out to Sacramento, to San Francisco, and down to Los Angeles. Another thing that was surprising to us is that we actually do a lot of national selling. I just sent some things off to Denver, Kansas, even New York. Because we deal with one-of-a-kinds, people buy from us and ship, even though with rising gas prices shipping is expensive. We ship tons of stuff every day. It’s almost overwhelming. We were just talking about hiring a new shipping and receiving person, because we’re having trouble keeping up. We’re also tiptoeing into the Bay Area with some of our advertising. We’re in a couple of different magazines, with both editorial and advertorial material. We’re getting more hits on our website because we’re viewed more and more as experts.

Our immediate trading area is a 60-mile radius that includes Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, and Illinois. Our newsletter mailing list includes customers as far away as Los Angeles and New York. Just last week we shipped a handbag to a lady in Texas who orders from us routinely. With the introduction of the Internet, we all have worldwide reach, so in that respect our trading area has increased over the past few years. Our advertising market expands across the four-state area, and we exhibit at bridal fairs in two states. Of our registered couples, only about 50 percent live in this area, but all of them have local family or friends. We even had a couple who live in Austria register here this year. (Of course, the bride grew up in Murray!) Nonetheless, I believe it is important to focus attention on the people who enjoy our store in person. We are located in a university town, and we reach out to students and their families by participating in a town and gown event by setting up a booth so incoming freshmen and their families can get to know us and we can reach out to them.

Our trading area is growing. Our main customer base is local: we draw from our community, but also from the smaller towns north of us, so the total local base is about twice the size of our town. Anyone south of us tends to go to Salt Lake City, but we’re trying to convince people that the freeway also goes north. We’re located in an historic district that is still an up-and-coming area, so as our tourist base grows, our customer base grows. Tourist customers in our area are primarily skiers, so they come from all over. We’re trying to market ourselves as a destination store, attracting tourists by placing co-op ads with other local businesses in publications that are placed in hotels, as well as our convention and visitors’ bureau website and mailings. For the Salt Lake City area, we’re making the same efforts, except we’re targeting residents. We advertise in Salt Lake Magazine, especially whenever our street is having an event and we have a good chance of attracting first-time visitors.