Retailers often think that the next boost in their business is going to come from finding the next amazing line of merchandise, or discovering a new marketing tool (the next Facebook?). Sometimes they believe it will happen because they hire a killer salesperson, or hope that new businesses will fill vacancies around them which will bring traffic.
The problem with all of these “solutions” is that they are external to your business. You cannot predict or control them, nor can you invoke them when you need more cash. As such, while they are fun to dream about, they are not what you should focus on to improve your business.
What I am about to show you is, well, kinda magical. When I first learned about these little tweaks, I was honestly and truly blown away. I think you will be too. What blew me away about this was that these are small adjustments that have enormous impact on the business. They are easy to implement, and if done properly, will bring about tremendous change.
TWEAK #1 – Adjusting your selling cost. Most retail businesses operate on some form of base plus commission. This is an area that I find to be implemented poorly in many businesses. Many stores pay commissions on the first dollar sold (they should not be, the sales people should need to hit a goal) and are not planned in such a way as to keep the cost of sales in line. Let’s tweak that and see the results.
First, a definition. “Selling cost” is defined as the percentage of your sales that go to pay for your sales people. The formula for this is Total Cost of Sales (which includes salaries plus commission) divided by Total Sales (without tax). As an example, if you have an employee whose payroll cost for last month is $1,700 and that employee sells $12,500, then the selling cost for that employee is $1,700/$12,500 = 13.6%.
Now, what if you put in a commission plan that keeps the selling cost at a good percentage, such as 9%? How? Try this – take the hourly wage for your employee and divide it by .09. That number is the employee’s hourly goal. For example, if you have an employee that is paid $10 per hour, you would divide $10 by .09 and you would get $111.00. That is what that employee has to sell each hour they work.
Now take that hourly goal and multiply it by the number of hours that person works in a week. If he/she works 30 hours, the goal is $3,330.00. As soon as they hit that goal in the week, you can pay them 9% of all sales above the $3,330. This gives them incentive to sell, helps them earn great commissions, and keeps your selling cost low.
We did that in a store whose annual sales were $750,000. Look at the results below.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Fixed Expenses | $ 172,500 | $ 172,500 |
| Variable Expenses | $ 142,500 | $ 127,500 |
| Profit before COGS | $ 435,000 | $ 450,000 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
You can see that by implementing this strategy, we lowered their selling cost by 2%, which resulted in an extra $15,000 in cash to the bottom line. This works because the business gets extra cash, the employee is incentivized to sell more, and as such has some “skin in the game” meaning that they care how much is sold on the floor. Better still, no matter how much that person sells, your selling cost never goes above 9%. Everybody wins.
But wait, we’re not done. That’s only the first tweak!
TWEAK #2 – Lowering your purchases. This one almost seems too easy, but watch the math. We took a store and found ways to lower their inventory purchases by 2%. Look at the results.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Purchases (%) | 55% | 53% |
| Purchases ($) | $ 412,500 | $ 397,500 |
| Gross Profit | $ 337,500 | $ 352,500 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
Yes, it’s another $15,000 improvement. But let’s be careful here. This was NOT done by hacking 2% off of all orders unilaterally. It was done by determining which classes are “signature” classes for the store and which ones are carrying more inventory than they should. It requires a little thought, and a little planning. As a store, you have to figure out where your strengths are, and where your weaknesses are. You have to figure out where you have a competitive advantage in the marketplace, and how you can exploit that. Then you can determine the classes that you will grow, and the classes you will cut back, and that’s how you get to reduce your purchases by 2%. In the case above, this was done systematically, using all the tools that open to buy planning (definition: open to buy is a great sales forecast by class, accompanied with an inventory plan that prevents you from overbuying or underbuying). Our overall goal was to cut purchases by 2%, but we had to figure out precisely how and where. If you aren’t using an open to buy plan to do this, you should investigate getting on to one. There is a reason every major chain, every department store, and larger specialty chains use an open to buy plan, and that is that it creates cash flow for the store. Most independent retailers cannot afford to purchase open to buy software (and we’re not talking about simple spreadsheets, we’re talking about software with sophisticated forecasting and planning tools), so there are services out there to help.
TWEAK #3 – Adjusting your Markdowns. I can almost feel you all rolling your eyes reading this one. “Oh sure, Dan, just take fewer markdown – right!” Let me start this section by saying that there is no such thing as a “perfect buyer” and my retail customers have often heard me say that buying is the toughest job in the store. Having said that, there are some strategies we can use to reduce or limit the markdowns.
First, most independent retailers do not have a solid markdown strategy. Goods need to be given a sufficient time on the floor to sell, but after that the slow movers need to be identified and we need to get the cash out of them. The earlier we do that (especially for seasonal goods), the lower the markdowns, and the better chance of us moving through the goods faster.
Markdowns are usually caused by the following:
- Receipt of late goods
- Overbuying beyond demand
- Inadequate department/class structure
- Bad forecasting
- Bad buying
- Too broad of an assortment
- Too narrow of an assortment
- Not reacting to early poor sellers
- Bad performance on the sales floor
- Production issues with the merchandise
- Salespeople not understanding or not liking the product
We can develop strategies and measurements to reduce or control all of these. Here’s a simple one – if vendors ship late, we either get free shipping, markdown money, or we return the goods. Remember, shipping past a cancel date is something you do not have to permit. Cancel dates are the terms of the agreement, and if the vendor violates those, you have the right to either extra compensation or to cancel the agreement.
Here’s the tweak for this one – let’s lower the markdowns by 2%. Here are the results:
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Markdown (%) | 21% | 19% |
| Markdown ($) | $ 157,500 | $ 142,500 |
| Gross Profit (%) | 45.5% | 46.5% |
| Gross Profit | $ 341,250 | $ 348,750 |
| Improvement | $ 7,500 |
It’s vital to develop a markdown strategy so that you sell through the merchandise within 60-90 days wherever possible. While that may seem hard to do in some cases, remember that most vendors are expecting you to pay their bill in 90 days, and it sure would be good to have sold through at least half of the goods in that time frame so you have the cash to write the check, right? It’s not always possible but it can be done, especially if you are watching the aging inventory and taking action to get it sold.
Also, watch your sales floor and make sure that your salespeople have sufficient product knowledge so they can effectively sell the products. If a new product comes in, your sales staff need to become instant experts in it. They need to know all of the following: What does it do, why was it developed, how does it help, what makes it cool, etc. Certainly the vendors/manufacturers know that, and getting them to share that info will be critical to your staff’s ability to talk to customers about it, and ultimately sell them.
By implementing all three tweaks, we get the following increase in cash:
Let’s review the tweaks, and the benefits:
- Lowered Selling cost by 2%= $15,000
- Lowered Purchases by 2% = $15,000
- Lowered Markdowns by 2% = $7,500
We produced $37,500 on a $750,000 business. Not too shabby. And it didn’t come from a crazy new marketing idea, a revolutionary new line, or a magical new sales person. It came from looking at the details of the business. It came from watching the numbers, not only based upon what happened but what we PLANNED to happen and working with the buyers, the vendors, and the store managers to bring that plan to fruition.
Certainly, this plan takes some work. It doesn’t happen overnight, and requires that you take key action steps to make it happen. You have to start running more reports from your POS system than just sales. You need to look carefully at your inventory and determine what is good and what needs to go away. You need to develop a mid range and long term strategy for the store and then monitor the results to ensure that you are getting there.
When I recently did a seminar at a trade show, I went through all of this. Of course, there are lots of reasons to believe that this can’t be done. But what if this was applied to your store, and you had more cash as a result? It’s worth a shot…
About the Author:
Dan Jablons, President of Retail Smart Guys (www.retailsmartguys.com) worked in retail while attending the Ohio State University, where he graduated with a B.S. in marketing and production. He has worked with retailers such as Walmart, Target, JC Penney, American Apparel, Betsey Johnson, Donna Karan, Jimmy Choo, Charles David, Diesel, Oakley, Tumi, Hollywood Bowl, and many others. As a consultant for Retail Smart Guys, Dan brings many years of retail experience to stores of any size to improve their operations, revitalize their marketing, and maximize their profits. For more information, email Dan at [email protected] or call 818-720-2585.
Retailers often think that the next boost in their business is going to come from finding the next amazing line of merchandise, or discovering a new marketing tool (the next Facebook?). Sometimes they believe it will happen because they hire a killer salesperson, or hope that new businesses will fill vacancies around them which will bring traffic.
The problem with all of these “solutions” is that they are external to your business. You cannot predict or control them, nor can you invoke them when you need more cash. As such, while they are fun to dream about, they are not what you should focus on to improve your business.
What I am about to show you is, well, kinda magical. When I first learned about these little tweaks, I was honestly and truly blown away. I think you will be too. What blew me away about this was that these are small adjustments that have enormous impact on the business. They are easy to implement, and if done properly, will bring about tremendous change.
TWEAK #1 – Adjusting your selling cost. Most retail businesses operate on some form of base plus commission. This is an area that I find to be implemented poorly in many businesses. Many stores pay commissions on the first dollar sold (they should not be, the sales people should need to hit a goal) and are not planned in such a way as to keep the cost of sales in line. Let’s tweak that and see the results.
First, a definition. “Selling cost” is defined as the percentage of your sales that go to pay for your sales people. The formula for this is Total Cost of Sales (which includes salaries plus commission) divided by Total Sales (without tax). As an example, if you have an employee whose payroll cost for last month is $1,700 and that employee sells $12,500, then the selling cost for that employee is $1,700/$12,500 = 13.6%.
Now, what if you put in a commission plan that keeps the selling cost at a good percentage, such as 9%? How? Try this – take the hourly wage for your employee and divide it by .09. That number is the employee’s hourly goal. For example, if you have an employee that is paid $10 per hour, you would divide $10 by .09 and you would get $111.00. That is what that employee has to sell each hour they work.
Now take that hourly goal and multiply it by the number of hours that person works in a week. If he/she works 30 hours, the goal is $3,330.00. As soon as they hit that goal in the week, you can pay them 9% of all sales above the $3,330. This gives them incentive to sell, helps them earn great commissions, and keeps your selling cost low.
We did that in a store whose annual sales were $750,000. Look at the results below.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Fixed Expenses | $ 172,500 | $ 172,500 |
| Variable Expenses | $ 142,500 | $ 127,500 |
| Profit before COGS | $ 435,000 | $ 450,000 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
You can see that by implementing this strategy, we lowered their selling cost by 2%, which resulted in an extra $15,000 in cash to the bottom line. This works because the business gets extra cash, the employee is incentivized to sell more, and as such has some “skin in the game” meaning that they care how much is sold on the floor. Better still, no matter how much that person sells, your selling cost never goes above 9%. Everybody wins.
But wait, we’re not done. That’s only the first tweak!
TWEAK #2 – Lowering your purchases. This one almost seems too easy, but watch the math. We took a store and found ways to lower their inventory purchases by 2%. Look at the results.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Purchases (%) | 55% | 53% |
| Purchases ($) | $ 412,500 | $ 397,500 |
| Gross Profit | $ 337,500 | $ 352,500 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
Yes, it’s another $15,000 improvement. But let’s be careful here. This was NOT done by hacking 2% off of all orders unilaterally. It was done by determining which classes are “signature” classes for the store and which ones are carrying more inventory than they should. It requires a little thought, and a little planning. As a store, you have to figure out where your strengths are, and where your weaknesses are. You have to figure out where you have a competitive advantage in the marketplace, and how you can exploit that. Then you can determine the classes that you will grow, and the classes you will cut back, and that’s how you get to reduce your purchases by 2%. In the case above, this was done systematically, using all the tools that open to buy planning (definition: open to buy is a great sales forecast by class, accompanied with an inventory plan that prevents you from overbuying or underbuying). Our overall goal was to cut purchases by 2%, but we had to figure out precisely how and where. If you aren’t using an open to buy plan to do this, you should investigate getting on to one. There is a reason every major chain, every department store, and larger specialty chains use an open to buy plan, and that is that it creates cash flow for the store. Most independent retailers cannot afford to purchase open to buy software (and we’re not talking about simple spreadsheets, we’re talking about software with sophisticated forecasting and planning tools), so there are services out there to help.
TWEAK #3 – Adjusting your Markdowns. I can almost feel you all rolling your eyes reading this one. “Oh sure, Dan, just take fewer markdown – right!” Let me start this section by saying that there is no such thing as a “perfect buyer” and my retail customers have often heard me say that buying is the toughest job in the store. Having said that, there are some strategies we can use to reduce or limit the markdowns.
First, most independent retailers do not have a solid markdown strategy. Goods need to be given a sufficient time on the floor to sell, but after that the slow movers need to be identified and we need to get the cash out of them. The earlier we do that (especially for seasonal goods), the lower the markdowns, and the better chance of us moving through the goods faster.
Markdowns are usually caused by the following:
- Receipt of late goods
- Overbuying beyond demand
- Inadequate department/class structure
- Bad forecasting
- Bad buying
- Too broad of an assortment
- Too narrow of an assortment
- Not reacting to early poor sellers
- Bad performance on the sales floor
- Production issues with the merchandise
- Salespeople not understanding or not liking the product
We can develop strategies and measurements to reduce or control all of these. Here’s a simple one – if vendors ship late, we either get free shipping, markdown money, or we return the goods. Remember, shipping past a cancel date is something you do not have to permit. Cancel dates are the terms of the agreement, and if the vendor violates those, you have the right to either extra compensation or to cancel the agreement.
Here’s the tweak for this one – let’s lower the markdowns by 2%. Here are the results:
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Markdown (%) | 21% | 19% |
| Markdown ($) | $ 157,500 | $ 142,500 |
| Gross Profit (%) | 45.5% | 46.5% |
| Gross Profit | $ 341,250 | $ 348,750 |
| Improvement | $ 7,500 |
It’s vital to develop a markdown strategy so that you sell through the merchandise within 60-90 days wherever possible. While that may seem hard to do in some cases, remember that most vendors are expecting you to pay their bill in 90 days, and it sure would be good to have sold through at least half of the goods in that time frame so you have the cash to write the check, right? It’s not always possible but it can be done, especially if you are watching the aging inventory and taking action to get it sold.
Also, watch your sales floor and make sure that your salespeople have sufficient product knowledge so they can effectively sell the products. If a new product comes in, your sales staff need to become instant experts in it. They need to know all of the following: What does it do, why was it developed, how does it help, what makes it cool, etc. Certainly the vendors/manufacturers know that, and getting them to share that info will be critical to your staff’s ability to talk to customers about it, and ultimately sell them.
By implementing all three tweaks, we get the following increase in cash:
Let’s review the tweaks, and the benefits:
- Lowered Selling cost by 2%= $15,000
- Lowered Purchases by 2% = $15,000
- Lowered Markdowns by 2% = $7,500
We produced $37,500 on a $750,000 business. Not too shabby. And it didn’t come from a crazy new marketing idea, a revolutionary new line, or a magical new sales person. It came from looking at the details of the business. It came from watching the numbers, not only based upon what happened but what we PLANNED to happen and working with the buyers, the vendors, and the store managers to bring that plan to fruition.
Certainly, this plan takes some work. It doesn’t happen overnight, and requires that you take key action steps to make it happen. You have to start running more reports from your POS system than just sales. You need to look carefully at your inventory and determine what is good and what needs to go away. You need to develop a mid range and long term strategy for the store and then monitor the results to ensure that you are getting there.
When I recently did a seminar at a trade show, I went through all of this. Of course, there are lots of reasons to believe that this can’t be done. But what if this was applied to your store, and you had more cash as a result? It’s worth a shot…
About the Author:
Dan Jablons, President of Retail Smart Guys (www.retailsmartguys.com) worked in retail while attending the Ohio State University, where he graduated with a B.S. in marketing and production. He has worked with retailers such as Walmart, Target, JC Penney, American Apparel, Betsey Johnson, Donna Karan, Jimmy Choo, Charles David, Diesel, Oakley, Tumi, Hollywood Bowl, and many others. As a consultant for Retail Smart Guys, Dan brings many years of retail experience to stores of any size to improve their operations, revitalize their marketing, and maximize their profits. For more information, email Dan at [email protected] or call 818-720-2585.
Retailers often think that the next boost in their business is going to come from finding the next amazing line of merchandise, or discovering a new marketing tool (the next Facebook?). Sometimes they believe it will happen because they hire a killer salesperson, or hope that new businesses will fill vacancies around them which will bring traffic.
The problem with all of these “solutions” is that they are external to your business. You cannot predict or control them, nor can you invoke them when you need more cash. As such, while they are fun to dream about, they are not what you should focus on to improve your business.
What I am about to show you is, well, kinda magical. When I first learned about these little tweaks, I was honestly and truly blown away. I think you will be too. What blew me away about this was that these are small adjustments that have enormous impact on the business. They are easy to implement, and if done properly, will bring about tremendous change.
TWEAK #1 – Adjusting your selling cost. Most retail businesses operate on some form of base plus commission. This is an area that I find to be implemented poorly in many businesses. Many stores pay commissions on the first dollar sold (they should not be, the sales people should need to hit a goal) and are not planned in such a way as to keep the cost of sales in line. Let’s tweak that and see the results.
First, a definition. “Selling cost” is defined as the percentage of your sales that go to pay for your sales people. The formula for this is Total Cost of Sales (which includes salaries plus commission) divided by Total Sales (without tax). As an example, if you have an employee whose payroll cost for last month is $1,700 and that employee sells $12,500, then the selling cost for that employee is $1,700/$12,500 = 13.6%.
Now, what if you put in a commission plan that keeps the selling cost at a good percentage, such as 9%? How? Try this – take the hourly wage for your employee and divide it by .09. That number is the employee’s hourly goal. For example, if you have an employee that is paid $10 per hour, you would divide $10 by .09 and you would get $111.00. That is what that employee has to sell each hour they work.
Now take that hourly goal and multiply it by the number of hours that person works in a week. If he/she works 30 hours, the goal is $3,330.00. As soon as they hit that goal in the week, you can pay them 9% of all sales above the $3,330. This gives them incentive to sell, helps them earn great commissions, and keeps your selling cost low.
We did that in a store whose annual sales were $750,000. Look at the results below.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Fixed Expenses | $ 172,500 | $ 172,500 |
| Variable Expenses | $ 142,500 | $ 127,500 |
| Profit before COGS | $ 435,000 | $ 450,000 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
You can see that by implementing this strategy, we lowered their selling cost by 2%, which resulted in an extra $15,000 in cash to the bottom line. This works because the business gets extra cash, the employee is incentivized to sell more, and as such has some “skin in the game” meaning that they care how much is sold on the floor. Better still, no matter how much that person sells, your selling cost never goes above 9%. Everybody wins.
But wait, we’re not done. That’s only the first tweak!
TWEAK #2 – Lowering your purchases. This one almost seems too easy, but watch the math. We took a store and found ways to lower their inventory purchases by 2%. Look at the results.
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Purchases (%) | 55% | 53% |
| Purchases ($) | $ 412,500 | $ 397,500 |
| Gross Profit | $ 337,500 | $ 352,500 |
| Improvement | $ 15,000 |
Yes, it’s another $15,000 improvement. But let’s be careful here. This was NOT done by hacking 2% off of all orders unilaterally. It was done by determining which classes are “signature” classes for the store and which ones are carrying more inventory than they should. It requires a little thought, and a little planning. As a store, you have to figure out where your strengths are, and where your weaknesses are. You have to figure out where you have a competitive advantage in the marketplace, and how you can exploit that. Then you can determine the classes that you will grow, and the classes you will cut back, and that’s how you get to reduce your purchases by 2%. In the case above, this was done systematically, using all the tools that open to buy planning (definition: open to buy is a great sales forecast by class, accompanied with an inventory plan that prevents you from overbuying or underbuying). Our overall goal was to cut purchases by 2%, but we had to figure out precisely how and where. If you aren’t using an open to buy plan to do this, you should investigate getting on to one. There is a reason every major chain, every department store, and larger specialty chains use an open to buy plan, and that is that it creates cash flow for the store. Most independent retailers cannot afford to purchase open to buy software (and we’re not talking about simple spreadsheets, we’re talking about software with sophisticated forecasting and planning tools), so there are services out there to help.
TWEAK #3 – Adjusting your Markdowns. I can almost feel you all rolling your eyes reading this one. “Oh sure, Dan, just take fewer markdown – right!” Let me start this section by saying that there is no such thing as a “perfect buyer” and my retail customers have often heard me say that buying is the toughest job in the store. Having said that, there are some strategies we can use to reduce or limit the markdowns.
First, most independent retailers do not have a solid markdown strategy. Goods need to be given a sufficient time on the floor to sell, but after that the slow movers need to be identified and we need to get the cash out of them. The earlier we do that (especially for seasonal goods), the lower the markdowns, and the better chance of us moving through the goods faster.
Markdowns are usually caused by the following:
- Receipt of late goods
- Overbuying beyond demand
- Inadequate department/class structure
- Bad forecasting
- Bad buying
- Too broad of an assortment
- Too narrow of an assortment
- Not reacting to early poor sellers
- Bad performance on the sales floor
- Production issues with the merchandise
- Salespeople not understanding or not liking the product
We can develop strategies and measurements to reduce or control all of these. Here’s a simple one – if vendors ship late, we either get free shipping, markdown money, or we return the goods. Remember, shipping past a cancel date is something you do not have to permit. Cancel dates are the terms of the agreement, and if the vendor violates those, you have the right to either extra compensation or to cancel the agreement.
Here’s the tweak for this one – let’s lower the markdowns by 2%. Here are the results:
| Original Situation | Improved Situation | |
| Revenue | $ 750,000 | $ 750,000 |
| Markdown (%) | 21% | 19% |
| Markdown ($) | $ 157,500 | $ 142,500 |
| Gross Profit (%) | 45.5% | 46.5% |
| Gross Profit | $ 341,250 | $ 348,750 |
| Improvement | $ 7,500 |
It’s vital to develop a markdown strategy so that you sell through the merchandise within 60-90 days wherever possible. While that may seem hard to do in some cases, remember that most vendors are expecting you to pay their bill in 90 days, and it sure would be good to have sold through at least half of the goods in that time frame so you have the cash to write the check, right? It’s not always possible but it can be done, especially if you are watching the aging inventory and taking action to get it sold.
Also, watch your sales floor and make sure that your salespeople have sufficient product knowledge so they can effectively sell the products. If a new product comes in, your sales staff need to become instant experts in it. They need to know all of the following: What does it do, why was it developed, how does it help, what makes it cool, etc. Certainly the vendors/manufacturers know that, and getting them to share that info will be critical to your staff’s ability to talk to customers about it, and ultimately sell them.
By implementing all three tweaks, we get the following increase in cash:
Let’s review the tweaks, and the benefits:
- Lowered Selling cost by 2%= $15,000
- Lowered Purchases by 2% = $15,000
- Lowered Markdowns by 2% = $7,500
We produced $37,500 on a $750,000 business. Not too shabby. And it didn’t come from a crazy new marketing idea, a revolutionary new line, or a magical new sales person. It came from looking at the details of the business. It came from watching the numbers, not only based upon what happened but what we PLANNED to happen and working with the buyers, the vendors, and the store managers to bring that plan to fruition.
Certainly, this plan takes some work. It doesn’t happen overnight, and requires that you take key action steps to make it happen. You have to start running more reports from your POS system than just sales. You need to look carefully at your inventory and determine what is good and what needs to go away. You need to develop a mid range and long term strategy for the store and then monitor the results to ensure that you are getting there.
When I recently did a seminar at a trade show, I went through all of this. Of course, there are lots of reasons to believe that this can’t be done. But what if this was applied to your store, and you had more cash as a result? It’s worth a shot…
About the Author:
Dan Jablons, President of Retail Smart Guys (www.retailsmartguys.com) and the newest BRA Advisory Board Member, worked in retail while attending Ohio State University, where he graduated with a B.S. in marketing and production. He has worked with retailers such as Walmart, Target, JC Penney, American Apparel, Betsey Johnson, Donna Karan, Jimmy Choo, Charles David, Diesel, Oakley, Tumi, Hollywood Bowl, and many others. As a consultant for Retail Smart Guys, Dan brings many years of retail experience to stores of any size to improve their operations, revitalize their marketing, and maximize their profits. For more information, email Dan at [email protected] or call 818-720-2585.
Push play to hear about how Dan Jablons of Retail Smart Guys can help you save a significant amount of time and money
Dan and his team at Retail Smart Guys also created a Services Division – to help retailers farm out those things that are keeping them from analyzing their business. Further, they priced it very inexpensively so that everyone could afford these services. They believe by doing this, we can help tons of retailers improve their sales, their margins, their inventory flow, and their market share.
Here’s a story that illustrates what Dan is talking about: “I called up one of my retailers, and I said, “You seem awfully underbought over the next few months. Why aren’t you placing orders?” He told me he was “working on stuff” and would get to it. I pressed him for a minute, and he finally admitted that he was working on bank reconciliations. I said, “Well if you don’t write some purchase orders and get more inventory, next month’s bank reconciliation will take a lot less time!” Our Services Division took over his bank recs, and some other things. He got inventory in, and he’s seeing sales increases unlike anything he’s seen before in 20 years of the business.”
Don’t let the administrative tasks in your life, rule your life. Farm them out to people who do them well, so that you can be the great merchant that you want to be!
We hope you find all this helpful as you chart your course ahead. We also hope that you’ll let Dan help you plan your inventory, work out your marketing, assist with any staffing issues, and generally be of service to you in any way he can!
Please contact Dan at the number or email above to learn more and be sure to mention that you heard about these helpful services from Board Retailers Association as a portion of the revenues will go back to BRA to help with the development of new educational opportunities and retailer resources.
– Doug Works, Executive Director of the Board Retailers Association
If you are not yet a BRA Retail Member, you can easily opt in to either Regular (no cost) or Distinguished ($100/yr.) Membership via this super simple join form