12 steps to prepare your convenience retail for the Christmas season
The Christmas season can be exhausting, but with preparation in place, it can be exciting.
Given that Christmas is one of the most exciting seasons of the year, according to Finder.com/uk, 1 in 10 Brits start their holiday shopping as early as July.
Start your Christmas preparations early, regardless of whether you own a large, small, or convenience retail business. Small retailers must pick up their game by planning and stocking up on the correct products if they are to compete with the big online retailers who have dominated Christmas e-commerce. Here are 12 steps to prepare your convenience retail for the Christmas season.
The 12 steps to get your convenience retail ready for the holidays:
- Request feedback from your regular customers-
Customer feedback is crucial because it acts as a roadmap for the expansion of your business. As a convenience retailer, your customers purchase your items in person and not online, but this should not stop you from getting feedback from your customers. Asking your regular customers about their preferences and needs in terms of Christmas products is beneficial to your business. It will give you information about your community's concerns, ideas, and opinions. It will help improve interactions with your business, goods, or services.
- Plan your Convenience retail holiday collection-
Make a holiday plan and act quickly. Review your account from the previous year to get a sense of what to expect.
- What were people requesting last year?
- What was the most sold?
- What are your competitors selling?
You can select the items in the Williams of Swansea Christmas 2022 Collection.
- Make your Convenience retail festive-
Customers enjoy the holiday spirit. You will lose business if you do not keep up with the competition. You can do this by having a festive window display to draw customers' attention.
Question to ask yourself; If I am walking by, will I be driven to enter the store for my Christmas decoration and gifts?
Always put yourself in your customers and potential customers' shoes.
Williams of Swansea have many Christmas decorations that can be used in the office, house, or shop anywhere!
- Hire extra help for Convenience retail-
Christmas is a busy season, and you could find that your current staff needs a little extra help to keep up with the demand. To give yourself enough time to train new employees, if you find yourself hiring, do so a few weeks or months before the season begins.
- Make your Convenience retail a secure area to shop-
Keep your store very clean. The Christmas season is typically busy, and keep the monkeypox and Covid-19 viruses in mind. To stop the spread of the disease, your shop needs to be cleaned up and ready for this busy season.
Offer Fun Promotional Bundles in Convenience retail -
Some products will sell better than others. By combining your low-selling items with your fast-selling ones, you can work on price techniques over time to increase sales for them. It will make it easier to sell the goods that customers are not buying.
Analyse your Convenience retail sales data-
The larger eCommerce retailers are growing because they know what their customers want/what is selling the most.
We do not expect you to perform in-depth research, but it is still important to track what sells and what does not, so you can decide where to focus your investments.
Once again, ask yourself:
- Which Christmas 2021 products were the most successful?
- What hardly ever sold?
- What were the customers asking for last year that you did not already have in stock?
What is the point of selling without doing a sale analysis, right? There is no way to know if an idea is working or not if you do not analyse the sales.
- Get your Convenience retail in the local press-
Depending on where your shop is, this is an optional tip. Your business can benefit over the holiday season if you use the local press to get your goods or store mentioned in publications.
- Pick the right time for a discount-
Large eCommerce often offer discounts to their customers. For small retail, you want to make as much money and can not afford to offer as many discounts. Understanding when giving discounts is beneficial for your business and when not, so you don't lose profit.
Although late August and early September are ideal times to begin selling your Christmas products, especially Christmas decorations, we believe that late November and early December are ideal times to provide discounts on your products. Sales will increase as a result. The Christmas collection from Williams of Swansea is reasonably priced and sure to wow your customers. Our staff can help you pick since we know what sells.
- Deals to drive sales-
Create appealing promotions to reward your customers, such as "double bundles" or "buy one, get one half price." You can walk into shops like Superdrug, Savers and Boots. These companies often offer rewarding products, which drives sales.
To avoid taking a loss, be selective on products offered is only allowed for a select few products.
- Christmas leftover stock-
Even though there will be holiday successes, some goods will unavoidably underperform. After Christmas, some customers may still want to buy your store's Christmas leftovers, don't get rid of them the minute it's January.
- Analyse Data For Successful Strategies-
Examine the factors that contributed to the success and those that didn't after Christmas. Use this year's results as a jumping-off point for ideas to focus on in the following year. Applying what has previously worked well can be a successful plan for the future and provide a strong return on investment.
It is difficult, but not impossible, to stand out from the competitors. You may ensure that your sales grow if you plan ahead of time. Remember to show your customers you care and are not just there to sell only. The Christmas 2022 collection by Williams of Swansea is now available for purchase. You can reach us at [email protected] or 01202 891890; we hope to hear from you soon!