Framing Goddess
SGF, Supreme Grumble Framer
This will have to be a short post, because I am deep in the weeds.
I decided earlier this year to have a clearance sale this past weekend. I dragged out all the old art, mirrors and open back frames, some absolute junk.
I sent out 400 'teaser' postcards, then followed up with 400 "Musings," my second in a series newsletter in which I rhapsodized about what I was clearing out and emphasizing that it WAS NOT a going out of business sale. (thanks to FrameMaker Dave for that tip...) When I have another moment will post both here. I had a Thursday night sneak preview/early bird/preferred customer ("You!") reception from 6-10pm with lemonade and tomato/basil/mozzarella salad and crunchies. At least one hundred people stopped in. And spent. I ran the sale Friday 10-9, Saturday 10-9 and Sunday 12-5. At Bossy Ellen's suggestion I made EVERYTHING in the sale half price on Sunday, which came to roughly 75% off retail... which made Sunday the biggest day money-wise by far.
I set up two dining canopy tents out on the sidewalk out front. (and got them down before the city noticed...) and hauled out plastic bins full of empty frames. We had a steady crowd Thursday night, Saturday and Sunday. We could have skipped Friday, but still some things sold even then.
We sold literally hundreds of frames and took at least 50-100 framing orders with these bargain frames. These were all frames that we build out of scraps- er, I mean leftover inventory. People brought in literally stacks of things they wanted in frames. To take 10 orders from one customer in the space of 1/2 hour was not uncommon.
I bought no new inventory for this sale, I just sold what I had already paid for. If it was a dog in my length bins, I chopped and built it into a standard-ish size.
I wanted to emphasize that it was many of my fancypants customers who came to pick out bargain framing. They are the ones who tell me that they bring their good stuff to me and take their 'fun' stuff to one of the big boxes during one of their sales. They were very happy for my sale to be able to bring the 'fun' stuff to me.
Don't think your customers don't go to big boxes. They do. They don't need much of a reason to bring everything to you; a bin clearing sale like this gives them all the reason they need.
It was a lot of work and monstrous hours, but do the math and you can see how much business this little sale generated for my shop. BTW, I 'invested' about $600-700 in the mailings for this shindig.
By the way, the framed art and mirrors were real dogs. We'd have been better off taking the frames off and selling them as open backs. Fyi... Unframed art tanked, too.
Bob Carter deserves a special thumbs-up mention for inspiring me to actually follow through on my threat to do this. Thanks, Bob!
edie the lovesbeingcrazybusy goddess
I decided earlier this year to have a clearance sale this past weekend. I dragged out all the old art, mirrors and open back frames, some absolute junk.
I sent out 400 'teaser' postcards, then followed up with 400 "Musings," my second in a series newsletter in which I rhapsodized about what I was clearing out and emphasizing that it WAS NOT a going out of business sale. (thanks to FrameMaker Dave for that tip...) When I have another moment will post both here. I had a Thursday night sneak preview/early bird/preferred customer ("You!") reception from 6-10pm with lemonade and tomato/basil/mozzarella salad and crunchies. At least one hundred people stopped in. And spent. I ran the sale Friday 10-9, Saturday 10-9 and Sunday 12-5. At Bossy Ellen's suggestion I made EVERYTHING in the sale half price on Sunday, which came to roughly 75% off retail... which made Sunday the biggest day money-wise by far.
I set up two dining canopy tents out on the sidewalk out front. (and got them down before the city noticed...) and hauled out plastic bins full of empty frames. We had a steady crowd Thursday night, Saturday and Sunday. We could have skipped Friday, but still some things sold even then.
We sold literally hundreds of frames and took at least 50-100 framing orders with these bargain frames. These were all frames that we build out of scraps- er, I mean leftover inventory. People brought in literally stacks of things they wanted in frames. To take 10 orders from one customer in the space of 1/2 hour was not uncommon.
I bought no new inventory for this sale, I just sold what I had already paid for. If it was a dog in my length bins, I chopped and built it into a standard-ish size.
I wanted to emphasize that it was many of my fancypants customers who came to pick out bargain framing. They are the ones who tell me that they bring their good stuff to me and take their 'fun' stuff to one of the big boxes during one of their sales. They were very happy for my sale to be able to bring the 'fun' stuff to me.
Don't think your customers don't go to big boxes. They do. They don't need much of a reason to bring everything to you; a bin clearing sale like this gives them all the reason they need.
It was a lot of work and monstrous hours, but do the math and you can see how much business this little sale generated for my shop. BTW, I 'invested' about $600-700 in the mailings for this shindig.
By the way, the framed art and mirrors were real dogs. We'd have been better off taking the frames off and selling them as open backs. Fyi... Unframed art tanked, too.
Bob Carter deserves a special thumbs-up mention for inspiring me to actually follow through on my threat to do this. Thanks, Bob!
edie the lovesbeingcrazybusy goddess
