Make Your Store Memorable How to get people to remember your store and come back for more. by Linda Cahan Your goal: Lots of customers who talk with your staff and buy your products. Then, they come back over and over again for maintenance, accessories and service. Plus, they recommend your place to their friends and family. Your competition: Not just every other independent spa ...

Give Your Store a Mini Face-Lift Simple, low cost ways to increase sales by improving your store inside and out. By Linda Cahan Have you ever noticed that when you move things around the selling floor people start looking at what you’re moving? It can be aggravating. Here you are, dragging product from one end of the store to the other and the pretty displays are being ignored ...

Off-Site Branding The elements you need for an off-site event and how to make sure they correlate with your showroom. By Linda Cahan The buzz right now is all about tweeting, texting and online messaging. But local buzz, the type that attracts customers into your store, is created by off-site events. People still read their local newspapers, listen to local radio and see fliers and ...

Curb Appeal Tips for creating an exterior storefront that will draw in customers. By Linda Cahan You’ve probably heard this 1,000 times, “You only have one chance to make a good first impression.” As cliché’s go, it’s a goodie. Your customers are usually people in your community that drive past your store either daily or occasionally on their way ...

Improve Your Business Now Five free or almost-free things you can do to make your store and life better. By Linda Cahan Many of us grow up with the belief that it takes pain, suffering and hard work to bring us the rewards we desire. We drag that concept to work with us every day. Guess what? Success doesn’t have to be that tough. We can have both large and small successes every ...

A Natural Persuasion Bringing outdoor elements inside your store helps customers visualize their purchase. By Linda Cahan We are organic, natural beings made up of 59 elements – many of which end with “-ium.” The average human body contains enough iron to make a three-inch nail, enough fat to make seven bars of soap (or more) and enough water to generate 10 gallons. ...

Making Beautiful Retail Music Your hot tub retail store can become more inviting by engaging your customers sense of sound. When you walk into almost any retail shop, you are greeted not only by sales people but also by the sound of music over the speakers. For years, retail locations – including grocery and department stores – have been luring customers with tunes and ...

CREATE A SHOWROOM THAT IS BOTH APPEALING AND ACCESSIBLE, COAXING CUSTOMERS IN AND GENERATING SALES. BY LINDA CAHAN A GOOD STORE LAYOUT encourages and allows customers to flow freely throughout your space. This is something that can be easy to succeed at, but it’s sometimes difficult to see where your store falls short. A major influence on a store’s layout is the placement of the front ...

YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO REMODEL YOUR STORE, BUT A CAN OF PAINT AND THE RIGHT COLORS CAN MAKE A BIG IMPACT. BY LINDA CAHAN YOU ARE ALL FAMILIAR with vanilla box stores; you may even have one yourself. A vanilla box store is a store with sheetrock walls painted white – or maybe vanilla white – a suspended ceiling, fluorescent lights and fuzz on the floor. Exciting? No. Attractive? Not so ...

It’s no secret that the smell of popcorn wafting through the air is pretty much a universal icebreaker. Having a commercial popcorn popper on your showroom floor is a simple, effective way to say hello with a smile. Marquis Casual Living has two locations in the Portland, Oregon metro area and one in Salem. Sheri Boren, Marketing Manager for the stores, says they’ve had old-fashioned popcorn ...

What makes a checkout area grab a customer’s attention? According to Mike Madore, owner of Beachcomber Hot Tubs Durham in Whitby, Ontario, Canada, three of the most important ingredients are cleanliness, location and smell. Yes, smell. "I always have a scented vanilla candle burning near the checkout area because I once read that it has a soothing effect and makes the customer feel relaxed," ...

When thinking about it what makes spa businesses successful, owners often consider things like providing high-quality products at fair prices, giving excellent customer service and hiring people who are both knowledgeable and friendly. But what about the clothing that employees wear when they come to work? Is it possible that their attire can also have a positive impact on the success and overall ...