Ending The Year On A High Note
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One of the defining trends of 2024 has been the challenge of managing sales volume and profitability in the firearm range and retail space.
The pains dealers have been facing are the last moments of the hangover from the “punch-drunk” days of the pandemic era paired with the sobering fact Americans are struggling with the impacts of the economy and inflation.
Looking at historical data and where the industry sits right now, we’re priming the pumps to have a much better last few months of the year than the prior nine months have given us. The confluence of what is traditionally the peak season for our industry — along with a recovery of sales volume partnered with this being an election year — gives us options to make Q4 a profitable season.
Let’s talk about how you can plan to take full advantage of this season and act today.
Gift Cards
More gift cards are sold during the holiday season than most any other time of year — but how can we maximize their potential?
A recent Deloitte study shows 83% of Americans plan to purchase gift cards for their friends and loved ones during the holiday season. The key here: make your customers want to buy a gift card! (It starts with having them on hand. Now is the time to get them on order.)
To maximize the use of a gift card, take a visit to your local grocery or electronics stores and see how they are displayed. Typically, they’re either hanging on pegs glued to a backer card or on a perforated plastic two-piece display. This is how people have become accustomed to “what a gift card looks like” — so be sure yours have the same look and feel.
Simple “business card”-sized gift cards stuck in a business card holder near the cash register will go unnoticed, as many people will think they’re just that — business cards. (I’ve seen this happen on numerous occasions.) As I noted above, your customers are already conditioned to what a gift card “should” look like thanks to all the other venues they buy them from.
One of the ways you can copy other retailers is using a hanging display for your gift cards. Hanging them on a peg gives you significant flexibility to present them so customers can easily find them. Also, consider swapping gift cards with other retail operations in your area to tap into the potential for new customers.
Gift cards serve a variety of functions: They’re an important avenue to finding new customers, building brand awareness, entrenching customer loyalty and improving cash flow. In addition, a measurable percentage of gift cards are never redeemed and can bring a little free cash to your establishment.
Get Sales Projections On Point
Along with selling all those gift cards, we need to make sure to have enough goods on hand to sell to the recipient. Therefore, it’s imperative we plan and forecast our sales goals and inventory needs. Make projections based on historical sales data, market trends, political indicators and other signals that can help you make best-guess estimates for each upcoming month.
With lead times often being weeks or even months for the in-demand product, it is important we identify the items, how many of them we will need to satisfy customer demand and get them on order ahead of time. All too often, retailers wade into the holiday/election season without an inventory plan only to find themselves out of stock on key — and profitable — items, with no chance of restocking in time to take advantage of them.
Your Digital Storefront
This is the time to lean on your data but also to stop, take a deep breath, clear your mind and put on your “customer hat” and think about it from the perspective of not only your best and long-term customers, but individuals looking for gift ideas for friends and loved ones who themselves have no understanding of the products you sell and need a helping hand on their purchasing journey. This extends both to your physical retail space along with your website.
A 2023 study by American Research Inc. found 80% of consumers shopped online last year. I would expect even more plan to do so this holiday shopping season. Make sure not only your physical store is ready but polish up your website with holiday gifting suggestions to land those extra sales.
This might be a special tab dedicated to “gifts for everyone on your list” on your website or a section of retail space visible from the front door that highlights an assortment of holiday gift items. Be sure to target the sweet spot of $40 and under for this gifting assortment as this is the typical average gift price for the season.
Knowing this targeted gift price can help on the profitability side as well. Focus on products that afford you extra profits at this price range. Pro tip: If a product ends up pricing out in the mid-$30 price range, bump up its selling price to $39.95. Those extra dollars can really help your profitability while still staying under the $40 mark.
Consider creating gift bundles of lower-priced items that together hover around this $40 price range. Cleaning products, flashlights with batteries, ammunition bundles or even just a two pack of $20 thermal mugs can all help increase the volume and profitability of your holiday sales.
Convenience Leads To Profits
During the last quarter of the year convenience can lead to extra profits in areas you might not have even considered.
Think about buying an assortment of greeting cards, wrapping paper, gift bags and the like to have on hand in your store to make you a one-stop shop for holiday giving. Margins on these products can easily be in the 50–70% category! Go one step beyond and offer a gift-wrapping service, and profits can go even further. Convenience goes a long way not only to profits but also customer satisfaction and loyalty.
In this busy time of year, remember to not only have the inventory customers want but to let them know you have it! Marketing is essential. Use every venue available to you be it radio, print, television, social media, e-newsletters and the like. Get the word out ahead of the competition that you are the place to come to get their product and service needs.
Planning now gives you time to partner with manufacturers and vendors to share in the cost of these marketing efforts. Trying to ask a manufacturer, at the last minute, to help fund a billboard you want to buy off the highway will be responded to with a resounding “maybe next year” so make calls and send emails as soon as possible.
Host An Appreciation Event
A parting tip: leverage this nostalgic time of year. Holidays abound and it’s important to give thanks where thanks are due. There’s no better time than now to have a “Customer Appreciation Day” at your facility.
Take a moment to show how much you appreciate your customers and what they do for your shop … convert the goods and services you provide into cash and profits! When I owned my shop, our customer appreciation day was on Christmas Eve.
Much of the day was spent reminiscing with customers, delivering layaways and having a nice catered lunch for the employees and customers alike. Not only did customers appreciate the sentiment, but for many it became part of their Christmas tradition to stop by the store, grab some food, buy a few last-minute Christmas gifts and start off their holiday journey on a high (and well-fed) note. Even though the focus was not on sales, our customer appreciation day turned into a very lucrative and profitable day.
There’s a very real opportunity over the next few weeks to take 2024 out of the red column and into the black. However, the means to getting there is to make your tactical plan now and act on it. If you don’t, someone else will.
