No one expects you to greet customers in all of the world’s 7,000 languages. But it would be simple to learn a few signs to make deaf customers using American Sign Language feel welcome. The easy ASL sign for thank you, for example, is shown in the illustration above. “By implementing strategies focused on equal… Read More

An update of a popular blog post from July 15, 2019 Next year will mark the 25th anniversary of  Independent Retailer Month, which was started In 2003 as National Independent Retailer Week. Tom Shay, principal of Profits Plus Solutions, wanted to encourage retailers to create celebrations for their communities, industries and own businesses.  Now is… Read More

There’s a new weekly retail roundup newsletter available to you for free – and its name is a clever play on the shopkeeping term SKU (a stock keeping unit, i.e. a single item of inventory). The SKUPE, which is pronounced scoop, is a recent product of the British-American media and marketing company MVF.  As their… Read More

We’re all dreaming of getting a refund on the tariffs we paid over the past year now that the Supreme Court has ruled that the recent tariffs – which wreaked havoc with our industry – were unconstitutional. The government has established an online portal called CAPE (Consolidated Administration and Processing of Entries) to process refunds,… Read More

An update of a popular blog post from June 23, 2009 Things have changed, and mostly not for the better, since I wrote about the world of organized crime against retail stores 15 years ago. At that time Stores magazine (the monthly publication of the National Retail Federation) had reported that ORC, or Organized Retail… Read More

Vendors that provide retailers with a platform for online ordering are often able to offer us timely access to closeouts. This is so much better for us, as their loyal customers, than having these items show up at a TJ Maxx or other discount outlet.  We also appreciate knowing that when we order online directly… Read More

An update of a popular blog post from November 28, 2011 “I personally recommend this” are powerful words in the interaction between a salesperson and a customer. (OK, not as powerful as “free,” but we need to stay in business!)  Shoppers are eager for ideas about what to buy, and as specialty shop retailers we… Read More

Heart on Main Street was a newly launched program when I first wrote about it just over three years ago. The non-profit had announced that its mission would be helping independent retailers and locally-owned businesses evolve and thrive within their local communities. According to founder Patrick Keiser, they planned to do this by providing tools,… Read More

An update of a popular blog post from February 8, 2011 I read in a fashion magazine about the common practice of allowing employees to take home beauty product samples received from manufacturers hoping for free publicity. The editor of this publication decided to ask her staff for $1 per item, with all proceeds going… Read More

This year marks the 40th anniversary of All I Really Need To Know I Learned in Kindergarten, a book of essays about life by Unitarian Universalist minister Robert Fulghum. While some of the lessons he shares – take a nap every afternoon comes to mind – may not be applicable to our lives as shopkeepers,… Read More