TRACKING THE RIGHT REP  I firmly believe that sales representatives play an important role in the success of a specialty shop, conveying information about new items and helping you stay on top of the latest in merchandising.  In order to make sure that my sales reps get credit — they almost all work on commission,… Read More


There are now over 266,000,000 Internet users in the North American (according to Internet World Stats), which represents a good 77% of our population. Not all of them shop online, thankfully, but e-commerce is clearly a competitor to brick and mortar stores that is here to stay. How can you compete with the deep discounts… Read More


How hard is it to produce something that will get your store on the evening news, on Vimeo and YouTube, and end up being posted on your customer’s Facebook walls?  Let me tell you about the “flash mob” event we just did at Orange Tree Imports, which cost us less than $500 — but in… Read More


If only they would make gift wrapping an Olympic sport, I’d have a chance to go for the gold. My training over the past 35 years has been wrapping hundreds and hundreds of customer packages.  And I’m really fast — but that’s mostly because we have wrapping down to a system. This service that is… Read More


The customer may always be right (or not), but the customer is not always cheerful.  One of the day-to-day challenges facing shopkeepers and our employees is how to deal with an unhappy customer.  Here are four techniques I hope you’ll find helpful: 1)Acknowledge that the customer is upset and ask them to tell you the… Read More


About four years ago, an announcement was made that a new “WebTV channel” was being created to help retailers be more successful. This idea evolved into a web site rich in streaming video clips on many different topics of interest to small business owners. The Gift and Home Channel site also featured a number of… Read More


In order to fully reap the benefits of Twitter and Facebook, you need to keep in touch with your fans regularly. But who has time to tweet and post, especially at this busy time of year?  I find myself coming up with a great idea at 11:00 on Saturday night, and all the social media… Read More


On the way home from the Gift and Home Trade Association conference in New Orleans, I was looking for a magazine in the airport and discovered an article in Reader’s Digest by Michelle Crouch called ‘13 Things Your Salesclerk Won’t Tell You.’  Now chances are good that like me, you are a salesclerk, at least… Read More


The media has been talking so much about “Black Friday,” expanding it to “Black Weekend” and beyond.  This traditional launch of the Christmas shopping season occurs the day after Thanksgiving, and theoretically got its name from the fact that it is the day that is supposed to start putting you in the black for the… Read More


We first noticed text alerts, or mobile offers, while shopping in a Copenhagen department store a few years ago. The sign said that shoppers could find a special SMS offer on glassware using their mobile phone.  We didn’t even know at the time that “SMS” stands for short message service, and refers to text messages… Read More