Gift Baskets Are Still Popular
09/01/10 06:15 Filed in: Success Scoop
Don’t Believe The Nay-Sayers . . .
Gift Baskets Are Still Popular (But you’ll have to work harder for the sale)
By Debra Paulk, Editor, Gift Basket Review Online
The woman in the booth was energetic, positive, and prepared for tighter margin gift basket sales. She called out to Christmas shoppers strolling down the street of the local gift fair, and invited them to her booth. When she had their attention, she pointed out the bargains, and talked up the value of the quality gift line, designed for and targeted to the local community. Unlike most of the other vendors in the fair, when the day was over, she had little to pack up because her merchandise was virtually gone. Only a spare basket or two remained. The day at the fair had been good with an 95 percent sell-through on every gift basket theme and style.
That was a picture of me, field-testing gift basket sales this year. After so much bad news about the state of the market, I had to see for myself if everyone left in the industry should be crying that the sky was falling. So, I took a few cases of odds and ends, designed the items into nifty, thrifty gifts, and took them to the Christmas fair in our home town. What an uplifting eye opener!
Don’t give me the downer, negative talk about gift basket sales. From my own holiday selling experience, I KNOW that people were buying this year. But I will concede that these were possibly the hardest sales I have ever made. Shoppers did not want to part with their dollars -- and wouldn’t -- until they were thoroughly convinced that these were the cutest teacher gifts, the best Sunday School secret Santa treat, and the most welcome co-worker gift anyone would find this holiday season. Better still, this quality merchandise was a super deal -- the best gift they would find anywhere for the money.
My voice was gone by the end of the day, but my enthusiasm for our industry soared. As an experiment, I priced items individually -- the same merchandise that was arranged in the wrapped baskets -- and set it out next to the baskets. Here’s the good news: virtually no one bought the items outside the baskets. Shoppers wanted “the look” of the items arranged together and wrapped with festive cellophane and ribbon. That, and the fact that other vendors were packing up almost everything they brought, convinced me that the gift basket still had a future. The trick was understanding the market -- getting the merchandise and price right -- and working in a high state of energy to make the pitch and elevate the gift basket to its rightful place of value.
With Valentine’s Day just a few weeks around the corner, get yourself in a positive frame of mind about sales. People will buy if you give them what they want at a price they can afford. In other words, do what Gift Basket Review has always told you: customize your line for your market.
Oh yeah . . . and buy yourself a few packets of throat lozenges. You may have to do a bit of sweet-talking to pump up the volume of sales. YOU CAN DO IT! Believe and receive! The rewards are yours for the talking.
Gift Baskets Are Still Popular (But you’ll have to work harder for the sale)
By Debra Paulk, Editor, Gift Basket Review Online
The woman in the booth was energetic, positive, and prepared for tighter margin gift basket sales. She called out to Christmas shoppers strolling down the street of the local gift fair, and invited them to her booth. When she had their attention, she pointed out the bargains, and talked up the value of the quality gift line, designed for and targeted to the local community. Unlike most of the other vendors in the fair, when the day was over, she had little to pack up because her merchandise was virtually gone. Only a spare basket or two remained. The day at the fair had been good with an 95 percent sell-through on every gift basket theme and style.
That was a picture of me, field-testing gift basket sales this year. After so much bad news about the state of the market, I had to see for myself if everyone left in the industry should be crying that the sky was falling. So, I took a few cases of odds and ends, designed the items into nifty, thrifty gifts, and took them to the Christmas fair in our home town. What an uplifting eye opener!
Don’t give me the downer, negative talk about gift basket sales. From my own holiday selling experience, I KNOW that people were buying this year. But I will concede that these were possibly the hardest sales I have ever made. Shoppers did not want to part with their dollars -- and wouldn’t -- until they were thoroughly convinced that these were the cutest teacher gifts, the best Sunday School secret Santa treat, and the most welcome co-worker gift anyone would find this holiday season. Better still, this quality merchandise was a super deal -- the best gift they would find anywhere for the money.
My voice was gone by the end of the day, but my enthusiasm for our industry soared. As an experiment, I priced items individually -- the same merchandise that was arranged in the wrapped baskets -- and set it out next to the baskets. Here’s the good news: virtually no one bought the items outside the baskets. Shoppers wanted “the look” of the items arranged together and wrapped with festive cellophane and ribbon. That, and the fact that other vendors were packing up almost everything they brought, convinced me that the gift basket still had a future. The trick was understanding the market -- getting the merchandise and price right -- and working in a high state of energy to make the pitch and elevate the gift basket to its rightful place of value.
With Valentine’s Day just a few weeks around the corner, get yourself in a positive frame of mind about sales. People will buy if you give them what they want at a price they can afford. In other words, do what Gift Basket Review has always told you: customize your line for your market.
Oh yeah . . . and buy yourself a few packets of throat lozenges. You may have to do a bit of sweet-talking to pump up the volume of sales. YOU CAN DO IT! Believe and receive! The rewards are yours for the talking.