We were gathered at our weekly staff meeting the other day and one of our team members said, “I think we need to do more articles on retailing. “I rolled my eyes; one of the other long-term editors sighed, bored. I explained that I felt we’d done so much on retail our readers were fairly sick and tired of the subject, not to mention everyone seems to agree that nail technicians are simply never going to make a real effort to retail.

But she pressed on: “Well, maybe we’ve done articles that say they should retail, but we haven’t shown them how to retail” I grew weary and explained, “We’ve done retailing six ways to Sunday! We’ve done “You should retail” articles, “Phrases That Sell,” “How to Price Your Retail,” what product to choose, and how to display articles. You name it, we’ve done it!”

Another voice piped in, “It is an important topic, maybe it’s time to do another piece.” So, ironically, not only am I now writing about retailing, but we have come up with an idea that we think will help salon owners learn all the mechanics to make retailing a winner in their own salons. I can’t let the cat out of the bag now, but we’ve got a project going that we think will be very helpful.

Let me give you an example of why we still feel so strongly about why salons have underexploited retailing; I get my car washed at a place near my house. And because I’ve got a few minutes to wait in the car wash, I look around. You would not believe what kind of stuff they are retailing. Not just floor mats and car deodorizers, no They sell sunglasses, neckties, lamps, candles, and Christmas gifts. As a matter of fact, they sell these porcelain miniature shoes that I though were so cute, I bought two for a friend for Christmas.

Now I figure that if I can do my Christmas shopping at the car wash nail salons ought to be able to sell their customers nail polish! Stay tuned.

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