“While it’s not a product or service that you can make money from, offering gift-wrapping is a wonderful way to thank your loyal customers for their patronage throughout the year and to make their stress-filled holiday time just a little bit easier,” says small-business marketing expert Nanette Miner (www.salonmarketing.biz). Send a holiday note early in the month of December alerting your customers that on the day they have an upcoming appointment with you, they can bring their gift purchases in and you will have them wrapped while they are having their service. “This will be an especially welcome gift for your clients if they’ve spent the morning Christmas shopping and have their appointment in the afternoon,” she says. “They’ll be happy to come in with all their bags and leave them in your lap for an hour.” You may want to limit the service to afternoons and weekends so you can utilize high school or college students to do the wrapping. You may even be able to barter beauty services in lieu of paying your wrappers.

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