Attendees share best practices
By Furniture Today Staff -- Furniture Today, February 18, 2007
Scottsdale, Ariz. — Members of the Furniture Marketing Group spent time at their annual symposium here swapping best practices and ideas. Here's a sample of what they had to say.
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Charity Drive Sale. Joe Beiter of Beiter's Home Center, South Williamsport, Pa., reported strong results from an event that gave consumers a 5% discount and the ability to direct another 5% of the sale proceeds to the charity of their choice and in their names.
As part of the promotion, Beiter's sends letters to local charitable organizations explaining the promotion, and in the process it creates some of the store's best marketers — the charities who encourage their supporters to go out and shop. The first time Beiter's held the event, it raised $26,000 for 193 charities. When it repeated it last year, it raised $42,000 for 337 charities.
Not only does the event incur goodwill, Beiter said, it provides a tax benefit for customers and creates positive word-of-mouth advertising. -
Scratch and Win. Both Miskelly Furniture of Jackson, Miss., and Wolf Furniture of Bellwood, Pa., presented scratch-off mailer cards, where consumers could play for a percentage discount or, in Miskelly's case, up to $100 off a purchase of $699 or more. (All the Miskelly cards mailed out were for $100 off, so all players came into the store feeling special.)
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Family Tree. Furniture Fair's Bill Daniels brought a 16-page color circular that not only promoted the Fairfield, Ohio-based retailers new Design Destination store, but played up the family-run business' history, starting with founder William Robert and Kate Daniels and their first store opened in Erlanger, Ky., in 1963. Another advertorial piece in the circular highlighted the designer team at the new store with color photos and information on their backgrounds.
"We did a lot of business," Daniels said. "That's important today. People do business with people."
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