Selling The Customer What They Want

Speciality Bites with

Paul Hargreaves

Chief executive of Cotswold Fayre

• Becoming a B Corp
• Top trend predictions for Christmas 2021
• Self-sacrifice: The importance of building a leadership legacy centred on others
• Undercover Boss
• Can/should bosses really be close friends with their staff?

All I have heard so far this year is that customers are going to be tightening their belts and being very careful what they spend etc.

It seems the doom-mongers are at work again – they got going early this year before some of us were back at work. They justify their spurious claims by using the VAT increase from 17.5% to 20%. I really can’t see how this is going to make a huge difference on our customers’ food spending patterns.

Even a large basket of food and drink valued at £100 will only increase by a pound or so – as more than half the items will be zero-rated – and on a farm shop average basket of £15 - £20 the difference will be negligible. So let’s start this year the way we did in 2010: by shooting down the negativity in the press.

It’s early days yet to ascertain how Christmas was for independent retailers in general, although I do know for sure some of them were hit badly by the appalling weather. However, some smaller local shops actually benefited due to being the only shop customers could access.

In general terms though I always reckon that the size of the orders we receive at the beginning of January are a good indication and so far these have been very respectable! And our pre-Christmas quarterly sales figures for Oct-Dec were more than respectable at 44% up!

However, if there is a seed of doubt in some of our customer’s minds, all the more reason to sell them what they want. How do we do this? Quite simple really! Ask them a few questions, read a bit of body language or even refer to something they have already said to you on the phone.

A good example of how not to do this was yesterday when I went to the office on my motorbike. I stopped at a convenience store to buy some croissants for breakfast wearing my helmet and was asked if I wanted a take-out coffee. How exactly she thought I was going to drink it on the move or carry it in my rucksack, I really don’t know. But I imagine it is one of those things she has to say and doesn’t even think about. On the other hand, if she had offered me a nice, fresh easily-portable bottled orange juice I may have been interested!

Let’s train our staff to up-sell at the start of this year and by doing so they are actually offering a better service to your customers. Now is the time to do these things, as we have more time for training.

Have a prosperous 2011.