Brainstorm - Things to Increase Income

Posted on January 5, 2008
Filed Under plan |

Have you ever participated in a brainstorming session? In the corporate world, we used to have the frequently. We would all gather in a room and write possible solutions to a problem on post it notes. It didn’t matter if the ideas were feasible or crazy, we were just looking for as many ideas as possible in a short period of time. Working out the details would come later. Once each person had at least 4 or 5 post it notes, we put them on the board and talked about them.

If you read yesterday’s post on my current income situation, you will know that I desperately need to increase my income over the next month or two. I spent a whole day in panic mode whining about it and now I am ready to get busy fixing it.

Problem: I bought a grooming business 4 months ago. Prior to buying it, it was open 2 days a week and was not accepting new customers. The shop is now open 6 days a week and I am faced with rebuilding business on a very limited budget. Many clients were turned away in the past few years and most people don’t know the shop exists. Business has been growing slowly but I need to boost it up fairly quickly.

Like any good brainstorming session, feel free to throw out wild and crazy ideas. These are a few of mine, some good, some… well, it’s a brainstorming post, they don’t all have to be good. I’d love to hear some other ideas, or input.

Get back in touch with customers that we haven’t seen for awhile. I sent an email newsletter out to the 45 people who listed their emails on their registration cards. Several others either don’t have email or didn’t list it and I am going to snail mail the newsletter to them. I am also going to start doing reminder cards to people who have missed or canceled appointments. I’d like to do some advertising in one of the larger papers but that might have to wait a month or so.

Referral Discount - My best advertising has been word of mouth. My customers often refer their friends and neighbors to the grooming shop. In order to keep it top of mind, I am actively promoting it by offering $5 off for each referral.

Retail products - The shop has never done much retail business and I have thought seriously about doing away with the retail products. It does bring in some income though and I like being able to carry the products that we recommend to our customers. I am in the process of listing the pet product inventory in an ebay store. I am promoting it in the newsletter and on the Country Groomer Blog. Hopefully, I can generate enough business to make the retail side worthwhile.

Special Activities - I am going to try to have one pet related special activity each month for customers to promote the shop. This month we are hosting Picture Day. A photographer is coming to the shop to take pictures of pets and people. This is a nice one because we actually make money on it but I’d like to start doing some other things such as a pet picnic during the summer months.. I am a bit stuck for things to do during the winter. We don’t have enough room at the shop to have large numbers of people there at the same time.

Photo Courtesy of Jacob Botter.

Help keep me awake to write by buying me a cup of coffee! .

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Comments

4 Responses to “Brainstorm - Things to Increase Income”

calgirlfinance on January 6th, 2008 12:28 am

I think the referral bonus is a good idea. How about posting fliers at places where there are dogs (e.g. dog parks)? Or maybe advertising in the Pennysaver?
CindyS on January 6th, 2008 4:15 pm

No dog parks in the area but plenty of veterinarians. I am going to take flyers and business cards by all the local vets on Monday.

Thanks for the suggestion!!
calgirlfinance on January 6th, 2008 5:39 pm

The vet is a really good idea. Check out this article about dog washing facilities becoming more popular.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22421795/
CindyS on January 7th, 2008 7:21 am

Hmmmm. Self Service is an idea that I really haven’t given much thought. My shop isn’t very big but then there are times when I could open it for self service.