Advice for local indie retailers on how to thrive through the valley of death of retail: June – August every year

June, July and August are tough months in many local shops, independent shops. There is no major season, and, it’s winter. Brrr. Some who have been in retail for ages call these months the months of death.

This year could be tougher because of interest rates and the penchant in newsrooms for stories negative about the economy and the future.

Here are 7 ways you could make these three months work for you.

1. Be happy. Make the shop bright, happy, smelling good and sounding good. Good lighting. Have a candle burning. Have an awesome playlist. Make your shop a place people enjoy. And, reflect this in your social media posts.
2. Pitch your offers consistently: discount vouchers, buy x cards and get a card for free. If you have value offers, pitch them in-store as well as on your socials.
3. Google My Business. Post several times a week. Be found by people nearby searching for what you sell.
4. Christmas in July. Get out any Christmas related stock you have and sell it off. Heck, host a Christmas party to launch it. Load the sale with other stock you’d like converted to cash. Consider a local charity or community group connection.
5. Bring in something new, something you’ve never sold before, something you thought you’d never sell. Challenge yourself to reach new shoppers. Launch it with an event. Put on some drinks and nibbles. Give people a reason to come out.
6. Get a second opinion on your business performance. Gather your data and ask someone to look at what’s working and what’s not. It could be that fresh eyes help clear a better path ahead for you. We gladly help retailers with this.
7. Pitch occasions like you would seasons. Bring together cards, gift bags and gifts to make it easy for people to celebrate: new home, baby arrival, engagement, wedding, congratulations and, yes, even sympathy. Choose one for a week or two and bring all the options together. Sometimes we have to show people what to do. The best opportunities here are the ones other retailers ignore.

Our point with this list is that this valley, June, July and August, separates retailers. Those who do well tend to be engaged, they tend to embrace opportunities to make their own success.

What’s this got to do with POS software? Plenty. Here at Tower Systems we serve a community of local indie specialty retailers. Our interest in their businesses reaches beyond our software and for they use it. We share ideas and inspirations to support their businesses because we want local indie retail to thrive.