Be prepared: how to beat the competition this Christmas

Christmas is a crucial trading period for most retailers and the competition is intense. What you do in the next few days will make a difference.

• Double-face and have secondary displays of Christmas edition TV listing magazines. These are still key sales drivers at this time of year
• Ensure that your supplier knows your requirements for short-date products such as milk and bread. Sales of these items peak in independent stores in the days around Christmas day so make sure you can meet demand
• Identify top sellers and put a plan into place of how you will sell even more of these over the next week. Setting yourself and your staff Christmas sales targets could make a real difference

In addition to this, it’s important to consider your customer experience at this time of year. What are you going to bring festive cheer to your store? As Paul Mathers has shown, customers really appreciate decorations and events that involve the community so think about what you could be doing.

Finally, you should have decided by now what your trading hours will be over the Christmas and New Year period, and be telling your customers. Whether you put up a notice or hand out leaflets they do need to know. In tomorrow’s post, Christine Hope of Hopes of Longtown will be telling us how she’s let people know her opening hours through personalised, Hopes Christmas cards, as well as her other plans for the festive season.