As
Mikki knows and many others here do as well, we DO SELL GIFTS! And Christmas Collectibles and Home Decor items as well as photo frames, Notecards and a bunch of other stuff. In fact, it has evolved to the point that we do about 45% custom framing and 55% other stuff. Some of you have taken my
Diversification -Adding Gifts Seminar where I've presented this to a few PPFA Chapters.
I should start off by saying that this is not something for every framer! However for many custom framers it will work and work well for many reasons.
- It gives potential customers other reasons to visit your store!
- It blends into the shop creating a feeling of ambience and "home like" atmosphere.
- Gives your business more opportunities to create interesting display and vingettes.
- Provides optional advertising messages to present to your potential clients
- Can reinforce your custom framing business by making you more visible to a wider audience.
One has to be patient...Adding gifts is a progression/transition that takes time. Currently we stock and sell several lines of table lamps, four lines of candles, four lines of Handbags-Purses and two lines of jewelry. We put up 14 trees during the Holiday Season full of Christmas ornaments and display almost 350 different German nutcrackers, smokers, pyramdis etc. This didn't happen overnight. It came slowly starting with a few lines in the early 1980's. One of the key deciding factors in how a line is added to our shop has to do with quality, uniqueness and product exposure.
I know this concept has potential - It is substantiated by a recent discovery when I learned that the biggest growth area in one of the Big Boxes was with their Home Decor lines - 40% annual growth...Not their custom framing. To illustrate my point further, framing industry guru, Jay Goltz to whom we associate with the largest custom framing store in the country obviously spends a great deal of his energy and dollars developing his diversion business...
Jason Home
Deborah Price said:
have always shied away from adding "typical" gift items, especially since I have gift stores on either side of me on the same block. However, I do art-related gifts such as hand-thrown pottery and hand-painted oyster shells...Over the past 3 months, I've hit on another item that went over really well and sales were great! Hand-made jewelry from a local designer.
This is a thought that sometimes stops framer/gallery owners from diversifying their business with gifts. However as Deborah has discovered with her "art-related" and jewelry designer, is that she can stand apart from her "gift store competitors" quite easily.
Finding the right mix and products takes time. You want products that match the taste of your customers and locale. You want items of various price points to appeal to different people but also to create impulse sales as well as destination merchandise.
Meghan MacMillan said:
Nope. When I win the Powerball and buy the building up the hill with the parking lot I want to bring in some other items, but when that happens I'll also hire someone else to inventory and dust them...
Meghan hits it right on the head in being aware that adding gift inventory or display and storage requires additional space and manpower! Especially to do it well.
Meghan MacMillan said:
...I've done very poorly in this spot with photo frames. I have a few, but don't expect much from them. My shop is tiny. I can't turn over space to anything I'm not sure will sell...
Interesting comment in that one of the criteria for an ancillary item to have some success is No.1) It's relationship to your core business and No.2) The depth in which you market and showcase the item. Photo frames meet the first criteria but it sounds like perhaps "testing the waters" proved to be part of the problem to the lack of success. Sometimes, you need to go in full steam ahead with enough inventory to entice and draw customers, otherwise you create a "this is nice...but I'll go look where I know they have a bigger selection" mentality with your customers.
Randy Parrish said:
I do okay with photo frames, just had a kid in here who said no one else in town sold them. For me it's finding the right mix, Garret @ WCAF had some great prices on basic black and silver 5x7 and 8x10's in the $2 range, 12 per box, I bought 6 boxes. Should be good for that $20 and under crowd which for me equals college students...
For you Randy, it sounds like you may have found a match with the younger college crowd with less disposable income. We have found that going in the opposite direction seeking out premium, unique photo frames matches the tastes and income of today's custom framing customer in our shop. We've had very steady sales for the past few years focusing on Roma, Prisma, Bedford-Downing and Dennis Matheson photo frames. With all but the later, these brands are all manufactured in the U.S. or other first world countries - when 90% of gift items are made in China, many customers find this refreshing.
Randy Parrish said:
...I have ton of antique/vintage maps, then some modern ones, Axis maps.com has some good "typographic" maps.
Randy - this sounds like a great diversification where you are also specializing in something that sets you apart from the competition! :thumb:
Evan Bertwell said:
Gift items are not something that we carry at the moment. We sell some ready-made frames, and over the last couple of months we have added a printing service witch is just now starting to pay off.
It may not be a good mix for you...and only you might know this, Evan. However if diversifying into printing has taken off and created new customers and another reason for folks to visit your business, you may not want to get your hands dirty with a third entity. As human beings and business entrepreneurs we can often do two things well....that third task can dilute our efficiency and quality.
Thanks for endulging me to add my lengthy reply to this thread, but this is a subject that I belive to be important to the success and perhaps survival of many frame shops.
John
