How do i boost business sales with little or no money?

i am assistant manager at a little hometown country grocery store that is extremely broke and in debt, any suggestions?

ok, there is also lack in parking, so anything having to use parking space is out of the question. the groceries we get are pre-priced. we do have a deli that serves home cooked food everyday, the main sellers in the deli are fried chicken and potato logs. Our meats are usually the best sellers in town. We only have enough workers to do what needs to be done. Every week, we are paying out more than we are making. This store has been open for around 60 years, and was doing good, but is continuing to fall down hill.

I used to sell shops. From what you said, no parking facility and located in the country, I guess locals are buying somewhere else and even the existing customers buy more will not solve your problem before the store goes bust. Ad and promotions will be good idea but LOCATION is the MAJOR weakness in this case. Step one is to see if you can do delivery (up to you charge for the delivery or not and for how much) this will expand your customer base and the goods you can sell. Step two if step one works move to a new location but keep the old one for a while. The last resort is to sell the store, and hope all of you can work for the new owner.

Make signs, get some produce on the sidewalk were people can see it while driving by, do in store specials.

You could burn down your nearest Wal-Mart...

It may sound stupid, but make sure your store is clean, clean, clean. The cleaner a grocery store is the more people will shop there, even if you raise your prices. The cleaner the store, the better.

You can not compete head on with supermarkets, but you can justify your higher prices with a little hometown charm. Consider a little country style decorating, old fashioned aprons for staff, and feature local seasonal produce, homemade pies and such. Many housewives would love to have their baked goods featured. A little local butcher shop where I live in Bucks County features pies made by neighbor ladies at $12-15.00 each, and they sell like hotcakes. As you build traffic, experiment with a few very high margin items like imported cheese. Things like this drives traffic. Keep it interesting.

Like suggested before, try a new specialty item or food category. Home baked pies, cheeses, wines, whatever and then announce the new service and make a big party out of it. Give away samples (people love samples) and balloons for kids? Try to do something to get free advertising - doing something crazy or work connections to get on local radio or call in interview program.

By trying to be the same as other stores, you are forced to compete on price. Focus on being different and bringing value to your customers - friendly, personalized service, maybe home delivery (if you can swing it), a punch card for loyal customers (buy x number deli meats get thee 10th free or whatever).

Always try to up sell - when someone buys deli meat or salads, ask "Would you like some cheese to go with that?" I'm a sucker and I usually end up buying something I don't need just because it looks or sounds appealing.

How about making a small donation to a needy family or organization and getting free advertising (story about family or contribution) in local paper? (it doesn't have to be big or extravagant to boast about it - you have to work your public relations!)

Best of luck...

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First ask ur self one question.Do you have any customers left with who visit your store repeatedly.If yes, then establish a good rappo with them.Try to find out what they purchase and why they purchase some itom and why they dont purchase someting from ur store.Then ask their suggestion what they expect from your store and do whatever possible to improve them.Get the mail id of your repeated customers and take their permission to mail them if ur offering discounts or just to let them know what new products you have in ur store.

All the best
Pratap K Pattanayak,Business Analyst,Creative Services & Branding

service is the the ultimate! if your team morale is low because of the poor performance, this is reflected in the service that is given to the customer. competition from supercentres and their low prices are difficult to beat, but its all about your point of difference.. focus on what that is...

Your biggest weakness is lack of parking. Most people are NOT going to buy big quantities and walk a long distance back to their vehicles. In the long term, you would want to resolve this with a new location. In the short term, you can offer delivery although this will definitely eat into your margins unless you are offering something no one else has in your market which means you can charge. To offset, you need to look at moving into higher margin products. People are obviously either getting their groceries from other locations or the entire local market is shrinking.

On a positive note you did say that your meats are the best sellers in town. That is working and so you should look at ways to maximise this. Get customers to buy more and get more customers to buy these products. What other meat products at similar or higher margins can you offer that customers want to buy? Ask yourself what is it about these products that people like so much and how that might translate to products that compliment your meat goods.

If you do make any changes to your offering, make sure you get the word out! Even though you have limited budget for promotion, you can probably produce a few flyers to pass out. Distribute through businesses within walking distance of your location. Better still, create excitement by having media cover it. Another way to draw traffic is to be very creative with your internal store displays. You might be able to draw people inside with unusual displays - make them fun and entertaining, stay away from weird and creepy. Then try everything you can (within reason) to get them to buy something once they are in the store. The entertainment value will have people do marketing for you as they will likely tell others and once others are in the store they will likely buy something because they already there. If you go with this approach you need to change displays to maintain the interest. Of course don't have to have anything which will keep people guessing. People are bored... you can use that!!!

In addition to this, keep stores clean and make sure service is 1 or 2 notches above your competition. Even though you don't have the budget there are probably many things that you are doing that you can do better.

But remember, the big issue of no parking remains. When you can afford it, look to relocate.

Best of luck.

If you want every marketing question you will ever have, especially in retail, go to Wal-Mart and take notes. Everything from placement, pricing, customer service, department organization. Everything!! Wal Mart is a marketing guru. You walk in not expecting to buy anything and you walk out with $200 worth of stuff. You want to boost sales and keep your customers coming back you make yourself a mini Wal-Mart all your own. Good Luck!!