Most food and drink businesses enjoy a disproportionate amount of their revenue in the run-up to Christmas. If you’re thinking about how to maximise your sales in the festive season, the best thing you can do is consider how you can help the retailers who stock your products.
When you’re selling through retailers, it’s essential to think in terms of a win-win approach. The more you can help them, the more they will help you in terms of sales – so try and put yourself in their shoes. What will they be thinking about? How can you help them choose your product? How can you incentivise them to push you over others?
If you need some help thinking about what the world looks like from the retailers’ point of view, let’s chat.
I’m sure it won’t come as a surprise that retailers want to maximise their sales at Christmas. However, they also want to attract new customers, maximise order value and create moments of magic for their customers. Here are some ideas to help you work more effectively with retailers.
- Cash flow is always a concern, so consider offering retailers an early-bird discount to encourage their customers to stock up early.
- Can you support their festive events and promotions with sampling sessions? How about helping to make their event an absolute success by promoting it in your social and email marketing to spread the word and encourage your existing customers to attend.
- Work with other producers and suppliers to create a great collab, ideally with an offer. For example, pair your festive chutney with cheese or crackers (or both), or if you’re a snack brand, pair it with beer or wine and offer gift bundles.
- Inspire end-customers and show them how to use your product to help retailers sell more. Could you create recipe cards (or online resources) featuring ways to use your product or ingredient to create amazing festive meals or treats? For example, working with spice brands, I’ve seen things like mulled wine spice kits, ‘spice up your gravy’ and ‘add this to your marinade’ for cold meats work really well.
- You can help retailers sell more by thinking of ways to get your product into more people’s baskets – both for themselves and as gifts. Signposting this option with festive labels or ribbons is a simple way to make your product much more giftable. The benefit of tags or ribbons is that they can be removed after the festive period, so there’s less chance of wastage. (
- If retailers aren’t doing any specific Xmas events, can you offer to go in and do a sampling to help drive sales?
- If you’re selling at Christmas markets, be sure to let people know which local retailers stock your products so that they can purchase them there. Again, flyers that you can pop into bags work well here.
Of course, the selling doesn’t stop once Christmas is over. Consider the period after Christmas as well. Make sure you have a plan for why customers will want your product in January. You don’t want to go from feast to famine!
If you’d like to discuss ideas for boosting your retail sales, book a discovery call today.
