Tip of the Week

Business SMART:

The Grand Opening of the CHA SMART Store

By: Dennis A. Conforto
Chairman & CEO of A-Z Media Group, Inc.

The CHA SMART Store, won by John and Camille Akin, finally opened last weekend. The store is simply stunning and reflects, in part, the scrapbook store of the future. What is great about the store is how it was adapted to fit the needs of the building and the personality of John and Camille.

The store features wide open aisles and a lot of wide open spaces. The ceiling is high and is adaptable to all sorts of creative ideas. The floors followed the recommendations of The SMART Group, using highly polished concrete. The versatility of the display units is fantastic! They are on wheels and can be moved around with ease. Consumers who went to the store and saw it for the first time loved it! The store was packed the first two days of the Grand Opening weekend, when I had the opportunity to visit.

Adapting the Store
Some in the industry thought The SMART Store was designed only to work one way; however, nothing could be further from the truth. Here are some of the adaptations made:

1. When John and Camille won the store, they had just signed a new lease on a location five doors down from their old location. The new location was more than double the size; and the doors were to the far right of center. The door placement alone forced the Akins to adjust and adapt their thinking from the original layout of the store.
2. The CHA SMART Store used the backlit signage to show 50% branding and 50% themes. John and Camille modified that ratio to 90% themes and 10% branding.
3. The CHA SMART Store had the cashier front and center to the front door. John and Camille adapted the store to have the cashier facing the front door, but they pushed the location back and sideways to take advantage of a steel support beam.
4. The CHA SMART Store had the children’s play area in the front right side of the store so that the children could be seen through the windows. John and Camille moved it over to the front left of the store where there were no windows.
5. The CHA SMART Store had the crop room in the center. John and Camille moved it to the back corner of the store, but gave it signage that can be clearly seen from the front door. They also named it “Studio C” – “C” for creativity.

In a true adaptive style, they transformed their store, logo, and website to be more hip, young, and in style. The music was louder than normal for a retail store, but fit perfectly well into their new look and feel. I liked it. In addition, they did a great job on the window displays. They created a great hip display that looked good and reflected the feel of the store.

Why is being adaptive so important? Well, retail is all about adapting to your environment. You always want to be able to adapt the look and feel of your store to meet the needs of your community and store environment.

Today, Ever After Scrapbooks is a new store; the fact is, it’s a new company from the ground up. It has to be, because the store is twice the size and the risk is now even greater – but so is the opportunity.

The Challenges
The challenge Ever After faces is the same as the challenge that all scrapbook retailers face: attracting new customers. No longer can a scrapbook retailer expect the same old tired customer list to produce the same sales results as it did a few years ago. Today the scrapbook retail business is about growing that mailing list with new consumers at a rate that is faster than the expert scrapbookers are ending their seven-year cycle with the craft.

The SMART Rules
I believe John and Camille have achieved a more inviting store for the new consumer in their interpretation for a SMART Store. The rules of a SMART Store are few, but the interpretations of the store are as endless as there are ideas. Let me give you a few simple rules of a SMART Store.

1. Hire right. Get the right employees with the right skill sets in the right positions in your retail business.
2. Merchandise right. Get the right merchandise at the right time for the right price.
3. Promote right. Get the right promotion at the right time to the right customer for your store.

Hidden within these three rules are some profound truths. What is funny is that everyone knows in their heart what to do, but few do it. For example:

1. You might have an employee who is not the “right” employee for that position and you delay a confrontation about it.
2. You know you have dead inventory but you’re not discounting it to move it off your shelves and make room for something that really sells.
3. You know you need to promote your business more, but you’re not willing to risk spending the money to do it because you’re not sure what will work. But doing nothing does not work.

Just like the saying, “There’s no crying in baseball,” there is also no crying in retail. Retail is about doing what you know in your heart needs to be done. John and Camille could have set up the store exactly as it had been sent to them. But they saw a chance to change everything. Did they have to create and implement a new logo? No, but they did. Did they have to update their website? No, but they did – and they did it while they were building a new store from the ground up. The point is that they did not take the easy route. They simply took the right way for them. In the end, that is what being business SMART is all about.