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Tricking Broca

by: Danny Summers
Category: Gail Vanik's Blog
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Apr
25

Tricking Broca

by Gail Vanik

Even though garden centers are primarily a visual industry with bright colors and interesting textures, another sense should be considered when planning your marketing mix: auditory.

I’m a huge fan of radio advertising because it’s one medium where you can cast a net broader than anywhere else to catch new customers. The airwaves reach far and wide, and radio worked especially well for me in Colorado when I would have gone broke advertising in every small-town newspaper within our 200-mile marketing area.

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Be a Regular Guy or Gal

by: Danny Summers
Category: Gail Vanik's Blog
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Mar
21

Be a Regular Guy or Gal

by Gail Vanik

This is a tale of two Garden Centers. I’ve owned both of them. The first was a small Garden Center in a rural area in small town America. Although we experienced some success along the way, it seemed like we weren’t able to grow sales the way I had hoped and projected. Since I had simply continued the marketing efforts of the previous owners – newspaper, a paper newsletter that was mailed monthly (sometimes), and a few print ads here and there, the frustration of “why isn’t this working when it worked so well for them” continued for several years. Overwhelmed with all of it, I admit I wasn’t much of a “regular gal” back then.

The second Garden Center was that same small Garden Center a few years later but by now the world had changed. Our sales numbers reflected that the previous owner’s methods were no longer effective. I switched things up, but more importantly, I made a firm commitment to a consistent schedule, even during times that were slow or when we had bad weather. Once I became a “regular gal,” things improved.

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