Pet Product News - August 2016

BUSINESS NEWS

Beat Online Sellers With Your Strengths

Although the independent bookstore category has taken a big hit in the past two decades due to online retail giants, some independent bookstores are still thriving. According to a recent column by USA Today small business columnist Rhonda Abrams, there are lessons in that category for all independent retailers on how to survive and thrive against online competition. What you can’t do is pretend that e-commerce isn’t there or hope it is just going to go away. It isn’t.

Play to brick-and-mortar’s many strengths. What has worked for booksellers in many ways will work for pet retailers.

Local is good. There is a growing trend toward shopping local—and for locally made goods.

Consumers prefer to be able to
shop locally, and people also
want to see their own downtown
thriving and prefer to be loyal to
local businesses. Show customers
how much you help make the
community a success.

What do you offer that online retailers don’t? People can touch and see merchandise in your store. Give pride of place to toys, collars, clothes—anything that a customer will want to be able to pick up and touch. Also, pet owners love to talk about their animals—encourage in-store chats.

Share your pet knowledge with your customers—whether it is about good nutrition or behavioral issues. The more they see you as a source of knowledge, the more they will come to your store. Know the names of good trainers or walkers in your area that you can recommend. Whether or not it leads to an immediate sale, it is likely to pay off down the line.

Be a part of your community. Partner with local shelters or have your store involved in events in town. Partner with your suppliers too. This isn’t a one-way street— even in the age of the smartphone, most people are going to first find out about a new product when they happen upon it in your store. Suppliers need you and may well be able to help you with promotional events.

Don’t rely on the same-old, same-old that has worked in the past. Keep up-to-date on what the online “enemy” is doing. Follow marketing trends in retail— what works for other categories may well have lessons in the pet business, too. Don’t hide away in your store—know what’s going on in your community. Are there more and more retired people? An influx of millennials? New developments with a lot of school-age children? Keep your product offerings relevant to your customer base. What works in one town is not necessarily the secret to success in a neighboring community.

SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS
ARE FEELING BLUE

A recent survey by Bank of
America found just 29 percent
of small business owners think
the national economy will im-
prove over the next 12 months,
compared to 48 percent who
thought it would improve this
time last year. Business owners
are slightly more confident in
their local economy, which 38
percent see improving over the
next year. The No. 1 concern: 79
percent list the effectiveness of
U.S. government leaders. Taxes
and health care will decide the
small business vote. Just 51 per-
cent expect revenue to increase
in the next year (down from 63
percent a year ago), and only 22
percent have plans to hire more
employees this year (down from
46 percent a year ago).

NO CREDIT CARD
READER?
PREPARE FOR
A BIG BILL

The bill is starting to come due for retailers who didn’t swap to the new credit card readers by the deadline last October.

The Wall Street Journal reports that chargebacks among small- and medi-um-size merchants rose 15 percent in the fourth quarter. Strawhecker, a payments consulting firm, said that figure is rising because the fourth quarter only had a few weeks under the new rules.

Since October, merchants who didn’t swap to the new readers for cards with an electronic chip are on the hook for fraudulent activity in their stores.

According to one survey, only 22 percent have installed readers that can process the chip-enabled cards. The main complaints are the cost of new readers and the slower time for processing each transaction.