Holiday Happenings

          One of the most frequent questions I've heard over the holiday is "What are your current sales?" With the economy still recovering, many consumers are being frugal with their money. Currently, our store does not offer holiday specials and this has turned many customers away. In fact, many customers have left not only disappointed, but angry.
          Offering incentives to loyal customers helps to create repeat buying and entices customers to shop your store over others. An incentive as little as a 10% discount can encourage shopping and will in turn help to increase sales over the holidays. Many companies are seeing marginal increases in sales revenue in comparison to last year, even without incentives to buy. With the addition of incentives, customers are more prone to spend within your store rather than in stores that do not offer good discounts, or any. Popular incentives include percentage discounts, gifts with purchase, purchase with a purchase (such as a discount on a purchase item with another purchase) and promotional offers such as $25 back with any $100 purchase.
          Although holidays such as Hannukah and Christmas are over, companies who concentrate on promoting incentives to customers post holiday should continue seeing increases in profits into the new year.

Push-ups, Padding, and Uplift. Oh My!

        In continuation to my last blog entry, another trend that piggy backs this phenomenon of perky ladies, is the distrintion between push-ups, lined bras, and uplift bras. Over the holiday season the biggest seller in bra varieties has been the varying lines of push-up bras. We have nearly sold out entirely of push-ups in the classic colors (white, nude, and black) and have begun seeing more and more vibrant colors of push-ups flying out the door. One thing, however, that also seems to be occuring is the confusion to what the differences between a push-up bra, a lined bra, and an uplift bra are. Women seem to think of these terms as a colloquialism for the same meaning. In reality, a push-up literally pushes the girls up and in, adding roughly a cup size (or even two) to the overall size. For instance, a woman who measures as a B cup will be transformed to look like a perky C while wearing a push-up.
       Uplift does just what the name implies, it boosts the girls up, creating that perky, youthful look without adding to the overall cup size. Women who have larger ladies frequently do not want to add to the overall size. These ladies often tend to confuse this term with push-up and miss out on the benefits of this bra. Along with this, these same women think that lined bras means that they are padded. Lined means that there is an additional layer of material (or lining) to the inside of the bra so that women will not get the "cold" effect. Both uplifts and lined bras are the ideal product for well-endowed women.
       Its important not only to fit women properly and make sure that the customer maintains the proper fitting information, but to also take the time to thouroughly explain and detail benefits, distinctions, and features of the many different bra types. Many stores do not provide this information thouroughly enough and leave customers confused, frustrated, and ultimately disappointed. Building brand reputation begins with giving the customer superior customer service, answering any questions about products, and taking the time to ensure that the customer is more than satisfied with their purchase. This is turn will build positive brand reputation and brand loyalty.