Tuesday, April 23, 2013

How to start Stationery and Office-Supply Business

Stationery and Office-Supply BusinessSuccess of a stationery and office-supply business is contingent upon several variables. One often-overlooked success factor is customer service. Always be friendly to your customers and go out of your way to help them. Additionally, you should know the competition. Always strive to offer products that competitors do. However, include additional product lines or services. For example, include computer or fax services in your stationery and office-supply business if competitors do not.




Significance

One of the most important success factors for any business is location, according to Entrepreneur.com. A stationery and office-supply business is no exception. You must locate your store in a high-traffic area such as a strip mall, busy intersection or uptown at a major university. Moreover, make sure you are located near customers you want to target. For example, people with middle or upper-middle incomes have more to spend on stationery and office supplies. Rent a location downtown if you have a lot of potential business customers in the area. Business customers will often purchase in high volumes. Business customers also require massive amounts of copies. For example, a downtown advertising firm may need to make 50,000 copies of a brochure.

Features

Another business success factor is store appearance and ambiance. Keep your stationery and office-supply store neat and orderly. Keep the aisles clear of clutter. Use bright lighting so people can see what they are purchasing. Hang large signs throughout your store so people know where to go for certain items. Shoppers are busy. They do not want to spend extra time looking for items they need. Display new or sale items on end caps or at the front of the store. Encourage people to test out floor-model computers and other merchandise.

Suppliers

Suppliers are important to the success of stationery and office-supply businesses. You must be able to purchase your items at the lowest wholesale cost available. Larger retailers pay extremely low prices for products when they purchase them in volume. You may need to occasionally shop around for wholesalers that can provide you with a lower per-unit cost on products and stationery.
Stationery and Office-Supply Business

Promotion

Promotion is another important success factor for stationery and office-supply businesses. You will need to target your customers with fliers, newspaper classified and coupon magazine ads, and Internet marketing. Create a website for your stationery and office-supply business. Have employees hand out business cards inviting customers to visit the website for coupons. You can also hold drawings for those who visit the website. Give away gift cards and free office supplies. Have liquidation sales occasionally to get rid of old merchandise. Put the merchandise in dump bins near the front of the store.

Considerations

Like other businesses or retailers, stationery and office-supply stores may need to create special programs to increase customer loyalty. People will tend to shop more often at your store if you give them an incentive. Consider a loyalty program for your stationery and office-supply store. Start with a points system. For example, people can earn 100 points if they spend $25. Track people's purchases by assigning everyone a card and identification number. Gradually offer coupons of greater value or free items the more people spend.




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2 comments:

  1. Thank you for giving the information. I am running the same business and it would be easy for me to run my business.
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  2. Really great and helpful information to whom who are going to start their own business and infact who are already running their business they can also get idea that how to per mote their business, how to supply. I'm also going to follow some steps from it.

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