When it comes to Pro Shop sales, March is is usually 50% bigger than February.  As the start of the golfing season looms, it's a great time to implement good habits that will help you to manage your time more effectively, and achieve your best season ever.

Good retail might be about buying and selling well, but great retail requires a vision that you plan for, and work towards.

You may have entered the profession due to a love of the game, but, more often than not, it's your business skills and acumen that will dictate your real success.  Here are our 5 easy wins for retail brilliance this season:

 

1. Create a Budget

March often signals the end of the financial year for Pro Shops and a great time to set out your budgets for the coming year.  A budget should give you a benchmark and enable you to monitor how you're performing throughout the year. Set your shop targets based on how you did last month, or this time last year, and give yourself a target of achieving 5% more.

If you're an XPOS user, run the Monthly Sales Analysis report to see how you did and always him higher the following month!

We're going to be talking more about budgeting this month in our updates on the website and social media, so watch this space.

 

2. Regular Stock Takes

March often sees the end of the financial year for Pro Shops and a big stock take is often on the cards. And if you've been stock taking regularly throughout the year, there shouldn't be any nasty surprises. With more new stock expected into the shop than normal, staff will be bracing themselves for additional admin.  XCODES users will appreciate the super-fast stock creation, using the barcode scanner on your smartphone - saving you hours of time.

We can't stress enough the importance of good stock management. Undertaking smaller regular, stock takes throughout the year is perhaps THE single most important habit to establish for several reasons, including:

 

1. Highlighting any discrepancies such as damaged, or missing, stock; or unreceived orders
2. Staff involved in stocktaking will be more aware of the stock you are holding, and thus easier for them to sell it on
3. It’s the only way to get a true picture of your actual business performance including which brands and products are/aren’t selling well.
4. Regular stock takes will help you review upcoming orders. If an item isn’t selling, you will want to cancel any bookings you might have previously made
5. You need to aim to ‘turn over’ (sell) a stock item within 3-4 months of it coming into the shop. Regular stock takes can help with this strategy and will enable you to manage this proactively

A proactive approach to stocktaking makes excellent business sense. We guarantee you’ll soon see the benefits.

 

3. Invest in Good Technology

Competition is tough, and to keep customers coming back, you need to be ahead of the game.

A good point of sale system should be so much more than just a till – giving you the tools to manage and maintain stock, improve your margins, and provide the solutions you need to be a better retailer.

XPOS is the ultimate sales and stock management solution, designed specifically for golf and sports retailers.  Use our intuitive app to transform your smartphone into a barcode scanner, linking directly to your XPOS system.  The best thing of all is you'll never have to create another stock item again, and stocktaking will be lightning quick and more accurate than ever before.

XPOS' simple reporting helps you make the best buying decisions for your business, getting your stock management right and enabling you to enjoy healthier cash flow and increased profits.

Don't let dated systems hold you back.

 

4. Get to (Really) Know your Customers

Use your XPOS system, or other epos, (if you aren't a customer of ours' yet),  to collect customer information against every sale. Knowledge is power when it comes to customers, and you can only buy the right products if you know who you’re buying for.

Even the most basic analysis of data you manage to log, might reveal a surprising result.

Peter Hancox is the PGA Pro at Chippenham Golf Centre, “We really do appreciate the concept of “good information in, good information out”. By capturing data against customer sales, and keeping on top of stock, we’re able to run reports that either confirm or challenge that gut feeling you have about what is, or what isn’t selling”, says Peter.

 

5. Transform your Team

Don’t try to achieve all this on your own. Make sure your employees are working to your vision for the business: involve them, train them, and trust them. An employee who feels appreciated will always do more than is expected of them.

“If we weren’t still hiring great people and pushing ahead at full speed, it would be easy to fall behind and become a mediocre company” Bill Gates

Involve your team in decision-making; ask for their thoughts on new products; and make sure they know how to use the latest equipment that’s just arrived in the shop! Employees will be better sales people if they’re trained in all the kit, and kept up to date with new stock and in-store decisions.

 

It’s never too late to establish good habits that will help to set you apart from the competition. Commit to a clear vision for your shop, put the habits and processes in place to make it happen, and make 2018 your best year yet.