NFIB

Primo Promotions
03/ 14/ 2002

By Carolee Boyles

For Henry Caimotto, promoting The Snook Nook in Jensen Beach, Fla., is a state of mind. He exposes the tackle shop's name to potential customers by giving daily radio fishing reports, hosts weekly radio and television shows, and donates products for charity auctions.

"If I have a customer going overseas to fish, I give them a couple of T-shirts and tell him to give them to the mate on the boat," Caimotto says. "People come in and tell me they've seen one of my shirts somewhere across the world."

Party on
Martin Shine, owner of Kirby's Men's Wear in Tampa, Fla., held a promotion for the Goodwill building that had recently burned. A customer who brought in a used suit received a discount on a new suit and the store donated the "recycled" suits to Goodwill.

In another promotion, when the store began carrying the Tommy Bahama clothing line, Shine held a theme party. "We featured the line, and had shrimp, crab cakes, Bahamas beer and other foods with a Bahamas theme," Shine says.

Something to crow about
Jerry Presley says the best promotion they used at Dixie Outdoors Pro Shop in Columbus, Ga., involved naming a rooster. A local radio station that used a rooster as its mascot teamed with the sporting goods store to provide a trip to the Bahamas for the listener who came up with the best name.

"People had to come in and register to name the rooster," Presley says. "We bought the advertising and the radio station paid for the trip. We had to keep the mean, smelly bird in the store, but we got a lot of response from it."

Cross-promote
David Willis, owner of EJW's in Morehead City, N.C., cross-promotes bicycle sales and in-store bicycle repair by making service a part of the sale.

"We offer a free 30-day checkup when someone purchases a bike," he says. "And when someone comes in to get their bike repaired, we make sure they see the new bicycles we have in the store."

Just stuff it
At Family Christian Store in Miami, Victor Sanchez used bag stuffers and radio ads to bring in more than a thousand customers on one morning. "Customers pre-bought an album and we gave them booklets for the artist to sign. The next day they came back for the CDs."

---

This article originally appeared in the February/March 2002 issue of MyBUSINESS Magazine.

Small Business Sound Off
Does this story hit home?  Share your story with us