Selling it....

A little story....

Sunday my wife and I are out for a drive and stop in a small boutique wine shop in Clifton VA, very quaint. It's a high end store and we browse the racks - I couldn't find the Italian section and the owner of the store came over and asked if she could assist. I told her I was looking for a Classico Chianti and couldn't locate it in her store. She took me over to it and it was priced at $ 34.95 a bottle. As I looked at the label she said "I have some other nice Italians that are less expensive than that" and she began showing me some Tuscany table wines in the $ 18 to $ 26 range. I was amused, because she was committing a classic error in sales, she began the downsale before she has the first objection from the customer. I didn't gasp at the price (having worked for Gallo Wines in my prior career, wine prices don't stun me) or otherwise give her any reason to think I wanted something 'cheaper'. I wasn't dressed very fancy as I had been cleaning out my garage earlier, so perhaps the jeans and t-shirt were the sign I wouldn't buy a $ 35 bottle of wine but that was a rookie mistake on her part. NEVER do that unless the customer states flatly - "I won't spend that much". Why would you abandon your product and encourage the customer to buy something less costly? The correct response would have been for her to explain to me the value of that particular bottle of wine and what I'm getting for my money. Finally I told her "I'm not interested in the blended table wine, I'll take that Chianti" and she made the sale - but she almost blew it, too.

This illustrates all too often what happens in furniture stores as well. Salespeople think all customers are price-driven and take them to the promotional items in the store - they didn't LISTEN to the customer to see what they were looking for. If they did listen, then they can get them the product they would like and expect. It's a process of determining needs, finding the right item, informing them of the benefits and then handling objections. You're not really selling until that first objection pops up anyways - until then you're just an order-taker. While everyone likes to save money, that's not always the driving force behind a purchase. What customers DO want to know regardless of price is "What is this product going to do for me?" And that is the art of sales. If I'm coming in your store for a Classico Chianti, why are you trying to sell me a Merlot?

At this past Market, one of the CEO's of the showrooms I visited said to me in front of several of his staff "Duane here is the greatest furniture salesman in the industry today, I kid you not, he does it better than anyone else in the trade". I laughed and said to him "Its not magic. Listen. Communicate. Be Honest. Know your Product. Follow Up." But its nice that he said that!

This is something that drives me crazy. It happens to me occasionally with purchases, and it happened a lot while I was furniture shopping. I'm not sure if it's because I'm a younger guy or if it's because they had more profit margin on the other cheap furniture they kept trying to turn me to. I'm the kind of person who enjoys doing a lot of research before I spend my money, so when I was ready to buy a sofa I knew I wanted H&M, just not what model. I'd tell the sales person I only wanted to look at Hancock and Moore, and what would they do? Show me a Hancock and Moore piece and then after I would sit for a while to see how I liked it (and I told the sales person they didn't need to stick around, I'd find them when I was ready to make a decision) they would show me some "pocket friendly options" usually not even of the same quality. One of the larger stores in my area did that to me at both of their locations, that essentially took them out of the picture for me, that and they knew nothing about the product.

The "down sell" has happened to me in some retailers, and often I thought their motivation was purely to shorten the sales cycle. To some sales people, the lower price just automatically is assumed to be a lower resistance to making the purchase decision. What I have come across more frequently when furniture shopping is typically at the "Home Design" type establishment where they often know absolutely nothing about the furniture's detailed specifications but only who the manufacturer is, what the lead-time is and what the net price will be. I have seen quite a number of Sofas from various manufacturers at quite a range of price levels that can't hold a candle to Hancock and Moore furniture quality, style and value.

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Originally Posted by wisejd

The "down sell" has happened to me in some retailers, and often I thought their motivation was purely to shorten the sales cycle.

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Exactly! Ring the sale, get you out the door and make way for the next customer. ABC's..... Always Be Closing. I was taught that many years ago to get the sale no matter what. But I disagree with that approach because what is more important is building a relationship and you do that with trust and honesty. Know the product line, explain it, and most people are smart enough to make good choices from there. And if they like the first purchase and see value in it, they will come back to you for future ones as well as tell their friends.

One of the major hurdles is the average salesperson in a furniture store is just plain lazy. They're rather spend their time on Facebook or reading the sports page than studying the product lines they sell. Therefore they have no knowledge and have to fall back on selling on price points. Case in point this forum has been operating since 2008....and is open to anyone in the trade. There are zero, that's right...ZERO other people in the trade that invest time and energy here to help educate and explain. Once in a while you will see someone make an attempt and contribute, but they fall off quickly. Why? They are interested in a sale only, not building relationships. Short term thinking. When i started this forum in '08, I thought by 2014 there would be a dozens of people in the trade contributing on a regular basis, but that didn't happen and the reason is they are sales-driven for the day only. No sales, they move on after posting one or two ads in the flea market section..... Interesting how that happens!