Good LSM: Holiday Guides
‘Tis the season for shopping, party planning and celebrating with family and friends. It’s also the season when your mailbox becomes filled with catalogues from retail shops, coupons from online stores, and flyers from local restaurants. While most are just fun to look at, we read this creative holiday guide from Trader Joe’s from cover to cover:
The 24-page catalogue/mini-magazine/holiday guide left me wanting to do all of my holiday grocery shopping at Trader Joe’s. Granted, I already love Trader Joe’s and their unique and seasonal products, but – if you had never shopped at Trader Joe’s, I bet this mailer would encourage you to give them a try! Here’s why:
- Products are organized by category – and they cover every conceivable category of food, drink or product you might need during the holiday season
- Many of the products descriptions include suggestions as to how to prepare or serve the products in different ways
- The descriptions also include the size and price of each product – helpful for planning/budgeting
- Anecdotes about the history of each product (within Trader Joe’s and in the greater world) are fun to read
How could you make this type of guide work for your small business? We’ve seen online gift guides, in-store holiday entertaining displays, printable recipes incorporating products from your store and sampling and demonstrations showcasing holiday products. A few more ideas:
- Wine shop – create a 12 Days of Christmas case of wine (12 bottles of wine that are perfect for the holiday season).
- Restaurant – advertise a limited edition holiday menu and/or events in a calendar online or on paper
- Retail shop – depending on your inventory, you can draw up several “gift guides” that target men, women, kids, pets, home, even “Secret Santa” gifts.
- Spa or salon – display your services or packages in the format of a gift guide
