Off the Cuff: Open Houses Prompt Open Wallets

Hosting an open house shows off your shop's capabilities and attracts new customers.
Dec 8, 2008

By Mark L. Venit, MBA, Contributing Writer

Looking for a way to boost first quarter sales? Consider hosting an open house at your shop.

We all enjoy watching customers marvel at our screen printing presses and embroidery machines when they're operating. We enjoy hearing their observations and the predictable compliments on our capabilities. We appreciate their reactions when they see computer graphics happening onscreen for the first time. We all like to see prospects perusing the offerings on our showroom sample racks.

But when you liberally infuse the atmosphere with munchies (simple or fancy), liquid refreshments, a touch of music, scrumptious deserts, an energized crowd and the miraculous appearance of free goodies (T-shirts, promotional items), the occasion becomes an event. The gaming industry in Las Vegas and elsewhere have grown wealthy on the proven effect that a festive environment in their casinos turns people on and gets them to loosen their wallets. A party at your shop can do the same thing on a smaller scale. It's a friendly device to help your customers, prospects and friends to talk to each other, talk about your business and shell out some money.  


Party Planning Tips

The Invitation: Be creative. Demonstrate your graphic and technical taste, as well as your prowess. Print the invitation, for example, on a T-shirt, cap, infant shirt or T-shirt-shaped key fob. Add event details, if necessary, on a separate item or card. The object is to attract attendees, so spend the extra time and attention to make sure you get a good response. Invite your staff to bring their spouses, significant others and other family members. That way you'll have more people bragging about your employees and your work to other attendees.

Strut Your Stuff: Update your showroom samples. Get your favorite wholesaler and promotional products reps to set up their own displays. Be sure to have catalogs and price lists available, as well as custom-imprinted plastic bags, shopping bags or inexpensive tote bags for people to collect their literature and goodies.

Free Stuff: Your guests will love to receive little gifts. So, buy what is necessary, but remember that you can ask for free stuff from your vendors. You may be pleasantly surprised how cooperative and generous some will be. Decorate the freebies while your guests are in attendance, demonstrating what you can do in house. 

Food and Drink: Demonstrate your creativity here. Perhaps it's cookies or hors d'oeuvres in the shape of T-shirts or ball caps, or maybe a T-shirt-shaped cake with custom-printed candies and beyond-the-ordinary frosting decorations. Booze? Keep it to beer and wine to be on the safe side, limiting both cost and your liability. Soft drinks, punch, juice and coffee are much more interesting served in custom cups, which, you note on a small tent card on the serving tables, are available for delivery. 

Music: Hire a DJ if you have room for dancing. And any live music is always good, whether it's a classical string quartet, a solo guitarist, local band, barbershop quartet or whatever's reasonable on cost and appropriate for your audience.

Entertainment Ideas: Book a magician to work the crowd with close-up tricks, or a celebrity look-alike, a juggler or an artist who can sketch caricatures of your guests. Anything that elevates the occasion to an event status will generate buzz afterward — especially if you take digital photos and e-mail them to attendees the next day or send out in inexpensive frames.
 
VIPs: Inviting local politicians, reporters, coaches and community leaders guarantees lively conversation, and, possibly, photo opportunities and media coverage.

Dress for Success: Your staff should wear what you sell. Use one color for all, but feel free to outfit your crew in a variety of T-shirts, hoodies, polos, caps, vests, scrubs and lightweight outerwear to exhibit your product lines. Make sure everything is decorated with your logo, but be clever and cool — adding pride-worthy terms somewhere on the garment (sleeve, right chest, back yoke) such as "Embroidery Wizard," "Senior Screen Printing Technician," "Solutions Provider" (for salespeople), "Paperwork Expediter," "Inventory Miracle Man," "Creative Genius" (for art staff) and "Master Digitizer." The boss will have fun telling who he or she is —  "Jack of All Trades," "El Presidente," "Janitor," "Master Juggler," "Advertiser's Best Friend," etc.

Follow Up: Thank your guests with something tangible after the event and be sure to ask for an order. Thank your vendors, too. Send a press release and some good photos to local newspapers, your chamber of commerce, trade publications and anywhere else you can amplify the event's beneficial impact.


Prepping Your Staff

Don't assume everyone understands that first impressions are lasting ones. Explain to your staff that it's easy to say, "Thank you for your business," "Nice to meet you," and "We're glad you came to help us celebrate." 

Also, another immense benefit of hosting an open house — one perhaps equal to the effort of increasing sales — is creating a fixed-deadline opportunity to thoroughly clean and organize your shop, offices, showroom and exterior. Now, you've got a great excuse for getting around to doing what you've been putting off for too long. 

Mark L. Venit, MBA, is president of Apparel Graphics Institute Ltd., Ocean Pines, Md., which provides management and marketing consulting and proprietary research to apparel graphics companies throughout the Americas and Europe. He also is the chairman of ShopWorks Software LLC, a provider of industry-specific business software. Venit teaches pricing, strategic marketing, salesmanship and other business management topics at the Imprinted Sportswear Shows. You can reach him at markvenit@cs.com.