Every business has its ebbs and flows, especially retail-oriented ones. The parts business, particularly here in the Northeast, relies on bad weather as much as anything else to create sales.
Lots of cold, snow and ice make for lots of sales on winter items and body shop supplies. The problem is, it can be too easy to dismiss slow sales on unusual weather patterns or other factors that might affect the normal peaks and valleys on your sales graph until it's too late. If you're not constantly working on a Plan B and integrating it into your Plan A, you may soon find yourself with nothing to plan for.
If you're paying attention to these sales patterns, you can spot where and when sales are slipping, and once identified, try to figure out what to do about it. If it's a service or customer relations problem, you're lucky. Those are of your own making and you have the power to overcome them. But what about when it's something you have no control over? New competition, changing population demographics and local economic forces all are pretty much beyond your control. How will you deal with them?
Most people's first reactions to slumping sales probably center on keeping costs under control and trying to regain lost ground with existing accounts. Both are very sound solutions, but they are not necessarily the only options.
Keeping certain costs under control eventually will reach a point of diminishing returns. If you're at the point where customer service is suffering and nobody wants to come into your store because it's too cold and dark, you need to reassess your plan.
Also, if you're pounding away at the same accounts trying to drum up business where there is none, you need to expand your horizons. The average jobber store can be a huge resource for lots of products used in more than just automotive applications. The same chemical products, bearings and paint supplies you have access to all have uses in the construction and manufacturing fields. There also is a whole host of automotive products you might not even be aware of that could point your sales in a new, more profitable direction.
That's exactly what publications like this one are all about: keeping you informed about what's going on in the rest of the automotive world. Be aware of what's going on around you and be ready to take advantage of new opportunities when they occur.
I have to admit that this is an idea that took me a while to warm up to. If you had asked me a few years ago what my main focus was, I would have said to sell automotive hard parts to technician customers. It still is to a large extent, but there's a lot more competition now and more on the way all the time. It seems there is no such thing as a small town market anymore, only small towns served by big mass retailers and an Internet that can offer almost anything to anybody. In short, it's a good thing to find your niche in the market and to make it yours — just don't let it turn into a rut you can't crawl out of if you must.
Mike Gordon, a 20-year counter sales veteran, works the counter at Sanel Auto Parts, Concord, N.H.
