Is Your Store Summer Ready?

Seasonality is more important than you may think to your store’s success.  It’s June now and you can surely count on your customers to start coming into your store for those summertime essentials.  Sure, your regular customers will likely still visit to pick up their typical items, but many will likely start to change or add to their routine in one way or another.  If your store isn’t capitalizing on the opportunity pick up some extra profit on summertime spending, you’ll really be missing out.

Keep Them Cool

Of course with the increase in daily temperature and the extra hours of sunlight per day, many people are trying to find the best ways to keep cool.  Most customers will seek out the coldest beverages and of course ice and water.  While refreshing drinks are a staple for summer months, there’s also a great opportunity for increased sales by stocking fresh items like produce, salads, or even cold cut sandwiches

Keep It Fun

For many families, summer means having some fun in the sun or even taking trips.  This summer, consider stocking toys like squirt guns or even pool “floaties” that people can pick up on their way to enjoy leisure time.  Typically, when summer comes, impulse buys can increase so items like sunglasses or even fireworks could be great to start carrying.

Carry Other Essentials

With the increase in traveling and time spent doing outdoor activities, it makes perfect sense for convenience and grocery stores to make sure their carrying health and beauty needs.  By stocking sunscreen, lotions, allergy medicines, bug spray, and even travel sized toiletries you have the opportunity to become almost a one-stop shop for customers’ summer supplies.

Try Promotions

One great way to boost your summer sales is to run time and season specific promotions.  By offering special deals on the items your customers are likely to be seeking you have a good chance of bringing them to your store for more than just the promoted items.  When you cross-promote items that sell well together, you can increase basket size and even influence consumer habits.

Snacks Matter

During summer, convenience stores see a 17% increase in volume and snack food becomes the driver of sales.  As many people are traveling and frequently on-on-the-go during the summer, they appreciate the stores where they can stop by and satisfy their snack desires.  As a study by Planalytics showed that the types of snacks that will be sold the most will generally depend on the region.  Despite location factors, you can count on frozen snacks being a “hot” item wherever you may be.

More Money to Spend

Since regular gas prices are expected to continue decreasing to an average of $2.04 per gallon, the lowest average since 2004, there is plenty more money to be made in convenience and grocery stores.  Not only will consumers be traveling more due to the cheaper cost, they’ll also enjoy having an average of $700 more in their pockets this year.  Don’t miss your opportunity to profit from these extra funds by meeting their travel and snack needs.

While summer is a definite easy opportunity to increase your sales, you should really be considering seasonality throughout the year.  As you continue to stock your shelves and work on marketing for your business, you should pay attention to the items that are most attractive throughout different times in the year.  Take advantage of holidays, weather, and even economic trends.  Customers value the businesses that are providing what they want, at the times they want it.