MaxBlog

from the desk of Mary Mershein

Lululemon shares were $2 in 2007. Five years later they were $76 and the company was worth $10 billion. One reason for the growth was the creation of "scarcity" in which stores kept only a limited supply of merchandise. Low inventory levels forced customers to buy or lose out when the item goes out of stock, creating a buying frenzy. Lululemon also rarely sold items on sale, even charging over four times the price of similar items at the competition.
Costco was the first company to grow from zero to $3 billion in sales in less than six years. As of Feb 26, 2012, net sales for the first half year were $44 billion. Similar to Lululemon, Costco carries many items for a very limited time, encouraging customers to buy while they can. Costco does not carry multiple brands or products whose cost is too high, even if it’s a popular brand such as Coca Cola. Costco also does not stock extra bags or packing materials. Products are delivered to stores on shipping pallets and displayed that way, rather than arranged beautifully on shelves. There are also long lineups at the cashiers, hefty membership fees and the inconvenience of buying items in large bulk sizes.
In 1919 the first Loblaws grocery store opened using a new retail concept called self-service, the opposite to the traditional full service. Under full service, store employees fetched items for customers, weighed items and calculated the total purchase. The total was then added to the customer’s account for later payment. Home delivery was usually included free of charge. Under the new self-serve model, customers browsed freely throughout the store, picked-up their own goods without the aid of a staff person and then paid at a central cashier. There was no payment on account or home delivery. As with Lululemon and Costco, popular items might not be in stock to encourage customers to come again. Despite the lack of service, Loblaws is now Canada’s largest grocery store chain. On Dec 31, 2011, Loblaws had annual net earnings of $769 million on revenues of $31.25 billion.
Selling at an inconvenience. Refusing to sell. Selling out. Self-selling. High price selling. Low price selling. Selling directly from shipping pallets. Selling memberships. Creating urgency to buy through scarcity. These are all NOT the typical sales tactics of a traditional retailer where full service with plenty of convenience and a variety of in stock products arranged beautifully on shelves are the norm. Yet, these tactics drove these companies to success.

Accounting does not record sales strategies as having any value even when they are the key success to generating sales and company growth. In contrast, financial statements record inventory. More inventory increases the assets on the balance sheet and the value of the company. Yet it was the lack of inventory which often created the sales frenzy to drive the growth and value of these companies.

How does your company sell its products? Is there plenty on the shelf or limited supply in hot demand? How do you sell yourself?

©2012

Mary Mershein, CA is a professional accountant with a master’s degree in management who believes common sense is our greatest financial analysis. Additional common sense can be found at www.moosemoney.wordpress.com.

In business we tend to ignore the soft skills and concepts and focus on getting dollars into our wallets. This focus limits the amount of dollars that will actually flow into our wallets! :-)

There's a basic soft skill that I call "being complete." This distinction is simple and powerful and will always yield a result in the business world.

When we are complete with things we are free to focus fully on the task at hand as well as operate from a creative paradigm.

How do you know you aren't complete with something? You can't let it go. It haunts you (or at least hangs around in your brain more than you are comfortable with). Getting complete can be difficult because of all the crap we have around it. Things can be over or "finished" but the person can still be incomplete. High School is a great example, there are people who have graduated High School, gone on to College and are currently in their careers who are still not complete with High School. The thought of getting complete about High School is misunderstood with the idea that you are somehow weak or mentally inept. Others may even judge you in saying something like "Dude, it was HIGH SCHOOL! 20 years ago! Get over it!"

But when you're incomplete there's no way to "get over" it. Because something's incomplete. You need to do something, hear something, or say something to get complete about that. Once you're complete -it will no longer weigh you down, get in the way, take up space in your thoughts, feelings, or being. It's gone. Done. COMPLETE!

Sometimes we carry incompletions around our whole lives and don't even know it. I had coffee with an old acquaintence a few weeks ago who wanted to make amends for something he did to me over 30 years ago. I was between 9-12 yrs old. I couldn't even remember the deed. He brought it up and pushed through the conversation. Feeling incomplete himself about the whole thing. I didn't think much of it at the time. I thanked him, told him I forgive him -and we kept talking for awhile then we went on our way. On the drive home I was overcome with emotion about it. Kind of snuck up on me. It was a wonderful experience to become free of a blind incompletion in my life. It was really peaceful. Again, the power of completion.

So what does this have to to with attracting business to you? Just EVERYTHING! When you are complete you become a clearing for more powerful relationships to arise. You start to serve others with more clarity and focus on them -not yourself. This is automatic as you become more and more complete.

All business is about relationships so it stands to reason that you will be increasing your relationships and therefore your business.

To get compete, take a book and write out EVERYTHING you can think of that you regret, are disappointed in, want to repeat (this could be a good thing -not just negative things!), or events that happened that you feel have shaped who you are today.

Next, ask yourself what you would need to do (any actions you need to take) that would have you never have to think of this event again. Or you may have to hear something (from someone or something online). Or you may need to get into communication with someone to say something about this event. To have that person really listen to you and "get" you. It is the act of being "gotten" that has completion occur.

Once you do this you'll notice things change in your life and business almost automatically because in a way you now are seeing life through a very different context. It's a new view that isn't tinted by the incompletions of your past hanging around.

This blog post is not complete. :-)