But look at most successful retail businesses that you can think of – from supermarkets to clothing stores to game stores to pet stores – most successful retail businesses take advantage of clearance sales.
Why should you have a clearance sale at your store? 2 HUGE benefits:
1. Many of your customers will be happy to find wines or spirits similar to those they usually enjoy on sale for ridiculously low prices.
2. These sales will move products that are taking up space on your shelves and in your storage area out of your store.
It is hard to part with products that you already bought at the same price you bought it at – no profit.
I know.
But think about it this way: you have already lost your money on this product.
You paid for it a long time ago - it hasn’t sold, or is selling very poorly and you have more than a few bottles left.
What makes you think that these bottles will all of a sudden start selling in the future?
THEY WON’T.
If it hasn’t sold this year, it most likely won’t sell next year either.
How to start your clearance sale:
Get these products out of your store before the labels start peeling off, or the wine goes bad – before it is garbage. After all, you couldn’t give away stuff like that if you wanted to. So the next time you’re in your store, grab some paper, something hard to write on as you walk around, and get ready to spend a few hours checking out your shelves.
***NOTE: Life is wonderful with a good POS system, so if you have one set up, an easier way to do this is to use the POS to generate a list of items that haven’t sold and that have sold less than 3 or 4 bottles in the past 8-12 months.***
These are the types of bottles you will be looking for:
-Any bottle you are sure hasn’t sold in the past 6 months
-Any lower shelf wines that are 2 years old or older
-Bottles that have labels coming off
-Bottles from the back of your refrigerator that are old
-Weird flavors of hard liquor that aren’t selling unless you push it
-Do the same thing in your storage area – chances are that you have much more stuff there that you should put on clearance than on the shelves.
-If you can - on your POS run a report that shows items that haven't sold at all in the past 5 months.
Great, now get some kind of table set up in an area that every customer who walks in (especially the kind of customer who comes to buy the cheapest pint of vodka from behind the counter) can see it. Cover the table with a tablecloth and print or write out 2 or 3 signs to tape onto the table.
Clearance Sale Table, Everything for 4.99$, 9.99$, or whatever price you think will get it out!
TIP: The bigger the sign, the better – and keep it super super simple. Customers don’t want to think about it, they just want the clearance.
Pricing:
In my experience, the 5$ mark is the gold mark. When I put up a simple sign that has “CLEARANCE: EVERYTHING 5$!!” the table is empty within one day.
Other than that, selling at cost is the easiest method.
You won’t be making all of your money back on each item, as some items on the 5$ table were bought at 8.50$ for example, but 5$ and more space and organization is WORTH IT! Plus, the satisfaction your customer will receive when you tell them that they are buying the bottle at less than what you got it for.
Keep the pricing simple. It is much more effective to have set prices like 5$ or 15$ for a whole selection of items than to have individual clearance prices. Also, it is easier for customers to understand that something costs 15$ than it is to compute how much 50% off is. The easier it is for the customer to understand, the more likely he is to make a purchase.
Benefits and tips:
If you see a customer is buying a bargain wine already, like Gato Negro, point them to your table of higher quality wine for a similar price! This works very well.
Some customers will be suspicious as to why you are putting items on clearance. Many assume that it is already spoiled. Assure customers who seem to be on the fence about making the purchase that it is in fact a good product. This alone can double your clearance sales.
Another way to speed up the sale is to just have your cashier mention it to every customer! Before ringing them up, have them say “oh, by the way we have a lot of great products on clearance right now. It’s really popular and I’ve sold like 20 bottles today already, did you see it?” You may be surprised by how a little light conversation like this goes.
In our experience, elderly customers are the ones who show the most interest, and purchase the most from these sales. So when you have an elderly customer come in help them find what they are looking for first, then tell them about the great opportunity to save big. These are the types of customers who will walk out with a case of bottles time and time again.
After you have sold a few dozen items, you will have more shelf space! This is a great opportunity to add another row of a high profit item to sell it even faster.
Sometimes, products that salespeople push on us in order to get tasting bookings or similar trade-offs go straight to our clearance table. You should consider trying something like this. If it doesn’t work for your store, that’s fine, but try it out at least once.
P.S. If you plan on having a clearance sale in the near future, consider changing your receipt message to notify your customers.
ex: “Pike’s Mid-Summer Clearance Sale Going On 06/01 – 06/11”
Don’t let your dead inventory hold you back - get rid of it with a clearance sale.
