The Scarlet Tassel Adds Value with Services Beyond the Store

When Deirdre and I established our business, we shared a vision of what we wanted The Scarlet Tassel to known for, and topping that list was excellent customer service.  As we've grown into our store and our brand, we've developed a distinct retail personality and a strong presence in the local community.  Customer service is no longer limited to inside the store.

Our services have expanded to include workshops, design services, show houses and special events.  Having expanded our reach, we're realizing the benefit of added value in the form of brand recognition, a glowing reputation and increasing profits.

Yesterday, for example, we spent the day decorating and designing a room for the Roswell Women's Club Showcase home.  It's a 22,000-sq-ft. home and some of the designers are using product loaned to them by local retailers.  Our situation is unique in that everything in our room is from our store, allowing us to not only showcase our product and The Scarlet Tassel point of view, but also what we can do through our design services.

We offer two levels of design service.  Our in-house interior designer handles projects requiring extensive consultation, including large furniture purchases, window treatments and space planning.  The more nontraditional, and growing, design service is our Accessory Calls business where we go into the client's home and help with finishing touches and accessorizing.

We've extended Accessory Calls to include seasonal decorating and it's becoming a significant part of our business.  We charge an hourly rate, only for the time spent in the customer's home — the consultation and installation.  We'll hang artwork, position lamps, arrange bookshelves and mantels.  On the walkthrough, whatever the customer doesn't like, we'll bring back to the store.  We think Accessory Calls could grow to 10% to 20% of our business and are already devoting staff to it.

The more traditional, and growing, design service
is our Accessory Calls business where we go into the client's
home and help with finishing touches and accessorizing.

Free in-store design workshops are an important part of our open houses, something for which we've become known.  We have five open houses a year — spring, summer, fall, holiday and anniversary — and send out anywhere from 60,000 to 100,000 postcards.  The postcards list all the workshops with dates and times, and customers are required to sign up in advance.  Despite the fact that we set up 30 chairs, it's not uncommon to have standing room only, especially during the holiday event when we have wall-to-wall people.

One of the challenges we have is keeping the events fresh and new, so we're always trying to think up new topics or angles.  Last year we tried a breakfast workshop, Design and Dine, for which we charged a small fee and served a catered breakfast.  The workshop not only imparted decorating information, but each attendee received a small booklet of decorating tips we created just for the event.

From day one Shelly and I've been brand-conscious, and it's supported and reinforced in just about everything we do.  Each gift is tied with a red ribbon and our signature red tassel.  Everyone who works here wears a red carpenter's apron which helps customers identify staff and gives us a place to put things — nails, tape measures, notes, etc.

The other thing we've done since the first day is collect names and addresses.  Our house file has more than 10,000 names.  We also have a corporate gift program that's especially popular during the holidays, gift certificates that we're in the process of changing into gift cards, and a wish list.  The wish list is our version of a registry — we don't do a traditional bridal registry because our product changes so quickly and we don't carry a lot of tabletop — but we stay on top of it and alert family and friends in advance of birthdays, anniversaries and special gift-giving occasions.

Early last year we started taking the design workshops in the road — one of our customers needed a presentation for her meeting and asked Shelly if she'd conduct one offsite.  It amounted to a miniature table-decorating workshop, with product from the store, conducted at no charge because we benefit tenfold in the loyalty and interest it creates for our store.  Plus, Shelly's become the garden club queen — she did an offsite workshop last week and has three more planned before the month is out.

Working within the community, reaching out to the community, it really increases our store's presence and importance.  There are all kinds of connections that result, and it gets word of mouth going big time.

When Shelly went to one home recently to conduct a workshop, the hostess shared a lot of wonderful things about The Scarlet Tassel shopping experience with the group.  Hearing the customer describe how well we're delivering on the very vision we initially developed for our store is very rewarding because we know we're on the right track.

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