![]() Sales for the Dave’s stores spiked, and according to Ratner, the revenue was “found business” that did not cannibalize Christmas sales. The coupons were valid only during the second week in December, another traditionally slow week for the chain. To counteract competitors’ efforts, he mailed out discount coupons to the top 3,000 names in his database. “You couldn’t turn on your TV and not see one,” says Ratner. At the same time, Internet-based pet supply companies began aggressive marketing strategies late in the year. By late last year, its efforts to do so were in full swing, and Dave’s was feeling the impact in lost sales.Īdding to the injury, Iams had the highest margin among all brands carried, even surpassing that of the house brand. Right after the acquisition, P&G announced it would widen the brand’s distribution channels to include mass-market outlets. purchased The Iams Co., which markets a brand of pet food that had been available only through specialty stores. For example, last August Procter & Gamble Co. In special circumstances, however, Ratner will still use discount coupons. Ratner plans to double the number of pies he will give away this Thanksgiving, and will consider different incentives for mailings at other times of the year. Ratner also wanted to have enough pies on hand for “the next guy in line” – the customer who wasn’t highly ranked enough to receive a coupon, but was in the store when another customer redeemed a coupon. “Pies are fragile,” says Ratner, whose hands-on role in disposing of the broken ones, which he didn’t want to give to customers, caused him to gain 15 pounds. Ratner’s decision to mail fewer coupons than pies was a practical one inventory control proved difficult. They could only be redeemed during the three days before Thanksgiving, a period that traditionally has been off for the business. Nevertheless, total sales for the week jumped 30%.Īlthough Ratner didn’t say whether the number of customers increased as well, the coupon probably was at least partly responsible. The coupons were a thank-you for being a loyal customer and didn’t require a purchase, although recipients had to come into the stores to redeem them. Ratner mailed coupons good for a free pie to just under 3,000 of his best customers, based on how much they spent from the beginning of the year. This past Thanksgiving, in place of the firm’s usual quarterly discount mailing, Ratner bought 3,000 apple pies from a local supermarket for $2 apiece – significantly less than what he was rebating to his customers. Ratner, who tracks customer purchases through coded coupons and Club Dave, the chain’s in-store loyalty program, found that the mailings generated bulk purchases of low-profit soda and pet food instead of the more lucrative pet supplies. “They were killing us,” he says of the postcards. Having to rely on direct mailings that offered discounts had been a problem for Dave Ratner, “chief instigating officer” of Agawam, MA-based Dave’s Soda & Pet City. Ratner’s response to the threats of boycotts and vicious things being said about him on social media has been to repudiate the Trump White House.For one pet supply retailer, several thousand apple pies did what coupons couldn’t: they created goodwill among customers while keeping store margins intact. ![]() He has a record and reputation as a good corporate citizen. He is hardly alone among small-business owners who have complained that the Affordable Care Act has hurt their flexibility and bottom line. Still, there’s something very wrong about Ratner being dismissed and savaged as a greedy employer. If Dave Ratner thought the cabal of knaves currently occupying the White House are inclined to tell the truth about anything, he’s got bigger problems than I thought. Many of the other changes in the Executive Order are likely to make it harder for local residents to get affordable healthcare - the exact opposite of what I was hoping for when I went to Washington.” “It was obviously an error in judgement to believe the White House that this was the only change they would be announcing. We have long supported an effort that would give small businesses more flexibility in purchasing health insurance and we were told that a ceremony would announce that Associations could now provide members with group insurance rates (making health insurance more affordable for our employees).” “I was originally invited to the White House in my role as a member of the National Retail Federation. His explanation for going, detailed in a letter to the editor at The Republican, was honest, heartfelt, and shocking.
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