Change Your Displays and Cases For Bridal Season and More Tasks for Your September To-Do List

Sep. 1-7

MERCHANDISING Labor Day (Sept. 2) is the unofficial end of summer. Change your window display as your market’s thoughts turn to engagements and bridal season. Consider getting your large loose diamonds out of the vault and mounting them individually to let them shine in their full glory.

MARKETING Spend time investigating how your customers are finding you and what brought them into your store, be it from a billboard, print ad, social media, or digital ad. “If you have software such as The Edge, you can run a ‘Why In’ report showing you the data behind this to help you determine where to put your marketing dollars for the final part of the year,” notes consultant Megan Crabtree.

Sep. 8-14

OUTREACH Look to see if there’s a holiday gift show in your area. It’s a good way to pump up your early-holiday season sales. These are popular in many areas and some have stipulations on products being “locally made.”

DISPLAY Organize your bridal diamond case into groupings that match how your sales presentations’ flow, urges Larry Johnson, author of THE GUIDE TO EFFECTIVE JEWELRY DISPLAY. “Be sure you have all you need so you never have to get up and leave the customer,” he says.

FINANCES Meet with your CPA and discuss a strategy for 2025. New small-business tax breaks have been introduced in recent years. Are you taking advantage of them?

Sep. 15-21

TRAINING Three months out from Christmas is a good time to intermittently introduce role-playing to your morning meetings. Identify the skills your staff need to work on and record the action on a video camera so your people can see and hear their body language and their voice. Watch the videos as a team and discuss ways to improve.

MARKETING Assemble “bridal bags” complete with wedding band certificate, jewelry cleaner, coupons from local bridal vendors and a free gift certificate to get the bride-to-be into your store.

SERVICES If you offer in-house ear piercing, take a tip from last year’s America’s Coolest Store winner Eliza Page in Austin, TX, and send a quarterly reminder to clients, supported by ear piercing events to promote new designer ear piercing collections.

Sep. 22-28

MARKETING Big companies often start by making or selling things and end up generating a huge portion of their revenue from financial services, a la Starbucks, Apple and Toyota. If you don’t offer financing, get busy exploring the options. “If you go to any mall store, they are really selling a payment, not quality or style,” notes Torin Bales, owner of Torin Bales Fine Jewelry in Victoria, TX. “Once you get them in, they’ll keep coming back — for bridesmaids’ gifts, wedding bands and anniversary gifts.”

SHOP Go through finished repairs that haven’t been picked up. Try to clear them out.

MARKETING Draw up a list of top customers to receive $50, $75 or $100 gift cards.