Retail Product Sourcing - Limited Edition Collectibles

     Coming from a retail management background, I've learned what customer's expect before making a purchase in a retail store.  Even if they're buying an inexpensive item, their purchase comes with a level of expectation.  Knowing these expectations for a product before purchasing a new product for a gift shop or other specialty store are quite important. 
     Consider how functional a collectible product is first.  Even if it is a collectible for display only, the function and design of the product create a single force that impulses the customer to purchase.  For example, although a collectible plate would not be used for fear of damaging its finish, its function as a plate is entirely replaced by its form and function as wall art or a tabletop display.  This is where form and function merge, as the design of the plate featuring colors, textures, and shape, become the force of its function as a display piece.  A collectible that doesn't provide high contrast, texture, or some other artistic value, will no longer hold its form and be considered a waste to the potential buyer.  Then the collectible will simply waste inventory dollars and retail display space until it is liquidated at a heavily discounted price.  The loss extends beyond the retailer's cost of the item, and affects the profitability per square foot, the most important point of success for a traditional retailer (versus online retail).
     So how does a retail store plan and design new products to fill the consumer demand while avoiding potential dud products?  This is where design and sourcing strategy are most important.  Having a strong working relationship with a product marketing company can provide insight on consumer demand for products based on the sourcing company's overall sales history.  Having a graphic designer who can make an imprinted product stand out among the other products on the shelves is also key.  This combination will make each new product that hits your store display cases another hit among many strong sellers.  When a product immediately sells as soon as it is available to customers in a store, that's a home run product, and sales numbers will benefit from its presence in the product mix.

Top Selling Collectibles for Retailers:

     What are some of the top selling collectibles that every gift retailer should consider?  To start with, glass ball ornaments are one of the most attractive items available for gift shops to carry.  With their full-color imprint on a select glass color, each ornament stands out like a work of art.  Better yet, each glass ball ornament automatically comes inside a break-resistant display box to catch the eye of the customer.  Another top-selling retail collectible is custom woven afghans.  These natural woven cotton blankets have many thread colors as a tapestry, or two colors as a 2-1/2 layer afghan for simplified design.  To boost the sales of afghans, complimentary pillows can be sold along with the woven blankets.  Another top seller for the collectibles market is custom designer mugs and glasses.  These can be etched with an image into the surface of the ceramic or glass, molded medallions can be attached to your selection of mug, screen printed images can be printed onto the drink ware, or even a photographic image can be permanently printed into a ceramic mug.  The design options are quite open for collectible mugs and glasses, so it's probably best to ask a promotional marketing firm which designs are most in demand.  Choosing one of these product categories as an addition to your gift shop should be a start towards positive sales growth. 
      
How to Start Sourcing New Products for Your Gift Shop:    

      First of all, browse custom collectibles on a reliable supplier's website for design ideas.  Look at your store's sales numbers for what are your strongest selling products, and which are the weakest.  Focus on moving the weakest products out of your inventory, but understand what makes those products weak sellers.  Is it quality issue?  Does the product appear dated?  Are there too many similar products in your store that the entire store's sales suffer?  Does your product selection appeal to not enough of your customers?
     After considering the new products you wish to add to your store's selection, choose a design feature that would be consistent with your gift shop's purpose.  For example, if your gift shop is specifically for military themed gifts, choose a design that will mean something important to the likely shoppers.  If your gift shop deals with history of a place or person, select images that convey that history well.  Whatever images you choose, it's important to then provide your product supplier with the images for the products selected.  A professional supplier will then provide conceptual design ideas for the images to be featured in style on the products you wish to add to your gift shop.  This takes the guesswork out of product sourcing, and provides your retail store with improved product selection and sales growth.   

Fundraising for a Main Street Program (the National Trust for Historic Preservation Program)

There are literally millions of ways to fundraise for a Main Street Program, the program sponsored by the National Trust for Historic Preservation to preserve historical districts in cities across the United States.  How many of those fundraisers actually promote historical events, buildings, and people alone is an important question to ask when considering the fundraising options available. 

When a fundraiser promotes historical awareness on its own, not only should it raise funds effectively to preserve history, but it should also promote an appreciation of history.  What good is a fundraiser that only raises funds but leaves a historical group's purpose out of the equation? 

"How can a fundraiser promote history even if its not connected to a historical cause?", you may be asking.  It can do so by using historical subjects as its feature image on a collectible product.  Woven tapestries, afghans, collectors plates, mugs, and custom ornaments are just a few of the collectibles that preserve history.  For example, Norman Rockwell's art stayed relevant long after his death simply because collectibles featuring his art are still available today!  We may not own original sketches he created, but thousands of families own collectible plates with his colorful artwork on them.

In creating an unusual fundraising collectible for a main street program or historical group, it's a task to select an image that will sell well when its printed on the collectible.  In this case, having a graphic artist to help choose the image for the collectible can help, as can product consultants at Keystone Specialties, who create new collectibles for many main street programs to use as fundraisers each year.

Here's an link to see how an image your main street program or historical society sends us is transformed into a work of art for your fundraiser collectible:
http://www.keystonespecialties.com/treasuredscenes/art-process.html

As you can see from the progression shown, the end product's image represents the original photo well, but still provides a romantic view of the photo that may even seem more desirable than the original photograph.  That's the magic of product design.  If it's going to sell well, it has to look fantastic at first glance, and there's no better way to accomplish this than through Keystone Specialties' graphic design department. 

Read more about Main Street Fundraising Programs

Become familiar with Historical Society Fundriasing Ideas

Request a Treasured Scenes Catalog