Wade Spicer, president and CEO of Strong Industries, Inc., likens a hot tub’s hardcovers to the tires on a car. Strong Industries manufactures Strong Spas and the Titan HardCover. In 2016, the ULTRASTRONG CoverLift System will be built in to 90 percent of Strong Spas. “It’s an integral part of the hot tub, not an…
WHEN THE NEW ENGLAND SPAS VALET SERVICE TRUCK drives down the highway like a mobile billboard, onlookers may notice a white-gloved hand presenting a hot tub full of people on a silver platter. Norm Coburn, company president, says this butler imagery conveys the value of hot tub valet service. When New England Spas opened 30…
You’re at the gym, just finishing your treadmill workout. Before you jump off and head home, you check your workout stats — length, distance traveled, average speed and calories burned — on the treadmill control panel. Maybe instead you check your FitBit. This is what we’ve grown accustomed to doing with our workouts: We log,…
Photography by Meghan Molin Rich Strick wanted a hot tub. To help subsidize the cost of buying and owning one, he and his wife Barb figured they could rent it out, moving it to customers’ homes to let them use for a period of time. “But then it was gone all the time,” Barb Strick…
My son and I were waiting patiently at a local coffee shop for our food order. The lunch crowd began to grow. I felt my anxiety slowly rising, as I knew I only had a small window to work out before the gym daycare closed — and our order still hadn’t arrived. After a brief…
It would be so nice if your customers came into your store regularly to check out the new spas and accessories. In real life, they may visit somewhat regularly to pick up chemicals, and probably not as often to your service area. When they do visit your service area, however, it’s usually important to them,…
Truck wraps, logo uniforms…retailers have used these and other means to brand and promote their businesses for years. Here, a group of success-minded spa retailers offers six tested concepts that keep them visible and produce revenue. No. 6: Direct Marketing Brooke Rossi, retail general manager at Wilmington, Ill.-based DesRochers Backyard Pools & Spa stores, makes…
Photography By Adam Wickham I took a look at some retailers opening more than 100 stores a year: Forever 21: 470 Dunkin’ Donuts: 410 Dollar Tree: 375 Tim Horton’s: 300 O’Reilly Auto Parts: 200 Dick’s Sporting Goods: 105 Hobby Lobby: 101 Imagine the number of people needed to pull off this many store openings, especially…
Method No.5: FileMaker for iPad and iPhone Dan Friedman of the Northern California’s The Hot Tub Store chain has adopted online subscription software platform FileMaker for store-to-store inventory communication, inventory control and up-to-the-minute service call updates. “My service manager, Steve, created systems and forms for sharing customer, workflow and project management data entry, as opposed…
As a salesperson, it is our job to sell the product. As a sales professional, understanding the structure of the customer experience will give you the knowledge to retain a customer for life. When a client calls with a service question for the first time often they call their salesman. They have invested their hard-earned…