To those who run their own business

[hogmaw]

I have a website selling records and CDs. On Friday I sent out an email to all my customers announcing a RECESSION SPECIAL with a 20% discount on everything, ending Sunday at midnight. I thought well if Debenhams and M&S can do it, then so can I.

 

I just checked the online orders to see how many there were and I am staggered by the response. Looks like I will be doing nothing all day on Monday apart from taking money and packing boxes. I have worked out that the lower margin will be more than compensated by the higher turnover. I also hope to get a lot more repeat business in future due to the increased interest and hopefully get customers who would previously have shopped elsewhere.

 

Recession, what recession?!

[Jake]

Excellent! Good initiative

 

 

 

Do people still buy CDs?

 

 

 

Talking of records, our youngest saw an old vinyl disc and asked me what it was. I explained and she seemed bemused but quite happy.

A few months later something must've reminded her of it and she asked me "what did you say these big black CDs are called?"

[hogmaw]

Yes but our CD sales are down about 70% in the past 5 years, so you could say we're used to hard times etc while everyone else has been living it up

 

Vinyl has been steady in the same period. There will always be people who prefer their music on a particular format, and stick with it regardless of what else comes along. That's our niche market.

 

I've never done a promotion like this before, and so far so good. Does anyone else out there have any recession busting tricks they might want to share?

[Lbm]

Funnily enough I've reduced my prices by 20%.

So far...f#ck all response

Well done to you though sir

[AntD]

Good on you mate!

[RobD]

if youve got faithless insomnia on vinyl (esp is picture disc!) ill take it off your hands

[RedM]

What sort of music do you sell?

[Mike]

Yeah... what's the URL?

[RedM]

Yeah... what's the URL?

 

It's on his avatar drop down menu thing.

 

Egyptian Jazz!

[Mike]

How niche is that?! genius.

[Gerry]

Sounds like a great move...

 

Just make sure you double check your sums, especially in a recession it's easy to keep busy by lowering your margins, but your overheads will still be the same.

 

You need to make sure you know exactly how much more business you need to keep doing to make the same profit, and the hard bit is keeping it up, if your turnover falls your reduced profit margin will plummet.

 

I'm sure you've got it covered...

 

Sadly my business is always discounting like mad and you can buy identical equipment on-line for silly money

[hogmaw]

Yes I worked it out that I need to sell twice as much to make the same profit. Sales are much higher than double what I would expect so it looks to have worked. It does mean more work though, to make the same money. The trick, I think, is to make it for a very short and limited period, then the customers know they have to buy NOW and not wait until later, which of course might never happen.

 

Website is jazzmanrecords.co.uk and we do soul, jazz, funk etc. I don't like to solicit on this board, but seeing as people asked...!

 

On another note, IIRC the way to calculate how much VAT in a price is to x7 and divide by 47. That's fine for the 17.5% rate, but does anyone know a shortcut for the 15% rate?

[ivan]

Multilpy by 15 then divide by 115?

[carl0s]

Yes I worked it out that I need to sell twice as much to make the same profit. Sales are much higher than double what I would expect so it looks to have worked. It does mean more work though, to make the same money. The trick, I think, is to make it for a very short and limited period, then the customers know they have to buy NOW and not wait until later, which of course might never happen.

 

Website is jazzmanrecords.co.uk and we do soul, jazz, funk etc. I don't like to solicit on this board, but seeing as people asked...!

 

On another note, IIRC the way to calculate how much VAT in a price is to x7 and divide by 47. That's fine for the 17.5% rate, but does anyone know a shortcut for the 15% rate?

 

Well, the reason your trick works is because you are multiplying by "vat amount over gross amount" of an example figure, i.e. £47 gross is £40 + £7 vat. So to do the same on the 15% vat you could do "multiply by 6 over 46", which can then be shortened to "3/23", because with the new 15% VAT rate £40 + vat equals £46, so the VAT element in this example is £6, giving 6/46 or 3/23.

 

Also if you wanted to see how a price might change with the new VAT rate, just multiple the gross figure by (1.15/1.175).

E.g something costing £376 including VAT at the moment will cost £368 at 15% VAT.

[hogmaw]

Carlos you are almost as clever as Tannhauser

[carl0s]

Carlos you are almost as clever as Tannhauser

 

lol, not likely!

[RiceRocket]

I suppose you have to be careful it's not just a Xmas response thing otherwise well done

[keener]

I've noticed that I've lost some clients this year (through no fault of mine I might add - some have closed down etc) but orders from my remaining clients are up on last year.

I've just expanded the options of what I supply which gives me a little more work but not massively and we're doing a 3 for the price of 2 special offer. The majority of the cost is in producing the first one so if they order 2 it more than covers the cost of printing the 3rd given the volume I'm printing at the moment.

 

My gf has a theory that in this recession people aren't spending money on the big things like cars, tv's, kitchens etc but are still willing to grab a bargain on the smaller items. It seems to be working for me - I'm flat out at the moment.

[marbleapple]

 

My gf has a theory that in this recession people aren't spending money on the big things like cars, tv's, kitchens etc but are still willing to grab a bargain on the smaller items. It seems to be working for me - I'm flat out at the moment.

 

 

Think thats a good theory