If owning your own store is more appealing to you than working from home, I can only assume you know the demand of the retail industry. With the daunting figure of 60 percent of new businesses failing in the first year, it always impresses me when the determined entrepreneur plunges ahead with her dreams anyway.
In order to determine whether you have a viable business prospectus, you must have completed a thorough business plan and covered every area. There is no hedging in this all-important start-up overview. By really investigating each area we covered in the section on business plans, you will feel a peace of mind that you are ready, that you have the necessary funds (including a substantial buffer), and that you know your competition, your target market, and your inventory inside out.
For a sample business plan for a retail scrapbooking store, go to http://wsj.miniplan.com/spv/3625/. Here you will find a sample business plan for a brick-and-mortar retail scrapbooking store called It’s Scrappy!
“I spent over a year researching the scrapbook retail market before I approached a bank for a business loan,” Penny McDaniel of Legacies LLC told me. “What you expect and what you plan for are not necessarily what you get,” she cautions. Doing your homework helps eliminate the really costly mistakes that can sink you before your first customer enters the door.
There are always exceptions to the rule. Ranea Hasstedt, founder of Scrap 2 It, in Fort Collins, Colorado told me she opened her store on a whim. When I asked her if she had first run a home-based business, she said, “Nope. I had been scrapbooking for about fifteen years and knew a lot about the merchandise and the subject matter. I never thought about running my own store. I just finally got tired of going to the Internet where you are sometimes disappointed in the merchandise when it’s finally delivered to you. The paper may not look like the same color you saw online, or it may not be as bright. I was also tired of driving to Denver, an hour away, to find a good scrapbooking store, so I opened my own.”
Ranea Hasstedt seems to be in the right place at the right time. When I asked her if she applied for a tradition bank loan to fund her store, she shook her head and said, “Nope. SBA loan.” When I asked if it took the typical year for approval, she grinned and said, “I got it in three weeks!”
Small Business Loans are a great way to go and I highly recommend looking into them for your funding needs. The SBA is fully vested in helping the little guy have their shot in the vast business arena.
That said, let’s see what you can expect.
Obviously, one of the main pros to opening a retail site is the income potential. You are able to increase inventory and thus (hopefully) sales. You perhaps have an area for a workshop; workshops generate revenue and increase product sales. Your ability to offer innovative ideas, classes, holiday specials, etc., has more impact due to the clout that owning a retail outlet gives you over a home-based setup. You have more money for advertising and may own a website as well.
Manufacturers are more willing to work with you as a retail concern; you are now in a position to “wheel and deal,” or jockey for better shipping rates and bulk discounts. Costly catalogues are dutifully dispatched to your door, along with sales incentives.
I sat at one of the craft tables just inside the door of Scrap 2 It with its owner Ranea Hasstedt. I got to see first-hand how each customer was greeted by her the moment they walked in the door. Every one of them had a question about a product. Some brought in a scrap of paper they wanted to duplicate in color and texture, some asked for a specific stamping tool, or embellishment they couldn’t find online. She popped up immediately and walked with them to the section of the store where the needed item was kept. The customer service was phenomenal. This is something you cannot get from an online store. She was happy to recommend replacements if the paper color was just not something she carried and each customer left with a smile and a “thank you.”
Touching the array of merchandise in her store was an immediate understanding of just how tactile this business is. You can feel the puffy, embossed papers and get a sense of the depth in the layered paper techniques. That, along with the personal service, advice and encouragement make the brick-and-mortar stores something to be cherished and patronized.
Depending on the number of hours you are willing to work and the profit you are able to “plug back” into your business, you can achieve any reasonable goal you’ve set for yourself.
Speaking of hours worked, we now enter the cons arena. Most successful scrapbook business owners work an average of forty to sixty hours a week, especially in the beginning, when the cost of employees is too prohibitive or they feel a need to oversee the operations personally. Be sure now that you can handle that kind of workload and stress. Multitasking takes on a whole new meaning when you open a retail business.
“The cons are few,” Jeanna Maire states. “One may be that the scrapbooking industry is booming popular, and keeping up with all the latest products and having the room and bucks to stock them is very tough. What we think might sell could be completely the opposite.”
Most entrepreneurs feel that if they can run a successful home-based business, they can segue easily into retail. Au contraire! Besides the business of funding (a rather large detail to be considered), you will also need to become an expert on real estate in a brief period of time. Checking out store sites, measuring space, and haggling over lease agreements, zoning laws, and sign allotment are only a few of the headaches in store.
When you take on a lease site, it will come in one of three forms: new construction, existing store site, or existing site in need of remodeling.
New construction gives you a wider range of design options, but also many decisions to make. Technically termed a vanilla shell, a brand-new site will be a bare-bones minimum.
“You will get the perimeter walls up and dry-walled,” according to Peter Kast of Realtec Commercial Realty in Fort Collins, Colorado. “You may or may not get a suspended ceiling; the downside being you cannot have your heating or air conditioning distributed without a suspended ceiling. You will receive an electrical panel, but not necessarily distributed electrical outlets. Your walls will be taped, but not painted, and a vanilla shell does not include floor covering.”
As you can see, there is a lot of expense involved with a new site. If you want any kind of partition walls, you will either design these yourself or hire an architect to help you with the placement of walls, bathrooms, work areas, etc.
Penny McDaniel of Legacies LLC emphasized knowing who your neighbors are if you are looking into setting up shop in a strip mall or plaza. “No one should be competing with you, even on a subtle basis,” she stated. Find out if any store in the mall is selling albums or photographic embellishments. If you offer a professional photographer as an added service, make sure there is not a photography studio within the plaza’s perimeter. This should be included in your lease agreement.
“Lock in your lease for at least three years,” Penny cautioned. “This locks them into a lease price that can’t escalate on you.”
When asked what she saw as the biggest problem resulting in businesses closing their doors, she said, “Undercapitalization”!
If you are looking at an existing store front, you will probably save a lot of money over incorporating your ideas into a new construction location. An existing site will have the walls finished, flooring, lighting, bathrooms, etc. You may not like the wall color, but paint is inexpensive. Perhaps the green and pink linoleum is not to your liking, and you decide to peel it up and go with the new trend in color-glazed cement. The bathrooms may need a little updating, and the microwave the previous owner left behind was probably purchased during the Brady Bunch era. These are all fairly minor expenses.
Put your finishing touch on it, erect your shelves and racks, throw down a colorful welcome mat at the door, and it feels like it’s been yours all along.
Ranea Hasstedt of Scrap 2 It said she was lucky in that the store she took over was a scrapbook store before her. “It’s 6,000 square feet, which is a lot of space and overhead. We arranged things the way we thought our customers would like it, created welcoming spaces for work tables, a kid’s area (which the former owner did not have) and put our touch on things. I would like to repaint the walls, but other than that, it serves our purpose. It also came in handy when you talk about location. The fact that the store was already a scrapbook store before us had customers already aware of where we were.”
Read your lease carefully. What may have worked for the business just vacating the premises does not necessarily work for you. Watch the parking arrangements, sign allotment, and operating hours. You may want evening hours for workshops, but the landlord does not want the security responsibility.
“You need to be a strong negotiator,” Penny McDaniel states. “Hit what insurance the landlord will cover and what you’re expected to cover hard! In case of water damage from the store next to you, is that your insurance responsibility or the landlord’s?”
You may decide on an existing site, but the walls are in the wrong place and you need an additional work area for classes. You may want two bathrooms instead of one, or a sink area in the workspace for cleanup. This requires remodeling, and may include an architect and his subsequent fees. The landlord will probably have covenants you will have to comply with concerning whether you and your handyman brother-in-law Ralph can do the remodeling yourself, or if you’re required to have a licensed contractor.
The city or county governing your location will need to pass inspection on your work before, during, and after, and the health department and fire commissioner will also need to give you the nod. Materials used in the remodel will have to comply with any number of regulations, and if they don’t, they will shut you down . . . believe me!
While painting murals for new construction, I saw all sorts of horrific things including being shut down the night before the store opening due to illegal wiring in the walls. It pays to get it done right with a contractor or at least or at least hire one to act as a consultant.
Decide now if a play area for children would be worth the extra expense of partitioning off an area secure enough to make parents comfortable that their little ones are safe. Most retail scrapbook owners told me it did pay off for them, and their sales increased due to the fact mothers and fathers could shop without hassle or fear of their toddlers pulling things off the racks. Less stress, more time to buy!
A final word about store sites: It may not be worth your while to set up shop in a space that is too small in an effort to save money. By small, we are talking 1,000 square feet or less. The commercial realtors I interviewed recommended at least 2,000 feet or better in order to stock adequate inventory and provide classes, demonstrations, a child’s play area, etc. Don’t forget handicapped regulations for door, bathroom, and aisle clearance. If you don’t have the funding for adequate space, perhaps you should continue to run your business from your garage or basement for a while longer. You don’t want to sink your entire investment into a site that is undersized or in a poor location.
There is no one in this day and age who has not heard the spiel about the importance of location for a retail business or restaurant; your success or failure can ride entirely on the shoulders of this one business element.
Several factors can help you determine a poor location. Perhaps the store once stood in a busy area of town, but the perimeters have changed and it now resides on the outskirts or in a dilapidated location. The fact that you can get it cheaply is not an incentive. There’s a reason its price is reduced! Perhaps the store is not easily accessible to traffic. Busy intersections can be a plus or minus. While the exposure is wonderful, it may be a nightmare to find an easy turn lane into your parking lot. Ask other stores at that juncture how the traffic has impacted their business; would they choose that location if they had it to do over again?
Jeanna Maire of Your Crop Shop said she chose her location because “We wanted our location to be on a busy intersection, with lots of traffic; plus, we liked the idea that there were a lot of schools around us.” She went on to say, “Our store sits a little far off the road, and we are hidden from the main drag by a bank. We would like to have more anchors for our shop, such as restaurants, stores, etc. Our location has served us well, but we hope to make a move in the near future.”
We have a brand-new building at a major intersection down the street from us that was constructed four years ago. No one ever moved in. Why? A major drugstore chain built it wanting to profit from the visibility and traffic flow, only to find out after they built it that the two accesses to the parking lot were a mess. Neither traffic direction could enter into it without practically circling the block. So, there it sits.
If you have a site in mind, spend some time parked in front of it and notice the foot traffic. What time of day is it heaviest? What about evening hours? How is the parking? Are people circling the lot trying to find a place to park? Is the building in good repair? Do you like the style of the building and the signage allowed? Many plazas and strip malls will dictate if you can use channel letters, Plexiglas backlit signs, or neon. Your logo may be more conducive to a different sign format. We will talk more about that under “Signage” in this chapter.
If you are buying or leasing an existing site, have a building inspector evaluate it. You don’t need to have the added expense of hidden repairs and faulty wiring after you’ve moved in.
The “Competition” section in this chapter will also come to bear on your location decision.
You will need to determine your operating budget based on many things, including your store overhead expenses. These include rent, gas, lights, CAM (maintenance of parking lot and grass, window-cleaning, and snow removal) and insurance. These are fixed expenses that don’t vary month to month.
Variable expenses, such as payroll for your employees, advertising, inventory purchases, legal fees, consulting charges from outside professional guidance, and special promotions, can fluctuate. You may decide you only need help part-time one month, but take on full-time help during holiday seasons. Your advertising budget may vary along with your revenue.
If you are in a mall setup, your lease will determine many of your overhead costs. Read it carefully.
Your first thought when it comes to identifying the competition may be to look up other scrapbooking stores in your Yellow Pages within a thirty-mile radius. Although it’s helpful to get a fix on specialty scrapbook stores in your vicinity, these are not your only competitors. Craft stores such as Hobby Lobby and Michaels have entire aisles of merchandise geared to the scrapper. Department stores such as Target, Kmart, and Wal-Mart offer supplies as well. These giants can afford to run sales and discount merchandise due the bulk rates they receive.
What about the Internet? As of this printing, the Internet was not accountable or restricted by sales tax laws, and its operating hours are 24/7. Internet merchants also offer specialty touches such as page layout designs, new product overview, and customer networking with other scrappers. Can you compete with the enormous amount of product they sell? Their downside is that the customer cannot touch or examine the merchandise, check for true color, or “eyeball” sizes and shapes. That’s where you come in.
There are some very successful direct-sales companies out there, such as Creative Memories, that are making a huge impact on the scrapbook merchandise buying public. With in-home workshops, sales parties, and outstanding customer service, they are a force to be reckoned with.
Finally, there are catalogue companies such as Current that offer orders by mail; home shopping from television programs; and, of course, your in-home business entrepreneur with a fire in his belly to make a mark for himself in the scrapbooking community.
“What is your competition not offering?” Penny McDaniel from Legacies LLC asks. “What hours are they offering? Can you capitalize on that? We’re open until nine at night, and Sundays; most competitors aren’t.”
Jeanna Maire of Your Crop Shop states, “We had nothing on this side of town. The closest store was a fifteen-to-twenty-minute drive away.”
I asked Jeanna how she researched her competition, and she said, “We try and go to visit the competition as much as we can, or we have one of the employees do if for us.”
Janel with The Paper Attic in Sandy, Utah, advised me to tell my readers to “collect your competitor’s newsletters and study their class schedules, workshop topics, operating hours, and specials. Are they doing anything unique?”
Penny McDaniel also commented on the benefit of collecting competitors’ newsletters to study the advantages they offered their customers. Newsletters through direct mailings are very popular and generate a good rate of customer reaction.
“Look at their store and note aisle space and layout,” Janel advises. “Does it look cramped, dark, and unwelcoming? Is the layout confusing, with things bunched in illogical groupings?”
“We listened to our customers and what they were asking for,” Janel went on to say.
“They wanted pre-constructed, themed idea packs so that it was a no-brainer for them to construct well thought out pages all coordinated and ready to go. We listen and rotate ideas based on popularity.”
Listening to your customers is an often-neglected area of business. Instead of hearing complaints, try listening for ideas for improvement that will put you ahead of your competition.
Ranea Hasstedt with Scrap 2 It agrees with that assessment. When I asked her how she kept ahead of the game in knowing what merchandise to stock, she said, “I listen to my customers. Sure, I surf the Internet continually and look at scrapbook magazines, but my customers are on top of it. They will come in and ask for something they saw on a TV craft show or read about in a magazine. Most magazines research their material 6 months before the publication comes out, so often they are asking for something that hasn’t hit the stores yet. I listen and I learn. I keep a list of what they are looking for.”
“The Kids’ Center is a result of customer interaction,” Janel offered. “It is gated and locked, and has a TV, VCR, and toys. These kids are telling their parents they want to come to our store,” she laughs. “It doesn’t get any better than that.”
Jeanna Maire explained some of the wonderful innovations that set Your Crop Shop apart from the competition: “We offer specials such as B.O.G.O. (Buy One Get One) Tuesdays for all of our papers. Senior Wednesdays save our customers 15 percent on their purchases made that day. Also, B.O.G.O. Thursdays offer deals on all roll stickers. I don’t know of any store that offers this. We’ve been offering it for over nine months now. We also have three to four large sales a year, which offer huge savings and unbelievable deals. Another edge is that we only have one store and our customers know us well. One of the managers is usually there working. We are on a first-name basis with many of our customers and have developed friendships with them. Women run the shop, and we relate to our largely female customer base.”
I loved Ranea Hasstedt’s idea for selling merchandise that wasn’t moving at her Scrap 2 It store.
“I have a Garage Sale here in the store. I invite my customers to bring in items they want to sell, such as things they have extras of, or even their homemade items. I then set out papers and merchandise that didn’t do well in the store and offer them at 30% off. I was cleaned out of all my sale items in one day! Everyone had fun and letting the customers sell their things as well brought in people, and gave the people selling their things discretionary income that usually was spent in my store before they left.”
Defining your competition’s strengths and weaknesses is a critical calculation in beginning a new business. Study their inventory and store layout as well as location, operating hours, access to residential areas, schools, etc. If they are offering a volume of merchandise you can’t possibly compete with, you may want to rethink investing your money in a smaller enterprise. Wouldn’t you rather shop where you had more selection, despite the fact the sweet lady at Picture Paste-Ups is offering homemade cookies with each purchase? Find out all you can about your competition before you sign on the dotted line of a lease agreement.
If you can afford to hire employees and you take your time getting the right people for the right job, then by all means do it. A retail business is very demanding, and you’ll need time to recharge your batteries. Working long hours alone with no reprieve is mentally and physically draining; your business will suffer for it, and so will your health.
Many new entrepreneurs turn to family, friends, and other enthusiastic scrappers to staff their store. This had its advantages and disadvantages, as we mentioned earlier.
“Our employees have been great!” enthused Jeanna Maire of Your Crop Shop. “They are definitely a blessing. We have gone outside the box by hiring friends, neighbors, and even great customers to work for us. Some say not to do this, but I think, who better to trust and give you reliability than your friends? The time off is also a great perk since the business is very demanding.”
Of course, there is a flip side to hiring relatives and friends. Friendships can be ruined and family connections strained when communication falters and responsibilities slip. If you are going to use employees who fall inside your personal circle, I would recommend an in-depth meeting where everyone is told under no uncertain terms what is expected of them, when, and the repercussions if store regulations are not met. Who is in charge of inventory stacking and tracking? Who teaches the workshops and at what times? Who closes up, orders the coffee filters, sweeps the floor, greets the customers, etc.?
You want employees who are eager to be there and who pass that enthusiasm on to the customer. Nothing infuses a shopper with energy more than a happy, upbeat environment where it is clear the love of scrapbooking is abundant. Hire people who know their stuff and who offer the customer ideas and information based on tools and techniques they have actually tried. We’ve all been in stores where the employee clearly knew nothing concerning the product we were inquiring about and was doing everything not to yawn.
I’m a strong believer in rewarding a job well done. The morale of your business depends largely on you and how you treat your staff. Keep it a great place to come to work and they will return the favor with loyalty and devoted service. Never address a problem with an employee in front of a customer. It is demeaning to the staff and shows a lack of professionalism to the shopper. Handle things discreetly behind closed doors, and always listen to the employee’s account of the situation. You may not have all the information concerning the problem.
You will find tax information concerning employees is in Chapter 3, “Setting Up Shop.”
If all this information about picking a store site, remodeling and trying to set up shop is getting to you, let me give you a Christmas present early. While interviewing Ranea Hasstedt of Scrap 2 It, she dropped a golden nugget in my lap. When I asked her how she went about figuring out aisles, displays, inventory and everything else when she first looked across that empty floor space, she smiled and said, “I called Notions Marketing.” When I appeared blank, she continued, “Notions Marketing took a look at the floor space via photos I sent to them in Minnesota and sent back a completely planned scrapbooking store space. They call them planograms. Here was everything from where to set up the areas for tools, paper and all the other merchandise, along with a visual planner. They also shipped out all the products and supplies in individual boxes so you could literally lift the collections out the of the box and place them on the displays. They also send reports on the latest hot trends. It was amazing!”
So there you go, a scrapbooking store in a one-stop-shopping format. It takes all the guess work out of planning a new store and figuring out what inventory to begin with. And the best part? All the planograms, designs, and advice are . . . FREE. You pay only for the merchandise. I thought that was pretty amazing. I really appreciated the insight I gained on the tried and tested methods of setting up aisles and display cases, which the talented women I interviewed shared with me.
Janel with The Paper Attic had this to say about displaying merchandise: “Obviously, you group the like items together: die-cuts, templates, ribbons, etc. We organize the papers by company so that we know what’s running low.”
Other scrapbooking store owners I talked to said they grouped their specialty papers by theme and color. This area is a matter of preference, and time will tell you which method works better.
Ranea Hasstedt with Scrap 2 It in Fort Collins, Colorado organizes her merchandise by collection.
“By placing all the products for boys from My Mind’s Eye area, and all the products for girls from My Mind’s Eye in a nearby location, I can showcase all the accessories that go with the paper, or ribbon, etc. Someone may come in just for the paper but when you have all the accessories that were created to go with that paper grouped next to it, your upsell is guaranteed. Many customers today are merchandise savvy and come in looking for a certain brand. It is a lot less confusing to have your collections grouped together.”
Penny McDaniel of Legacies LLC advises to carefully think of wall placement and display cases in terms of theft. “You need good visibility of the entire store from your cash register area,” she states. “I learned after we opened our doors that things were being taken in an area not visible to the store front due to a protruding wall. I removed the wall and the problem.”
Ranea Hasstedt with Scrap 2 It agrees that shoplifting is a sad reality. “Customers typically take the higher end merchandise like Tim Holz. We also lost eighteen glitter gels in one month, so there’s no telling what will be missing. It is disheartening when you have done so much to show your customers you care about them and offer free work tables and access to your tools.”
Installing security cameras is expensive. You can put up mirrors that spotlight the less visual parts of the stores so that you are at least giving a semblance of security to discourage shoplifting. It is a grim reality that even with safety precautions in place, you will need to allow for inventory loss in your profit and loss margins.
Display end caps can be used to advertise the aisle contents behind them. “End caps are themed, with a representative sample of what is on that aisle,” Janel told me. “For instance, one end cap may be themed toward weddings and show a good selection of what we offer along with some clever decorating ideas. If you don’t see exactly what you wanted on the end cap, you can go down the aisle and look at the other wedding merchandise.”
Janel places her ideas atop the aisles and end caps where you look up and see colorfully decorated boards. “We use cork boards suspended from the ceiling with hooks. You can find everything from ideas to use with the product on that aisle to upcoming classes and workshops.
“We have eight aisles, fifteen feet long each,” Janel said. “The width of the aisles was carefully considered to accommodate strollers and yet keep the merchandise out of reach of the toddlers in those strollers. We came up with five to six feet wide as the most effective aisle width.”
“We’re very proud of our store and its open feeling,” she continued. “I’ve been in stores where the displays made you feel trapped inside the store—no breathing room!
A cluttered flow-through can make you feel slightly agitated and pressed in on.”
Jeanna Maire of Your Crop Shop says, “It’s best to space the displays to flow and to also give the customer a good view of new product. It’s nice to order a display from the manufacturer specially made for the product you’re selling. It makes it much easier and looks more professional.”
“I did not want wire racks,” Penny McDaniel told me. “The wood displays look more polished, and they’re sturdier. Never underestimate what a child will try to climb! I wanted a layout that allows a comfortable traffic flow.”
In terms of placing the merchandise, all the owners I spoke with said to place items, especially new stock, at eye level. “Don’t put the product too close to the floor,” Penny told me. “From the knees down, you lose visibility.”
One idea for what to do with the area that falls inside that lower level range is to place clearance bins there, or other “contained” items, such as plastic craft totes to organize supplies or boxes of remnants left over from classes and workshops marked to sell cheaply. That way, the shelves that are well below the customer’s eye level contain items that still catch the eye because they don’t lie completely flat. Just be careful they don’t protrude into the aisle, where they may be tripped over or strollers can hit them.
While researching Scrap 2 It in Fort Collins, Colorado, I was impressed with the flow pattern. Rather than the typical parallel aisles like you see at a grocery store, Ranea Hasstedt’s were set at angles, with nice sections created that spotlighted the different merchandise. Papers that were not part of collections were found along one wall and in specific aisles next to it, while an angled display case sat nearby. It gave the store a sectioned feeling that gave you the impression of organization without that “perfectly lined up like ducks” feeling. It was easy to see where all the tools were, all the ribbons, fabrics, etc. There is a feeling of flow and ease to the floor plan. You can see a photo of Ranea Hasstedt’s store layout on her website at www.scrap2itstore.com. I was surprised to learn she had only been open a little over two years.
“Customers follow a certain pattern,” Penny McDaniel told me. “Ninety percent of the people go to the right when they enter a store. Consider that with your traffic flow and learn to direct the ‘energy’ throughout the store.”
Don’t forget handicap accessibility when designing aisles and displays. Consider your elderly clientele: Can they reach things, and do you have carts or baskets? Have you provided a children’s play area or other ideas that make your store user-friendly?
Notice the traffic pattern and if people are bumping into things or constantly asking directions in order to find items. How is the lighting? Is it dark, or is it well lit and inviting? Do they have a workshop area, and if so, how many can they seat?
Overhearing conversations between shoppers provides a wealth of information concerning their likes and dislikes about the store.
“Our hours are very flexible for the customer,” Jeanna Maire states. “We are open seven days a week! Our operating hours are Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m., and Sunday is 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. We just realized we needed to be open and accommodating for the busy mother, etc. These hours work well for most.”
The Paper Attic, in Sandy, Utah, has operating hours of 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Mondays and 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. With the Mormon population in Sandy being highly concentrated, the shortened hours on Monday reflect the Church’s emphasis on Family Home Evening. Monday evenings are set-aside for families to spend uninterrupted time together out of the busy week.
“Our winter hours are longer and our summer hours are shorter,” Janel continued. “We are only open until eight in the evening in the summer. Cutting out that extra hour means a savings in salary and utility expenses. It’s just smart business.”
Stay consistent in your store hours, aside from making allowances for seasonal conditions. Hours that vary too much are confusing, and customers will not remember them. For instance, if you have your operating hours as Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., Wednesday and Friday 9 a.m. to 2 p.m., Saturdays 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sundays 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., who is going to remember all that?
Again, shop the competition and try to offer something in the way of store hours that they are not. Hobby Lobby is closed on Sundays and, believe me, Michaels in our town cleans up on that day. Weigh whether the extra hours or hour rotation is worth it to you and your stress-related workload.
I owned a sign and advertising business for many years. During that time, I argued with customers concerning their choice for color, layout, and materials, as these all affect your visibility and effectiveness.
If you are placing your store in a mall or plaza, that venue will in all likelihood dictate what type of sign you may have. Some allow neon and some do not. Backlit Plexiglas is a popular choice for many due to its visibility at night and its wide range of choices concerning vinyl lettering, logos, and color combinations for maximum impact. It is cost-effective compared to neon, and sometimes less expensive than channel letters (individual metal, plastic, or wood letters that have to have holes predrilled into the building’s face or glued on).
Be careful when deciding the colors and details of your store name. What looks great on letterhead may become too cumbersome for a sign. That amazing logo of scissors, paste, and an album wasn’t too costly to render on paper, but it could be astronomical to reproduce on a sign in scanned machine-cut vinyl in eight colors. Each color in a design has to be separated from the design on the computer, the correlating color of vinyl fed into a machine that then uses a blade to cut the image into the vinyl sheet. The sign artist then “weeds” the parts of the sheet that have nothing to do with the image and pulls them away, leaving only the design. A sticky transfer paper is then pressed over the image. This transfer paper with the image attached is positioned on the Plexiglas or metal sign and squeegeed down until the adhesive-backed vinyl is firmly in place and bubble-free. The process is repeated for each differently colored element of the design. This is time-consuming, and if the design is extremely detailed with tiny parts, the weeding can be a nightmare. This same process is used for lettering on glass windows, both on cars and on store fronts.
Keep in mind that signage is meant to be seen from a distance. Study signs as you drive by, and notice the ones that really stand out and those that you have to squint to read. The ones that usually work the best are simple but clever, and employ correct color combinations.
What is it you’re offering? This may sound like a stupid question, but I have seen signs and banners where the emphasis was put on the wrong area. A case in point was a large poster board sign being enthusiastically waved at passing traffic on a busy street corner by a group of teenagers advertising a car wash they were hosting in the adjoining parking lot. The sign read, “4-H Club Fund Raiser” in large letters. In tiny letters at the bottom of the sign, it read, “Car Wash.” I had to press my face to the car window to see what it was they were selling. Having “Car Wash” as the dominant feature and then who was sponsoring it would have been a much smarter choice.
Are you selling “Patricia’s” on your sign, or the “Scrapbooking” part? Make sure the type of business you’re offering is prominent. Remember that a car going by at fifty miles an hour can only get a quick glimpse of your sign.
If you are using neon letters directly on the building face, be careful of the colors blue or purple. They take on an intense, bright hue at night that becomes fuzzy and hard to read. Ask your sign company about color choices. Don’t choose colors based on the fact that your bedroom is all done hunter green. When working with advertising, color selection is very important!
Take into consideration your style of building, and try to incorporate a logo that flows with the architecture. You may move in the future, so don’t let the exterior completely influence your choice, but give it some consideration.
Some malls and plazas offer their stores a slot on a marquee flanking the parking lot, allowing you additional advertising for traffic going by. Usually you share time slots with the other stores. They may rotate the slots every two to three months for an additional charge to you of $50 or more. Each mall has its own requirements, and you are not obligated to use the marquee if you prefer not to.
Your exterior signage is not your only consideration when deciding messaging. Most retailers will tell that any space in your store that is not generating money is wasted space. Hallways and bathrooms aside, you need to look at all space as potentially income-producing.
Most scrapbooking stores rely on pegboard displays to hang all the myriad merchandise that comes in little plastic bags with eye openings at the tops. Since there is a height limit to display cases in order to facilitate easy reach for your customers, most displays end at 5’–6’, some even shorter. If this display is against a wall, that leaves a lot of empty wall space above it for use. What to do with it if your customers can’t reach merchandise displayed above a 6’ reach? You use it as an advertising area, or navigation tool for the store.
Due to the higher wall height in retail stores, you have a greatly unused area of space with which to advertise your store’s offerings. Why not create large displays of sample scrapbooking pages that show a clever way to implement matching components. Group photos of your tools in one large wall display with their names and purpose next to them. Customers who are new to scrapbooking may not have a clue as what the myriad tools are for. Rather than take up space in your aisle displays describing each tool’s use, or leaving the hapless customer to wander down rows of punches, diecuts, etc. and read the descriptions off the cases, show them in one glorious wall display.
Use an attractive wall sign to advertise upcoming events, crops, new merchandise, or focus on this month’s theme, such as Christmas, Graduation, or Duck Season.
While speaking with Ranea Hasstedt of Scrap 2 It, she pointed out that she was not happy with the light mustard color of the walls. A former owner had painted the store in the ochre hue and she did not feel it was welcoming. But, a recent interior painting bid had been $8,000 to paint all the walls in the store area.
Since I have painted wall murals for over thirty-five years, I passed along an idea to her.
“Rather than put out all that money on painting over the walls, why not create vignettes along the wall. You can create fake windows out of tempered Masonite or factory-sanded plywood. The windows can be quite large and showcase scrapbooking themes, creations and merchandise. You can even attach a real wooden window box or ledge to the bottom of the “window” and put silk flowers or decorations for holidays, like small pumpkins for Halloween. With enough of the fake windows hung along the walls at 3’–4’ intervals, no one even notice the wall color. Besides, the ochre color compliments everything so nothing you create in the way of fake windows will clash with it.”
She loved the idea. That money saved on painting all the walls would go a long way in custom created fake windows. Use your imagination. You are in a very creative, visual business. Your company is one where if a customer comes in and finds items displayed in old crates, copper teapots or vintage tin tea containers, it adds to the charm.
If you have ever entered a new store and been met with the overwhelming array of merchandise and aisles, you know that it is daunting. Use the empty wall space to designate locations of merchandise in your store. Again, be creative. Post a custom-made LARGE sheet of scrapbooking paper on the wall with the aisle number on it where the loose papers are found. Make a gigantic punch out of foam board, illustration board or tempered Masonite and paint the aisle number of location under it. Post restroom signs where people can look up and see them, as well as a sign that says Crafting Workshops with an arrow. Make it easy for them to find their way around your store by looking up at the walls and following the information. It is especially helpful if the categories spotlighted on the wall are above or near the aisle where the merchandise is offered.
Each scrapbooking store owner I interviewed listed the Internet as the number one place they looked to find manufacturers of scrapbooking merchandise.
“We order from the magazines, the Internet, and from representatives who sell us products directly,” says Jeanna Maire. “We buy according to popularity, theme, and seasonal demands, as well as listening to our customers and their needs. We look at the magazines our clientele are buying to see what the market is offering.”
Another huge avenue for locating vendors is trade shows and expos. Manufacturers from all over the world are there showing their merchandise and offering deals.
“The vendor will determine the method of shipping. Most use UPS, and some FedEx, and yes, larger companies are notorious for slow delivery,” Jenna told me.
I heard that particular delivery feature mentioned several times. Ask the larger manufacturers to tell you up front what ETA (estimated time of arrival) to expect, and be firm about your needs, especially during the holidays and more popular wedding months.
Negotiate where you can with vendors, and always shop around. With the scrapbooking industry expanding at an alarming rate, the manufacturers will be in competition for your business more than they used to be, as more and more vendors jump on the scrapbooking bandwagon. Importers are cutting out the middleman as well and selling their wares via the Internet. You have some juggling room here.
Ranea Hasstedt with Scrap 2 It said her main reason for choosing various vendors was obviously product. She added, however, that if the customer service was rude or just didn’t care about their clientele she would not order from them.
“I’ve heard of suppliers that literally told a store owner they didn’t care if she wasn’t happy with their service or product!” Ranea Hasstedt told me. “Do your homework. Each supplier is different in their shipping rates, estimated delivery time, discounts, etc.”
With all the pretty papers, embellishments, and new decorating ideas hitting the market weekly, it’s hard not to go crazy when ordering inventory. You must be careful not to overstock or exceed your budget.
“Start small!” Ranea Hasstedt told me. “You can blow a lot of money in the beginning thinking you need to have it all on hand. That’s how you go out of business. Tell your customers you are growing steadily and to check back often. Each time they came in and found we had grown our inventory, it gave them a feeling of stability that we were keeping our word and managing the bottom line.”
Since I’m assuming you are an avid scrapbooker yourself, you should have a handle on what the more popular decorating items and theme merchandise are. Does Disney merchandise fairly fly off the racks? Be careful of fads based on summer blockbuster movie releases that may soon fade.
Take a good look at your area and what is popular in your region. In Colorado, the lodge look is huge, and thus papers with fishing hooks and moose-antler motifs are very popular. Would that look fly in Florida? Probably not. Take into consideration the local high schools and colleges—what are their mascot colors? During graduations, these colors in your paper aisle could be big sellers. Study your area’s demographics: Do you have a large population of senior citizens or a more youth-oriented market? Is your location close to a school zone where harried teachers could dash in and grab some needed objects for an art class?
Janel with The Paper Attic said that sometimes you just have to use your instincts as to what will sell and what won’t. In this case her instincts were wrong and she learned a valuable lesson. “We had a vendor who kept pushing these mountain motif borders on us because we are located in Salt Lake City. They were an abstract design and kind of funky, so I was not really inspired to try them. But this guy was really persistent, so we agreed to try them on a commission basis. I put them with the other borders, not even placing them very dominantly, and they sold out the first week! I ordered more and could barely keep up with the demand. It seems the customers liked the different, trendy look they had. I now find myself more open to the unusual and artsy things people bring my way.
“It is seldom true that we are completely out of things, although the holidays can be tricky in ordering enough inventory. One year the snowmen are flying off the shelves, and the next it may be nutcrackers. We do offer rain checks if we can’t get the item in time for an occasion.”
Go to www.Bizfilings.com and www.retailtrafficmag.com for information on pricing inventory for retail. You will need to learn about margins (the difference in price between wholesale and retail), markups, distribution, and turnovers. These guidelines will help you price your merchandise so you make a profit even when it is discounted.
Contact the vendors you’ve found in scrapbooking magazines and on the Internet and ask them for their wholesale prices and terms. They may have a minimum requirement for your orders; find that out now. If you can, buy directly from the manufacturer to eliminate a middleman, who will take the manufacturer’s price and escalate it. Find out if they offer displays for certain products or any support materials. Do they send out flyers or newsletters alerting you to new products?
If you do find yourself dealing with a distributor, shop around for prices and shipping costs. Get a strong confirmation of delivery schedules and times.
Again, try to frequent trade shows and expos in the scrapbooking industry to meet the suppliers up close and personal and find out industry terminology and pricing patterns.
Know your customers and order accordingly. Obviously, the holidays are easy to calculate; other times of the year may need some ingenuity. Magazines go to print six months ahead of the holiday or seasonal times to create a demand. Study the trends.
The Home & Garden Television network has become very popular. Try and catch a few of these shows to watch growing trends, new techniques, and unique merchandising ideas. Shows such as Martha Stewart Living offer wonderful ideas for the scrapbooking industry.
When deciding what to order, here is a guideline: “We mainly decide what inventory to order by reviewing what’s in stock,” says Jeanna Maire. “Also, the computer helps us see what is moving and what is not.”
The POS (point-of-sale) system we covered in Chapter 3 is the most efficient way to keep track of inventory and monitor what’s selling and what isn’t. You can see at a glance your customers’ buying patterns and use it to determine merchandise that has run its course.
“Shop around for your POS system,” Ranea Hasstedt from Scrap 2 It told me. “I wish we had one now that offered Customer Reward Programs, more categories. . .things like that. QuickBooks can be pricey with some of these systems. Shop around and make sure you tell the supplier what kind of business you are running and what your needs are.”
When defining marketing, we are talking about how to get your product to move. Advertising will bring them in the door; effective marketing will get them to buy once they’re inside.
“I have what I call Profit Centers,” Penny McDaniel with Legacies LLC told me. “These are the different areas in the store that generate the most income: workshops, our special photography center, albums, the papers, stamps, and embellishments. In this business you need a retail mentality, not just a scrapbooking mentality.”
Pretend you’re a customer just walking into your store. What do you see? Are you welcomed by a dazzling display of color and fun ideas? Does a happy employee welcome you as you enter, or are you ignored until you need help or make a purchase, at which time they are only too glad to take your money?
Your employees are a marketing tool. Train them well. They can make or break a customer’s desire to return to your store.
Now that you’ve spent the money on product, get the most from it. If an item isn’t moving, what do you do? You market it, baby. Try packaging it with another item and placing it in a visually prominent area of the store. People love bargains and getting what they perceive to be more bang for their buck. Now, instead of teddy bear paper that wasn’t flying off the shelves, you have the paper and these adorable matching stickers and a bear-shaped template. You price it accordingly so that you are still making money, and now the “dead” product is being snatched up.
Penny McDaniel uses her aged items that are not moving in her classes and workshops. A wonderful idea, using the slow-moving item; suddenly the workshop attendees are scrambling to that aisle to use the product in the same manner they just saw demonstrated.
You can use the same merchandise to create idea boards. People have to be led. Show them something clever, put the means to recreate it in their hands, and they walk out happily planning their new album page.
Try moving slow merchandise around the store and displaying it in creative ways. Sometimes something just has to be repositioned to gain attention. As I mentioned earlier, holding a garage sale at your store and inviting customers to bring in their extras and sell them while you offer your discounted merchandise is a great way to unload tired inventory.
My favorite thing to do is brainstorm ideas. Do something fun! You have your own store, now be creative! How about Luau Days in the summertime? Group all your tropical-themed merchandise in the middle of the store beneath an inflatable palm tree you got from Party America. Have the employees wear leis and play Hawaiian music in the background. Push the travel bug feeling to urge customers to start making those vacation album pages. Make sure the Disney memorabilia is nearby. Have a drawing for a free punch or embellishment. Have each customer plunge her hand into a sand-filled plastic pool and pull out a small plastic shovel. On the shovel scoop, you have put a number in Magic Marker. If the number corresponds to the one you call out, they win!
Don’t forget to utilize your auxiliary PR—your Facebook and Twitter accounts. Ranea Hasstedt uses her Facebook business page for contests, among other things.
“We ran a contest where we offered a $20 gift card to our store if you signed up five friends. It was a great success and we got more customers and happy contestants.”
Marketing is doing anything innovative and different from the competition. Keep them coming back with great ideas and outstanding customer service.
You can send out coupons in your newsletters or mailings to quickly move merchandise that is obsolete or slow in leaving the store.
“We’ve learned it best to discount items to try and make back at least the money we paid for them,” says Jeanna Maire. “That’s why sales are a win-win.”
Everybody likes to feel they are getting something for nothing. Clearance sales tend to bring out the little “gimme monster” in all of us. Many people will buy things, especially crafts, thinking, “Shoot, at that price I can’t go wrong . . . I’ll find something to do with it!”
Make sure before you mark your merchandise down that you know your profit margin so that you aren’t losing money.
Workshops bring in customers and increase product sales. “I call it ‘Butts in the Seats,’” grins Peggy McDaniel. “Whereas the product generates more income than the workshops, the workshops bring in customers and increase product sales.”
Classes, workshops, and crops let the customers come together for a little chat time while organizing their albums and pages in a one-stop shopping environment. The work tables and chairs are there, as are supplies, merchandise, teachers, and networking.
The interruptions from husband and kids are left behind.
“Crops are great for us,” says Jeanna Maire of Your Crop Shop. “That’s why we offer them every Saturday and Sunday from noon to midnight for only $5 per customer. They have twelve hours to shop, which they enjoy doing as they work on their personal projects.
The Paper Attic in Sandy, Utah, has six teachers who offer different scrapbooking techniques for two- to three-hour increments. “We also have a twelve-page class on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. for only $25,” Janel said. “We offer classes designed just for kids, teenagers, and those who just want to do basic photos without all the excess.”
Ranea Hasstedt with Scrap 2 It has two workshop areas in her 6,000-square-foot store. The first area is immediately to your left as your enter the store. Three large rows of tables and chairs are situated next to sunny windows. Cutting mats are in front of each chair and the tables have paper cutters, punches, and other amenities awaiting the creative hand.
A restroom is located right behind this area and the store and its bounty of merchandise beckons to each crafter. At the back of the store is another area in a secluded room where more tables and chairs await. There are tables filled with punches, die cuts, pens, and scissors. A mini fridge holds soda and there is a jar next to it for soda donation money, if you choose to donate. There is a microwave oven and the feeling of a great place to kick back and create to your heart’s content.
“We don’t charge our customers to use the rooms and tables,” Ranae Hasstedt told me. “It’s our pleasure to let them use our tools and sit and create to their heart’s content.”
There are some of you who may be thinking that by letting customers use the tools for free that it is cutting down on the sales of those tools in the stores. Actually, Ranea Hasstedt pointed that most people are like her, they need to use a tool before they buy it to see if it fits their needs. “There’s nothing worse than investing in equipment and getting home and finding it is not what you expected. You have opened the package, which makes it hard to return it. We like giving our customers a hands-on experience with the tools and offer them a relaxing place to create. Besides, there is usually something they find they need from the store once they begin their designs. It’s a win-win for everyone.”
Think outside the album when coming up with ideas for your workshops and classes. Look at your competitors’ newsletters. What can you do better? Keep an eye on events in your area that could segue into a workshop idea. Graduation, Rodeo season (yup, I’m in Colorado!). NASCAR races, weddings, the hot air balloon festival, etc.
Mixed media is a creative way to expand your scrapbooking store inventory and increase your customer-base and sales. By offering fabric and tools to the quilting industry, you can double your profit. Quilting began snowballing about the same time scrapbooking hit its stride. With the latest in computer-generated quilting images, patterns, stitchery, and graphics, along with cutting devices that save hours of time, quilting is not how your grandmother remembers it. Since scrapbooking is now jumping on the mixed media bandwagon, there is a chance you are already offering fabric for sale in your store.
Another giant wave of creativity has hit the world in the form of Steampunk. Steampunk is an interesting blend of eras and components. Many have described it as Victorian meets Science Fiction. I prefer to look at it as Jane Austen meets Tim Burton. There are facets of lace juxtaposed next to gadgets from the industrial revolution. Leather, chrome, glass, clockworks, metal, keys, and subdued colors in sepia tones tease the elements of New England staid photographs, ecru lace, and frilly embellishments. Sound strange? That is the point. It’s a dose of Punk with a softer side. Tim Holz’s offerings in the scrapbooking merchandise area fits in well. Gears, timepieces, and chains are all additives that make Steampunk what it is. The distressed, antique look adds to its charm and mystery.
You will see more and more stores offering metals, chains, and clockworks as they enter this mixed media, creating tension and harmony with incongruous components. For an idea of what this looks like, go to www.alphastamps.com.
Mixed media can also bring on board acrylics, decoupage, oils, bits of sculpture, and anything your imagination can conceive in an effort to create a visual impact from scrapbooks and art. Pinterest and Etsy have started spotlighting Steampunk art. Check it out.
If you are concerned about “contaminating” your scrapbook store with items and ideas that are not purist to scrapbook fundamentals, I will leave you with this quote from Ranae Hasstedt of Scrap 2 It.
“If you’re not changing, you won’t make it. Mixed media is the way to evolve and increase your traffic, interest and profit.”
Penny McDaniel of Legacies LLC offers an in-store photographer to scrapbookers who want to have pictures taken for their albums.
“The photographer is usually my daughter, who is a professional,” Penny stated. “However, she just had my second granddaughter, so no picture-taking for her. I am also a photographer. I don’t claim to be as good as my daughter, but I do some. I also have three people I contract as employees. I promote the studio, I have all the equipment and the space, and I set the appointments. It’s a very unusual situation for a scrapbook store; I just chose to have it as a piece of my business plan.”
Don’t forget to send out frequent emails and newsletters to your customers. Have them sign a register in your store with their names and email addresses to receive news of upcoming crops, events, and new merchandise. Use their first name in the subject bar of the email to add familiarity. If you have a companion website, have them sign in there as well. While I was sitting with Ranea Hasstedt in her store, a customer walked in and said she was there to see the merchandise mentioned in the recent email she had just received. They do work!
Advertising your store is a must. You cannot rely on word-of-mouth, though customer referral is your best advertising tool. Make sure your name is listed in the Yellow Pages and Business Pages of your area phone book. If you skip this vehicle, it could cost you. People may look for you there to obtain your address or phone number and if you are not listed, they may assume you are out of business. While ad usage is shrinking due to the heavy use of Internet search engines, many still go to this tried-and-true media for business and product information.
Newspaper ads are fading but still out there. Put your ad under Services in the Classifieds at the back of the paper and announce your classes or crops.
Write your own press release and send it out to every newspaper, radio station, and TV news program in your state. Send it to the Huffington Post and scrapbooking magazines, both digital and print. Notify libraries that offer classes, senior centers, church organizations, the Chamber of Commerce, and women’s organizations.
TV and radio advertising is expensive, but effective. Many radio stations are getting creative with their offerings in an attempt to garner more advertisers. You can wheel and deal. Tell them your budget and let them get out their thinking caps for how they can pack that full. Radio stations now have websites with contests and profiles of their advertisers. Take advantage of the exposure. Offer to go in on a contest with them. Call local TV news stations and tell them something useful that the field of scrapbooking can contribute to the community. If it is a current trend, a craze or gossip-worthy, they may interview you for the show. I have been interviewed several times on TV news and radio programs for free simply by having the right topic at the right time. When my book The History and Haunting of the Stanley Hotel came out, I was asked to be on Colorado radio and TV news programs due to the fact the Stanley Hotel is in Estes Park, Colorado . . . and it was Halloween! Timing is everything!
Make sure you have business cards on-hand and use them freely. Online sites, such as www.Vistaprint.com, will create cards for you for as little as $10 for 500 cards.
Vehicle lettering is inexpensive and a great advertising tool. Everywhere you drive, and park, you are putting your name out there. I have had people write down my business name and phone number while I was sitting in a McDonalds’s drive-through and call me before I got home. Branding is just as much an advertising tool as anything else you invest in. It takes people an average of seven times to remember your message or name. It’s called “The 7 Touches”. That means they will need to see or hear your name at least seven times before they remember it. Put it out there wherever you can and often.
Advertising in magazines is very expensive, but you can look into it. Offer to provide a trendy or current blog for online scrapbooking magazines or submit it to www.ezinearticles.com.
Team up with local stores as I mentioned in the previous chapter for home-based scrapbooking businesses. Get creative. It’s the hallmark of your trade!
For information on all the ways to advertise online, please see the “Advertising Online” section in Chapter 11, “Let’s Advertise.” Here you will read about the enormous world of social media advertising and much more.
“I would have advertised that we were coming and put the signage up earlier,” states Penny McDaniel of Legacies LLC. “If you don’t get the word out there, they’re not going to know you’re here.”
When asked the above question, Jeanna Maire answered, “Not much. I would have made little changes, like the flooring of the shop. We have a light-colored pretty Berber carpet; I think a laminate would be better. It’s little things like that.”
Other owners said they would have hired a payroll service right from the start to handle employee computation. Another was getting more space to start out with.
“A 2,500-square-foot shop just isn’t big enough for this industry,” Jeanna Maire said.
Others comment that they would not have used family members for employees or asked them to help with everything that had to be done to get the doors open. Family and friends often volunteer, but when it’s time to show up with the buckets and mops, they suddenly have plans.
Opening a new store is not inexpensive. Advertising alone (a necessity if you want people to know who and where you are) can run into the thousands. Your cost for the building will be determined by how many square feet you’re leasing, upgrades, and signage.
Almost 40 percent of new stores can be opened on $10,000 or less. Another 30 percent will require start-up costs of $10,000 to $50,000. The rest average $50,000 to $100,000 or higher to get the doors open. The larger the space, the more overhead and more expense; your inventory factors in as well. Then you add employee payroll, insurance, taxes, advertising, etc. A new store could run you up to $150,000 to open your doors.
Your local commercial realtor can give you some idea of cost based on location and square footage. The landlord can show you what others who came before you have needed to set up shop.
The scrapbooking craze is still new enough to have few franchises offered at this point. They are, however, beginning to appear on the horizon. You can type in “scrapbooking franchise opportunities” on a search engine and look for upcoming sites there. Of course, Creative Memories is the biggest franchise out there at this time if you are looking for a home-based franchise. I did find the following new venture, which may interest you:
In a 2004 article, Fun Facts Publishing (www.funfactspublishing.com), stated that statistics show a real boom in the scrapbooking industry over the last three years, and points out that in spite of industry growth, scrapbooking retailers tend to be small and independent, thus lacking “marketing, branding, and supply-chain management expertise.” Of course, one retail analyst concedes, if scrapbooking stores are to become competitive franchises, they will have to distinguish themselves from national giants in the craft industry: Michaels, Hobby Lobby, etc.
Though the above quote is from 2004, it still applies. The main challenges of opening a brick-and-mortar store are the cost and the difficulty of navigating the advertising and marketing waters on your own. A franchise has done the homework for you, offering national brand recognition and advice on running a successful business.