The Better Way To Sell Discounted Retail Products

We’ve all been in the situation when you need to clear your shelves of a certain retail product. Sometimes this is because a product is being discontinued or a product line has repackaged their items. Whatever the situation, you need to move these products to make room for the new goodies! So, how do you do this?

Most salon owners will instantly discount the old products. This seems logical, right? Wrong—don’t do it! You’ve likely seen this scenario play out before. First, the items will be marked down 20%, and a few products will sell. Then, they will be marked down to 40%, and a few more will sell. But, eventually you will have a small group of products that simply won’t sell. There is a better way to do this!

Here’s what you need to do to move these products quickly without losing money. Try a promotion similar to: Buy $60 in products and receive XYZ product for FREE! The products that they are getting for “free” are the products that you need to clear from your shelves—see how this is working! So, are they really getting the product for free? Of course not. The price of that product is amortized across all the products.

The amount that your customer needs to spend to receive the free product depends on your salon. For instance, at our salon it is relatively common for customers to spend about $50-$55 per visit on products. So, we wanted to push that just slightly and set our minimum at $60. If a customer spends $60 in products, tools, or cosmetics, they can choose one of the selected products for free.

When running this promotion, there are a few logistics to keep in mind. First, you need to include “while supplies last” on your marketing materials, since the promotion ends when the discontinued products have been sold. Second, make sure that you’re giving a 100% discount on the free product, so it can’t be returned.

The bottom line is that people aren’t attracted to discounts. But, they are attracted to complementary products! Instead of devaluing your product, try this strategy and watch the products move off your shelves! Give it a try and share your results on our sister company's private Facebook group! We can’t wait to hear from you!