Fastener specialists nail down more money

nails and simply sell the customer galvanized box nails for his expensive deck project is selling yourself and the customer short," says Roelif M. Loveland at the Maze Nails division of W. H. Maze Co.

C PECIALIZE in quality fasteners.

9 Build an image of having the right fastener for every project. Earn the reputation of being a fastener expert and providing excellent service.

Follow this advice and you will find your sales and profit increasing. Although both bright and galvanized nails are often loss leaders or low margin products, specialty fasteners have higher margins. The difference will soon show up on your gross profits.

Specialty nails should always be recommended with premium products such as cedar and redwood siding or treated lumber. Nails designed for use with products such as these will give the customer more satisfaction as well as making more money for the dealer.

Faced with the option of rust stains on an expensive deck or the security of using hot-dipped, zinccoated nails on pressure treated wood, the customer willgladly pay a little more for nails recommended by pressure treaters. The dealer who doesn't stock the special nails or take the time to explain the difference will lose the extra profit and a customer when the cheap nails fail.

"To overlook the sale of specialty

His company produces several visual aids for dealers including a chart which shows recommended sizes, types of shank and points and applications for a wide range of interior and exterior nails. They also distribute a chart identifying 36 different nails.

Although there are more than 120 kinds of nails available, manufacturers continue to develop better performing specialty nails. One of the latest available utilizes a ring shank with an octagon shape factory fitted polyethylene cap. This nail is designed to be used with materials such as foam sheathing, vapor barriers, house-wrap and roofing felt where prevention of rips, punctures, pull throughs and blow offs is desirable.

In addition to stocking an inventory of specialty fasteners, the dealer must teach his sales people to recommend the proper fasteners. In addition to materials supplied by manufacturers. educational materials and home study courses available from the National Retail Hardware Association can be used to do this.

Point of purchase posters and product literature can be helpful in explaining to a customer the need for using special fasteners for various projects. Specialty fasteners extend beyond nails to screws, bolts and masonry anchors as well as a variety of connectors, joist hangers and similar products. Each is designed to be used in special circumstances. Although fasteners originalty came in bulk or kegs, a variety of packages are now offered to help a dealer organize a fastener department. Boxes sized by weight, buckets and cartons with drawerlike openings can be shelved easily. Individual drawers or revolving racks with small bins can keep items sold individuallv in order.

Story at a Glance

Suggestions

For Increasing

gross profit by selling higher margin specialty fasteners point of purchase aids available. ways to educate the sales staff.

Regardless of how fasteners are packaged or displayed, order and identification are key words. Picture or silhouette identifications as well as labels must be part of the self service display system. In addition, a system must be established for sales people to package and price purchases of individual fasteners or for cashiers to determine the price at the register.

Win Customers With Service

Ninety-five percent of customers who have a negative experience never patronize the establishment where the incident occurred again.

That's bad news. And if that weren't bad enough, the average customer who feels wronged tells somewhere between 8 and 16 people about his experience, according to the American Research Institute.

These statistics mean trouble for those in the service industry who act as though customer service is a concept of the past. As the consumer spending frenzy of the 1980s grinds to a halt, competition in the service industry for a share of the shrinking market is intensifying. Organizations in the industry who refuse to see cus-

Core Custorner Strategy Focus

A retailer who is well located relative to core customers has a strategic advantage over the competition.

"An intensely developed network of stores in a market can be a compelling, competitive advantage, which can only be overcome by a tomer service as the key to continued success are finding the door to the future locked and bolted. competitor over a long period of time and at significant expense," says Mandy Putnam, Judy Julikowski and Tom Rubel, co-authors of "Locating Core Customers," a new Management Horizons report.

Retailers have learned that topnotch customer service leads to valuable customer loyalty. However, a successful customer service program requires that all employees, especially those who directly serve the consumer, be committed to excellence.

How can that commitment be achieved? One way is using screening techniques to help select job applicants with attitudes that are favorable to good customer relations. Thorough orientation and training programs are another. Finally, management itself must be totally committed to giving customers what they want.

"In order to accomplish strong geographic positioning, retailers must be able to identify where appropriate demographic segments can be found. The process oflocating core customers has become an increasingly sophisticated task," the authors conclude. "The advent of easily accessible census data and the proliferation of geodemographic products and services. help marketers make the distinction between core and fringe components of strategies with respect to customers, competitors and merchandise." provide great support under normal conditions and exceptional support in special circumsances.

Core customers should be the dominant focus of all strategic efforts and the target of top priority investment spending, criterion for performance superiority, rationale for market position and source of performance improvement. Fringe strategy receives subordinate focus on these points.

Demographic variables include household composition, education, housing, age and employment. Various units of geography such as zip codes, block groups and countries combined with data and data basing can help retailers to retrieve the needed information.

On the coldest night of the year, fire destroyed Adams Building Supplies, reducing the company's invenrory and computer system to ashes. With a phone call to ProfitMaster, a customer support analyst was dispatched to hand deliver a new system the next day. The analyst stayed on-site day and night until Adams was up and running again.

'As soon as ProfitMaster delivered the new system, we were able to restore our accounts receivable and inventory records," explained a relieved Branan. "Using merchandise from our second location, we reopened in three days. It was like we closed for the weekend. That's all."

At ProfitMaster we know the lalue of a computer system doesn't end with quality equipment and prognms.

For more information on how ProfitMaster can help you achieve success, call today for a FREE BROCHURE.

lNil

lJuikkrs .Squure will opcn il warchousc st()rc in Norcttlss. (ia.. this lall with two nlorc schcdulcd to opcn by Junc. 1989, lirr a total ol'6 Atlanta area opcrltions (scc p. l7 tirr slory) llat'ltittj:er has a new sttlrc in ('entreville. Va. .,t'c'olt-vls has <lpenecl a ncw hardware storc ln Jacksonvillc, lrl., with a I)aytona Beach, I;1., unit under construction in the tlolly Ilill ShoPPing Center.

[.ox't"s will ol)cn storcs in Sparta, N.('., and (ialax, Vit.; rcIocatcd storcs hitvc ttpenccl in Kinston. N.('.. untl South lloston, Va.; rctrollttcd storcs in lrrankf<rrt, Ky.. l{ontc, (ia., ttttcl llockingham, N.('.; ncw stores in Snrithlreld and (loncorcl, N.('., and North ('olumbus, (ia.

Dottg 4sh1, Ruikling Mutcriuls has opened a third yard in New f beria, La. . . . Econont,v' Ruilding .Suppl.t', a subsidiary ot' .Sincloir Lumber ('o., Laurinburg. S.C., is opening an outlet in Bennettsville.S.C....

84 Lumber ( tt. has opened a new store in Sevierville. Tn.

. Wit'kes Lurnber Co. is closing two MontgomerY, Al., stores Portland Lumber and .Suppl.v, Portland, Tx., plans to relocate when displaced by highwayexpansion...

Williams Brothers. Atlanta, Ga.. will sell its lumber div. to concentrate on its ready-mix cement. block and brick business. . . Campbell Building Mqterials. Harahan, La., has left the building materials business, devoting itself to insulation contracung .

Foxworth-Galbraitlu a l)allas, Tx.-based 54 store chain, is 87 years old . Tlrc LumberYard,

Sclgovillc, 'l x.. is cclcbrating its 2nd irnnivcrsirr_\, . llobcrt lJotrdcn, lnc., Atlanta. (ia., ntarkcd its 5th ycar ol- opcration with a party lirr cntpkryccs lJcttcr Lit'ittt: llornt' ('t'trlcr, ('harlottcsvillc. Vit.. hlcl nlorc than $5,(X)0 in clantagc whcn tt warchouse rool'caughl llrc whilc being rc-rool'ed with hot tar . .

Itttt'r".s has closcd thc .\n,qltrtx' | )oor u nd llli II wtrk " consolidating thc opcration witlr its I)allas, -l'x.. lacility I)u.v'rttotul (\tryt.. -I'oronto, ('anada, wlrich acquircd 1/ & 14' lluiltling Pxxluct.s. Ilooncvillc, Ms., last ycar, is changing thc conrpany's nantc t<t llaurtlond Iluilrlitu! I'ftttlttd.s . .

I t i-r.sort Lttnt ber .\zrlc.s. I)lunrerville and Pine Illufl'. Ar.. has adclcd a ncw planer ntill operation, running yellow pine boarcis in Magnolia, Ar. lt. hl. Ltrpold & Assot'lo1(,.s is a new consulting firm openecl in IIolly Ilill. S.('., by Mac Lupolcl

,lctt'kson & Langlbrd Wholcsalc Lumber, Int'.,Tyler. Tx.. is a new office broker and LC[- specialist Mills c& Lupton ,*rypl.y, ('s., Chattanooga, Tn.. is being acquired by Ilttghcs 'SupPl1,. Orlanclo, Irl....

Mellco, Inc., Perry. Ga., has opened a $3 million wood preserving plant in Rock Hill, S.C. . . . La.\alle Lunber C'o. has opened a new hardwood mill in Olla. La. Americ'an Ltrmber has a new distribution yard in Atlanta, Ga., Wayne Jobson, mgr....

Ramsey Lumber Co., Int'., Suffolk. Va., has been sold to Georgia Padfic Corp. for $2.3 million.. Slaughter Brothers, Inr'.. Dallas, Tx., and its parent co., Furman Lumber, [nr'., Boston,

Nlir.. lrlvc comhincd nlttitlnitl lrccoLlnts sltles tcants unde r lhc clircctron ol' John l:lwcll, l)allas...

A $660 nrillion lcvcragccl buyout ol' Kopltcrl ('rr. .s chcnriculs husincss by u nranagcntcnt group lras coflitpsccl (iaorgiu-l\cilic ('rtr1t.'s brxrrd ol' clircctors has rrplrrtrvcrl :rcclttisitittn <tl' IJrun.sn'ick I)ul1t tQ lhpar ( ir., llrunswick.(iu....

A nranagcn'lcnt group hcaded by Sanford ('. Sigololl'has ntade a tencfcr ofl'cr for Wickes ('ompurtics, /rrr'., Santa Monica, ('a., firrnrcr owncr ctl' Wickcs Lttnther irnrf .\rtyttoiu .\ttp1il.t' k'nuu/ l:ihcr Glass, which is cclebrating its l{)th anniversary, opcnccl u ncw' plant in [.anett, z\f. llte('onslnttliott Mulcrials (ixtttlt<tl' 4mcrirun liltt'tric has relocated its llq. to Memphis, '1n....

1'hc /-.,S. .\turrclt ('r.r. has rerranrecl its subsidiary*, Evans Rule (ir., (lharleston, S.C., the L.S. ,\turrcll ('ort.stuncr Prodttt'ts Divi.sion

4cc llurtlwart, Crtrp. has createcl a rcgional program with the eastern region including Atlanta, (ia., Clharlotte, N.C., and 'l'ampa, lrl., and the western region including Dallas, Tx., and Little Rock. Ar... . Litorldwide Hurtlv,art,, 1rc'., Tampa Bay, Fl., has moved to nearbv Seffner. l:1....

U.SG C.orp. has announced plans to sell Masonite Corp., Kinkeatl Div., o./' USG Industries and the Marlite Div'. o/'USG Interiors as part of a recapitalization and restructuring plan . .

In a revised estimate of total housing starts for this year, the National .4ssociation ql' Home IJuilders sees a drop of lO(Xr from 1987 startst they project 1989 starts down 5%r . .

Housing s/arls for July (latest figs.) crept up 2.40/o to an annual rate of 1.489.000 units. . single family home starts were up 0.80/o; multifamily units, 18.704; building permits fell5.4o/o

Texas BBQ For Customers

Customers appreciate being appreciated as Foxworth-Galbraith Lumber Co., Bonham, Tx., has discovered.

Their annual Contractors Appreciation Barbecue is looked forward to each summer. The most recent in July attracted a large group of building contractors, customers and friends to a lunch of brisket and trimmings served outside. Neighboring businesses cooperate by loaning tables and chairs as well as a parking lot on which to hold the luncheon, according to Billy Reynolds of Foxworth-Galbraith.

Lowe's Encourages Feedback

How does a business attract and retain good employees? In a tight labor market an answer to this question is essential.

Lowe's Co.'s added a human resources department several years ago to solve the problem and show employees that they're interested in keeping them.

More in house training has been one result. The dePartment has the responsibility of making certain new employees get the training they need to be better sales or office workers.

In addition to creating a sense of worker loyalty, according to Clarissa S. Felts, investor research manager, the training program gives the company an opportunity for feedback.

"They're learning a lot from coming to the leadership school," she explains, "but they also give us a lot of feedback so we can learn from them."

Builders Square In Atlanta

Builders Square will oPen its fourth Atlanta, Ga., area store in Norcross this fall with two more scheduled to open by June 1989'

"Atlanta has been good to us," said Frank Denny, chairman and president of the Kmart chain, which competes aggressively with Atlantabased Home Depot.

Builders Square reportedlY recorded its first profit this Year although Denny refused to indicate how profitable the 120 unit chain is. "We are less than l0lo off our projec-

Redemptions Outdo Rebates

Following the theory that merchandise redemption promotions outperform rebate offers, OwensCorning is strengthening its 1988 National Football League jacket promotion.

This year's promotion from SePt. 23 to Oct. 16 for both insulation and roofing products involves a display contest for retailers, a d-i-y direct mail compaign, and national and local advertising in tv, radio, and print.

tions for sales and profits," he commented.

The new Builders Square warehouses will be about 80,000 sq. ft. in size. A new prototype, which Denny describes as "more attractive" and "easier to shop" will be followed. "Warehouses tend to be confusing to customers. We'll be doing something different in our stores," he said.

No sites have been selected for the fifth and sixth stores. The Norcross store is on Jimmy Carter Blvd. near Interstate 85.