HOME GENTER MERGHANT BILL FISHMAN

Bill Fishman & Affiliates

11650 lberia Place

San Diego, Ca.92128

rA TARTING this December, Joe lil Samulin and I will be touring the country conducting two-day workshops entitled Store Management & Aggressive Marketingfor Retailers ef Home Improvement Producls. This will be specifically pinpointed to topics of concern to retailers of lumber, building materials and other categories sold in home centers and lumberyards.

Joe, who makes his home in San Antonio, Tx., has been traveling the world consulting with retailers. This year he has been involved in the designing and redesigning of stores in Australia, New Zealand and Chile in addition to his United States work. This past spring when I asked him to find time to do a lunch & learn session at the National Home Center Show, he packed the room.

I was a little skeptical when Joe approached me about creating ajoint workshop program. lt has been a few years since I have done any platlorm work. I wondered whether today the industry was too sophisticated for our subject matter. "The need is still there," Joe confirmed. "There are retailers still building stores with balconiest waiting 'til Tuesday to merchandise Thursday's ads; allowing their sales desk to be used as an impregnable fortress; capturing no vital information from their cash registers; stifling their growth because oflack of qualified help ." The list went on.

This week we began to assemble the curriculum and the take-home materials that will be presented during our workshop. One segment is called "The UserFriendly Store" and features concepts for store traffic patterns, colors, signing, departmentalization, the co-existence of contractor & d-i-y business, the pay back in retrofits and appealing to the real decision maker - the woman.

In the "Positioning" segment of the workshop we will demonstrate how to correct an image problem, what can be learned from focus groups, conducting inexpensive surveys, meaningful services to offer and how to expand the market.

I have seen testimonial letters to Joe, from the store manager to the ceo, relating to his time management system to increase productivity and reduce stress. This will be covered under "Store Management," which will also encompass what-to-do when more competition moves into the market.

Another workshop topic is "Sales & Inventory Management, which demonstrates how open-to-buy systems increase margins, and what you can learn from your cash register with or without a computer. The sessions on "Merchandising and Advertising" detail the l0 top selling categories; negotiating techniques; budgeting and annual advertising budgetl all about co-op advertising; how to produce effective advertising.

The "About People" topic covers: finding great store help; incentive programs; conducting a review.

Our road show opens in Chicago this December and moves to Orange County, Ca., at the end of January, Atlanta, Ga., in April, and Vancouver, B.C., in May. Come see us, live, on stage, together for the very first time.