One way to get a good grasp on your inventory is to narrow in on your top sellers. Ask yourself a few key questions to help understand why they are your stop sellers.

1.       Have they always been your stop sellers?

2.       If not, why do you think they are now?

3.       Are there other products that would compliment your current top sellers and potentially sell as well? For example, if you are selling a lot of wine toppers, would cocktail napkins be a nice addition to your store assortment?

Likewise, determine what have become the worst sellers in your inventory and make plans to get them out your door as soon as possible. Easier said then done, yes. However, it needs to be done – even if you have to take a loss on some of your product purchases. Letting them sit on your shelves and make no return at all for you is worse than at least recovering some of your initial investment. By doing this, you may allow yourself to afford smarter purchases for your business today… or at lease sooner than later.

A few things you should consider when determining how to move inventory that has not been selling include the following.

1.       Call your vendors to see if they would buy back their stock. While not all vendors do this, some will consider it depending on your contract, your relationship, and your future business opportunities with them.

2.       Markdown your inventory right away if you haven’t already. Don’t just bring it down to 20%, but bring it down to 40%, 50%, even 75% off if you have to. Price to sell! The plan is to get it out the door, allowing you to get rid of access inventory that may be holding you back from bringing in new product that will have more selling potential.

3.       Host a special shopping event that caters to selling marked down items. Add special incentives to purchases made with multiple items. For example, you could have 50% off the first item, and 60% off each additional item. You can add additional or other incentives to help sweeten the deal. Buy one get one free. Gift with purchase. You get the idea.

4.       Some small business owners are willing to trade their inventory with each other depending on their customer base and more. If you have relationships with stores that this is a possibility for, consider how this may work for you.

Don’t be afraid to mark your product down because in doing so, you may take a loss. The bigger loss you are at risk for is not moving any inventory at all and ultimately having to close your doors. Be realistic with yourself as to what is the best scenario for your store, ultimately allowing you to bring in products that sell.

The goal of analyzing your inventory is to create balance. Top sellers should outweigh bad sellers in a perfect world, but this isn’t always the case. Re-evaluate your inventory each week, or at the very least each month, to best support your store trends and sell through. Have tips to help support inventory control? Let us know! Please comment below.

[tweetmeme]To kick start this game plan with your sales team, a Product Orientation should be planned. This Orientation can be as formal or informal as you see necessary for your store, but the main goal either way should be to get your team educated on all your products. Whether you are selling footwear, soap, telephones or toys, there are always details to learn about that will help enhance your products in sell-thru. A few key things to consider include:

1. Have a reference spot dedicated to product knowledge for your associates to refer to. This could be a bulletin board in your stockroom or a binder filled with product information – or both. Identify key highlights on products that should be among the top details for them to share with customers. For example, if a new product has recently replaced an old product, identifying what makes the new one better would be critical in communicating to customers.

2. Create a list of “How To Share” details for your associates to reference. This list should give easy conversation openings into how they can share product details with customers. Aside from direct questions being asked by the customers, associates should initiate these conversations to help encourage sales. An example is, “We recently received this (name product here) and have found it’s (name specific feature here) to be very effective in (name purpose here).”

3. Give your associates challenges to meet in regards to educating themselves and educating customers. If you don’t set the bar high for them to reach, they won’t know how far they should go in terms of learning and sharing. Some associates will naturally want to learn new product details and in return, they will likely share these details with customers. But many associates need an extra push – and that push needs to come from you.

The goal of educating your team is not just to make your job harder and their days busier, but to gain additional sales as a result. Informative associates equal informed customers. Clients will become more educated on your overall product assortment and in return, more sales will be made. There is nothing more satisfying than a customer returning to a store after being given a great product sales pitch and saying, “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about that product you showed me.” Your reward? Sales. More money. Happy customers. Satisfied employees. The list can go on and on! So what are you waiting for? Start educating and start selling!

Now don’t get my wrong – every store has their own flavor, so to speak, and I love stores that offer a vast assortment of products with shelves and tables of endless displays. But there is a difference between products merchandised with some rhyme and reason versus products merchandised in no organized, or at least understood, fashion. This was a case of a store that had the space and the fixtures to merchandise accordingly, but instead it was one confusing mess. So I ask you… Is your store merchandised so that your customers can easily shop it or are you not giving your products enough breathing room?

Just like most of us, products need their space. They can’t stand out and do their job (sell!) unless they have the tools to do this. It’s up to you to give them these tools. Consider how your customers view your products once displayed. Again – I repeat – consider how your customers view the product – not you. Sometimes it takes a new set of eyes to explain to someone why something is or isn’t working. Have a friend, associate, consultant or even trusted customer give you feedback on your merchandising if you think there is room for improvement. Let’s face it – we all can’t be great at everything! It’s okay to have to lean on others for some support sometimes, and if merchandising isn’t your thing – this is a great place to get support for. The value it can add to your store in appearance alone is near priceless, but what is even better in value is that you should sell more product!