Transform Your Business: Creating Irresistible Stores and Storefronts
June 10, 6:30 p.m. at Mint City Coffee Roasting
Interested in improving your business storefront and creating a more vibrant shopping experience for your customers? Join us on June 10th at 6:30 p.m. at Mint City Coffee Roasting for an engaging and informative workshop presented by Experience Chehalis featuring the talents of Main Street friends, Front Door Back! Learn the secrets of creating eye-catching storefronts that captivate customers—both in person and online. From the signage and lighting to window displays and shopper behavior, you’ll walk away with practical tips to make your business shine inside and out. There is no cost to attend, and NW Board Bites will provide a beautiful charcuterie spread.
Ready for more? You can take your store transformation to the next level with personalized, one-on-one consultations from the experts at Front Door Back. On June 11 or 12, you can work directly with these seasoned consultants to receive tailored advice for your business. Thanks to Experience Chehalis, participants receive significant discounts on consultation fees—plus, you can access a $750 grant for recommended improvements like displays and lighting, with no match required. Don’t miss this incredible opportunity!
Session Description
Gone are the days of shopping local out of a sense of obligation or duty. Shoppers want “great experiences” in “good stores.” But what exactly makes a “good store”? This presentation will define the elements that make up a great retail landscape that supports a “Main Street” downtown district. Main Street’s advantage is its authenticity and its ability to provide unique experiences. It epitomizes the Buy Local trend that mass retailers are trying to capture for their shareholders. Main Street retail can be exactly what shoppers are yearning for.
What to evaluate or where to make changes that deliver the greatest ROI is often elusive to busy independent retailers. Best practices for storefronts, coupled with a greater understanding of shopper expectations and behavior, allays retail shortcomings and positions businesses for increased enjoyment, loyalty, foot traffic, and sales from their shoppers. This 90-minute presentation will cover:
- Where Does Your Store Start? Seeing your store from the street and from the internet as shoppers do. Are you communicating the right message?
- Storefront Activation – SHOW vs TELL with signage, lighting, colors and sidewalk merchandising to improve visibility and attract foot traffic
- Powerful Windows – How to define and create them and why good windows are critical to bringing in the right shoppers
- Lighting – Appropriate styles and locations of lights as a sales tool for both the store AND the district
- Best Practices at Retail – Deconstructing revenue generating big budget concepts for small budgets & small footprints stores to make their own
- Leveraging Shopper Behavior – Creating path-makers, encouraging exploration and merchandising 360 to increase product engagement and sales
FAQs
What will I learn?
Attendees will leave knowing:
- Effective Storefronts– Key components that deserve attention and budget
- Showing vs. Telling your story. What’s the difference, and why does it matter?
- Capture Power– is anyone noticing you? Are you worth a visit?
- Windows– The #1 thing to start with
- Awnings– to have or have not? If so, what style?
- Signage Best Practices and costly rookie mistakes to avoid
- Lights– Which kind? Where? Why? How?
- Shopper Behavior– How we shop. Turning Pain into Happy.
- Predictable Patterns– Which relate to sales if you know how to guide them
- Visual merchandising that grabs attention and facilitates sales
Who should attend?
Business owners: Because every business plays a role in creating a cohesive, enjoyable downtown experience, ANY business located on a ground floor space, that receives clients or customers should attend this presentation. This includes service-based businesses (insurance, personal grooming, medical), food service (coffee shop or restaurant) and of course, retail stores.
Property owners: Learn how to enhance your property value to attract higher quality tenants with the right investments. Happy successful tenants attract good neighbors and increased rents.
Planners: Is the city supporting best practices for signage, lighting and other aspects of storefront activation that increase pride of place and are business friendly? Hear what we are recommending to find out if your policies support or encumber.
Why should I make time for this?
EVERY business contributes to the commercial fabric and collectively creates the “feel” of the downtown business district. How a community sees itself, whether they (the residents and owners) make the effort to keep things clean and refreshed or they neglect themselves, letting paint fade and improvements languish, shapes a district’s identity. If a city takes pride in itself, so too will visitors assign value and in return, spend their time and money.
Learn how each of you can support each other by being the best version of YOU. Learn how to develop and maintain your individuality and why that’s good business for the district too.
Are there any take-home materials?
Attendees receive a 30 point+ Storefront Checklist as a reminder of what we cover in the workshop. Attendees scheduled for individual consultations will receive a pre-consult preparation guide to get the most out of their consultation time.
One-on-One Consultations
Did you hear an idea you liked? Is that idea something you should consider doing? Are you planning some changes or improvements and want to get feedback from retail experts? One-on-one consultations give you access to two National Retail Experts, Seanette Corkill and Anne Marie Luthro, to focus our attention on how to help you be a better you. By spending time in your space, we will provide specific and personalized solutions to fix profit-blocking situations or brainstorm creative ideas to increase sales that you, the business owner, can implement in the near term (like simply rearranging things) and/or plan to improve in the longer term (as in refreshing graphics or investing in lighting).
There are 3 types of consultations.
Regardless of which level, all consultations begin the same way. We walk and shop your store like a secret shopper, looking at details, merchandise locations, fixtures, lighting, visual merchandising standards, signage and so on. (Time/notice permitting, we’ll review your online presence as well as your physical nighttime presence.) Once we’ve gathered our initial impressions, we compare our findings with your greatest areas of concern, share our Top 5 findings and recommendations for improvements plus any additional areas of opportunity.
Thanks to Experience Chehalis, participants receive discounts off standard fees! In addition to the discount, Experience Chehalis is offering a $750 credit toward recommended improvement costs for those purchasing a consultation — no match required!
- “Walk and Talk”- Assessments: $250 (Regularly $500) Ideal for businesses that are accomplished in their genre, are actively making improvements, need affirmation and clarification on their next moves, and/or appreciate objective professional input on action items they might not have considered. Since no written report is provided, clients are encouraged to take notes.
- Tier 1 Consultations and Reporting: $750 (Regularly $1,500) Complementing the in-store discussion, this Tier provides the business owner a written summary of prioritized guidance on their Top 5 list of action items. This report becomes a reference document, directly from the experts, reinforcing not only WHAT to do but WHY to do it. It serves to benchmark and guide the changes recommended.
- Tier 2 Consultations and Reporting: $3,250 (Regularly $4,000) This top tier report provides an expanded list of written recommendations (beyond the Top 5). These reports provide additional detailed support, customized creative direction and bring to life, via imagery, what even well-written instructions can’t offer. These often incorporate inspirational examples, renderings of the interior or exterior, product/fixture specifications, and select cost estimates. Tier 2 Consultations with Reports are often the foundation for advancing projects toward funding and implementation.
Testimonials
“The presentation by Frontdoor Back, “The How Behind the Wow” was absolutely the best seminar we ever hosted for our retailers! Every business that attended had a take-away, and some even implemented key ideas the very next day. The one-on-one consultations with Seanette and AnnMarie were highly detailed and the recommendations were not only tailored to each business, but also entirely feasible for a small business to implement. We keep working with the tools they have given us! I would highly recommend Frontdoor Back to any community that wants to give their retailers concrete tools for increasing sales.”
Louise Wadsworth, Downtown Coordinator, Livingston County Economic Development, NY
To put the importance of their visits into words of a local shop owner, “Please bring them back every year. Our businesses respect their expertise and creativity and have built relationships with these amazing consultants.”
Mary Des Marais, Executive Director, Gig Harbor Waterfront Alliance
“You helped me rethink my space and how to use my fixtures in ways that hadn’t occurred to me. My customers noticed and liked your ideas and so did I. It was refreshing to speak with someone that thinks like an owner and bounce ideas off of. I also used your ideas on the outside of my store and love how things turned out.”
Kristen Ling, owner A Framer’s Touch, Forest Grove, OR
“Your presentation was the kick in the pants I needed.”
Sandy Spencer, owner Lively Olive Tasting Bar, Port Townsend, WA
“Your ideas were both inspiring and practical.”
Ann Miner, owner Yarn Folk, Ellensburg, WA
“To offer the services of Frontdoor Back is an opportunity for our Main Street organization to provide needed assistance and ‘outside eyes’. I LOVE the way the suggestions are presented and explored with the owner. Frontdoor Back represents the essence of Main Street.”
Linda Haglund, Executive Director, Wenatchee Downtown Association, WA
“I appreciated your ingenuity.”
Mitch Mitchum, property owner Astoria, OR
“The shop owners were wondering how soon we could get you to their stores after your presentation.”
Vickie Chambers, Executive Director, Coupeville, WA
“WOW. Just Wow! This talented presenter has taken our downtown from longed-for big visions …. to accomplished projects. She is gifted, fresh and frugal in her approach. All the small steps we’ve taken have netted big results. ”
Lee Rafferty, Executive Director, Vancouver, WA
“You absolutely hit the mark.”
Todd Cutts, Executive Director, Olympia Downtown Alliance
“Within 90 minutes of rearranging a few key areas based on your suggestions, I went from watching reluctant sidewalk browsers pass by to having 5 shoppers come in and I made 3 sales. That made my day. Your ideas were creative yet common sense. I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect with the consult but I’m so glad I signed up. It’s been several months since the changes and the effects are lasting.”
Carine La Point, owner Carine’s Studio, Astoria, OR
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