Trends: Knowing your market; marketing what you know
Keeping it real... During a recent visit to Atlantic City, I met a lovely person named Vickie Race, who does a lot of worthwhile things at Race Farm LLC in Blairstown, N.J. Sometimes, the most important thing she does is tap the brakes.

You see, Vickie has a lot of the same customers you do — or, at least, a lot of her customers do the same things your customers do. They watch wonderful, informative television programs on HGTV and the like, shows that miraculously boil down tedious, expensive, time-consuming home overhauls into 30-minute snippets, prompting these customers to come to her garden center/landscape designing business to request that she duplicate the process at their abodes. Of course, when she explains that the project will take several weeks OR MORE and cost several thousands of dollars OR MORE, her customers are taken aback by her seeming inability to "just do it like they did on the TV show."

When she tells them that her proposal is, in fact, how they did it on the TV show, she generally is met with a blank stare — or with whatever "unfulfilled expectation" looks like. Either way, Vickie is faced with the challenge you often see: converting a customer's potential "Bat Turn" into a chance to make your business some money.

It's at this point that Vickie says something like, "here's what I think you should do... " and then proposes dividing the project into several phases, each of which complements the previous — and the whole. Of course, each phase costs some coin, but it's generally a number that is considerably more palatable than the initial sticker shock. "I have found," she says, "that this approach works with many of my customers."

There are many customers, period, for Vickie's family business, which runs the gamut in services from farm to garden center, from greenhouse to outdoor living supplier. It will be worth your while to check out the Web site, www.RaceFarmLLC.com to see how a company that juggles so many balls juggles so many balls so well. Some of Vickie's newer creations are on display on the Landscape Design link.

It probably should be noted that there is sometimes a drawback to Vickie's multi-phase approach to home/landscape projects, especially when the customer is a 30-something.

"Yeah," she said, "by the time we finish Phase Two and move to Phase Three, they become bored with the whole thing and decide they want something else."

Puzzling pictures
Complementary parts... One of the pictures below is a puzzle. Choose the correct one, and put the product together again. Accomplishing said feat will earn you kudos of the highest order (assuming we can round up the Highest Order Kudo Giver before sundown).

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Pick 'n Click
Instant info... This list of links to suppliers can help you find the garden/gift items you need — and maybe some you simply want. Please click the company for e-reader service.

Acorn Bird Products Allsop, Inc. Alpine Corporation Amturf Enterprises Anamese Garden & Home Aquascape, Inc. ATLAS Glove Consumer Products, a Div. of LFS, Inc. Bamboo Accents Benchmaster by Structural Plastics Bowling Enterprises Charlie Cook Associates, Inc. Clean Air Gardening Collier Metal Specialties, Inc. Danove Corporation Deer Out Deer Run Greenery Discount Pond Supplies, Inc. D-Lighting Illusions, Inc. DP Foods, LLC (Daniels Plant Food) Dramm Corporation EasyPro Pond Products EbioExpress International Echo, Inc. Fabriscape Fafard Freedom Ponds Garden Patch, The Gardenware Gifts That Bloom

Good Directions, Inc. Hines Pottery Hydrofarm K&H Manufacturing Listo Products Maine Bucket Company, Inc., The Michael Gordon LTD Norcross Safety Products Novelty Manufacturing Co. Ohio Wholesale, Inc. Olds Seed Company Plant Revolution, Inc. Poly-Tex, Inc. Principle Plastics Radius Garden LLC Red Carpet Studios Riverside Enterprises RSR/Echo Valley Ruibal's Topiary Systems & Ironworks Rustic Natural Cedar Furniture Co. SeedBallz Sunlight Supply, Inc. Topiary Art Works & Greenhouses Triumph Plant Company Trunk Mat Company, The Vitamin Institute Wayside Fence Company White Cedar Gazebos Woodstream

 

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Oh, yeah, the riddle answer...
An upright piano

 
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