What about your vibe?

Okay... you've got a great shop. But what are you doing to keep it great?

I've often been asked if I was ever going to franchise my music store. People walk in, they see the cool atmosphere, the friendly service, the customer support, the seasonal decorations in the windows.... you know.... the vibe.

They say things like: "This is such a cool shop. Have you ever thought about franchising?", or "Oh wow... do you guys have another location?". I hear things like "I didn't expect this store to be as nice as this...Is this a franchise?".

I take all of those as compliments, but my answer is always the same.

It's not a franchise. I'm not going to open one. There is only Pladd Dot, and this is where you experience it.

The customer experience

The customer experience is the most important thing in my shop. There is nothing more important. Your customers are your life blood and when they have a great experience, they look forward to coming back.

Since day one, I wanted to create a different vibe for my shop. When we answer the phone, we say: "It's a rockin' day at Pladd Dot Music, this is Chris, can I help you?". When a customer walks into the store and we haven't met them yet, we say: "Have you been here before? If not, we have two rules: Play anything you want, as long as you want...".

Those two things immediately set the vibe for our customers.  They knew what to expect from the very first time they called or the first time they walked into our shop.

Then as they walk through our store and see that it's not only spotless, they begin to get warm scents of apple cinnamon from the difusers we have around the shop. I don't play background music in my shop. It's a music store. I don't want it to distract from the music that they want to create.

If you're a clothing store with a modern, hip vibe, that indie band playing from your Spotify playlist my be EXACTLY what you want... and need.

My lighting is muted with warm tones and our store is way darker than your average neon blasted box chain.  I'm not talking Hollister dark, but the lighting itself creates a vibe that says:  "This is a place to relax, just like your living room.".  The four big comfy chairs we have for customers remind them of that as well.

My employees are trained to greet customers, not to be "counter shy", to offer top notch support, and to NEVER oversell.

So yeah. We've got a vibe.

You can spend all day on software, reports, ordering merchandise, and trying to keep up with the latest trends in sales.  Those things are important, but they aren't why you opened your shop.  You opened your shop because you thought you could do it better than the other guys...

So prove it.  Give your customers an experience that they'll never forget.