Easter means lots of different things. New beginnings, bunnies, the end of Lent, Good Friday, Easter Monday, chicks, baby lambs, chocolate and children screaming at you because they’re just desperate for ‘one more Easter egg’.
It means all those things. But it also means something else. And for a business owner, it’s perhaps the most important thing.
It means big bucks.
Just like Christmas, Easter is a fantastic opportunity for small and medium businesses to significantly boost their sales. It’s a time for family (what with two bank holidays and all), and it’s also a time for lots of food. In short, if you’re a B2C business (or a B2B business creating products for a B2C market) then you can use Easter to add more income to your top line and your bottom line.
But how do you do it? After all, Easter isn’t exactly a secret – your competitors are keen to grow their profits in exactly the same way as you are.
The answer is simple to say, but not quite so easy to do: make your prospects want to buy your product rather than your competitors. Make your product stand out enough that when your prospect is shopping for exactly what you sell, your product is the only one they’re interested in buying.
Now there are a number of things that can contribute towards your product being seen as more desirable than others. It might be a better product. You might have a more reputable brand. It might have been referred to them by one of your existing customers.
But the thing I’m going to alert you to is – surprise, surprise – the way it looks and the way it’s packed. Like it or not, if your product doesn’t look aesthetically pleasing on that shelf or that e-commerce website, no one’s buying it this Easter. A simple way to ensure that your product isn’t lost in the sea of competition is to ensure that it’s packaging is absolutely first class.
Good packaging can make a world of difference. Allow me to quote from a study commissioned by MeadWestcao Corporation:
“The findings show that consumers rate a product’s packaging to be on par with the brand itself (10% vs. 12%). Considering the investment companies make in building their brands compared to their products’ packaging, this is significant”
In other words, consumers rate a product’s packaging as pretty much as important as the actual brand of the product.
What’s the lesson here? If you’re selling a product, and your packaging isn’t accentuating or adding to the allure of it, you’re leaving money on the table, end of story. Have a peaceful and prosperous Easter.
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Noel Greenwood is the Managing Director of GWD Ltd, the designers and manufacturers of presentation and promotional packaging. You can reach him on (01279) 416093 or at www.gwd.ltd.uk.