Merchandising

One of the greatest sales negotiations of all time, was George Lucas retaining the rights to Star Wars merchandising. The studio didn’t value it, but without the billions of toys Star Wars may not have been the success it was, certainly financially.

Merchandising is loosely the act of putting your logo on products

• Sporting jerseys

• Those drink cups at the movie

• Point of sale displays

• Big display piles of a product with signage

Merchandising is more than shopper experience. I asked a veteran plumber what his number one sales tactic was and he said ‘fridge magnets no question’.

I was recently in a sales pitch and realised the pen I had been carrying around was branded with the company I was selling to.

In my first retail job a manager said ‘think of a fruit shop, if you go in and there’s a couple of crappy apples sitting alone on a shelf you walk out, but if there’s a cornucopia of mangoes, strawberries, and cherries, you fill your boots’.

At university my lecturer explained what a powerful brand Harley Davidson was, because it was the only logo people got tattooed on their body.

It can be a good cheap way to repeatedly have your logo looked at, or to create a corporate image by sticking your logo to a product, balance cheap and useful, government departments and some companies wont allow the staff to accept items worth more than a cup of coffee.

Don’t forget that as soon as you stick your logo onto many things like clothes and cars they become tax deductible.