February 2007

BUSINESS OF WEARABLES: The Art of Upselling

By Nowell C. Wisch, MAS

By looking for ways to help your customers up their images, you can increase
your profits. Up what?” Charlie cries, as I realize that she wasn’t listening very carefully to me in our conversation over lunch. As patiently as I can, I say, “If you were listening, I said, we should look for ways to move our customers ‘up’ in the world, meaning that we should upsell or upgrade their purchasing decisions whenever possible.”

“Oh,” she says, somewhat sheepishly. “I thought I heard something else.”
That’s OK. The concept of upselling can be a difficult one to master, not because the concept is difficult but because the mindset isn’t a natural one to most sales professionals. Our natural tendency is to run for the parking lot as soon as anything resembling a purchase order floats into our lap. The bird-in-the-hand philosophy is more evident in our profession than any other, but it doesn’t help us earn a living or support our employees and suppliers.

Why upsell?
The concept of upselling was best taught to me years ago by Rex Shoemake and Rod Brown. At the time, Rod had left a prominent distributorship (no longer in business) and opened his own shop, partly because his previous employer no longer wanted to accept small orders. Rod and Rex would say that any order is a good order, especially if it leads to more revenue opportunities.
I was a multiline rep at the time, and during a meeting, Rod pointed out that Rex could take the order he was writing and add another item to create a package sale out of a simple three-dozen cotton-twill project. Rex added a sewing kit from one of my suppliers and increased his profit on the order by a significant amount. He was no longer selling a shirt. Now he was upselling to an appreciation gift package. He didn’t simply increase the value of the sale; he sold up to a higher gift level and made more money.

"While we frequently mistake the concept of upselling as ‘taking advantage of my customer,’ we actually should look at it as a way of maximizing the customer’s opportunities."

Later that year, Rex and Rod did it again by upgrading. They sold a fall jacket from one of my lines. While that would have been a nice order for all of us, the guys weren’t satisfied. Rex convinced his client that she should add a kicker to the gift. He suggested a custom, pewter-looking aluminum coat hook cast with the company logo that would keep its name in sight on all those warm summer days. Rex showed her how the hook could hold a coat or umbrella or keys – or small children. The idea was so powerful that the client bought twice as many hooks as jackets. What’s important to note is that you can let your client know that if he upgrades his gift, he may be able to increase his end-user’s good will toward his company and up the gift’s perceived value.

How to make upselling work
If we choose to upsell our clients, we have a lot of ways to do it. Our arsenal includes selling a better fabric, using a different imprint or embellishment method, or bundling additional products with the gift.
Don’t make upselling difficult to employ. While we frequently mistake the concept as one of “taking advantage of my customer,” we actually should look at it as a way of maximizing the customer’s opportunities. If our job is to help our clients achieve their marketing, administrative, production and sales goals, then simply taking more money out of their pockets isn’t a solution.

The concept of upselling is to up the results without upping the ante. If spending $10 will result in a return on investment of “X” amount and spending $12 will increase the ROI more than the 20% increase in the cost, then the additional $2 in sales might be money well spent. The problem isn’t to convince your client that he should spend an additional $2, but that spending the extra $2 significantly will increase his chances of achieving his program goals. If we’re looking at things from a customer-focused point of view, this shouldn’t be a problem.
Here’s a real-world example of this concept in action: Joann helped her client choose a product that would best serve her needs by focusing on the project’s total cost of ownership. TCO is a valid and important concept in wearables selling. A $10 shirt that has to be replaced after five machine washings is more expensive than a $20 shirt that can last 15 machine washings. In looking at the ROI, it’s clear that the better shirt is cheaper in the long run.

Joann’s client, a major grocery chain, wanted to change its uniform look from twills and ties to polo shirts and slacks. While Joann originally showed a shirt that embraced this concept, she lost the sale to a uniform company that offered an inexpensive shirt at a great price point. Joann knew how the shirts would be used and abused, and had chosen a much better product that, indeed, initially cost more.

When the buyer put the sale out to bid among uniform companies, she changed the rules of the game, and Joann lost the sale on price. In Joann’s mind, however, the issue was quality, longevity and TCO. She decided to not only regain the sale but make even more money on it while providing what the client really required – good looks at a reasonable price. She took samples of the winning shirt, samples of the shirt that she originally had specified and a third shirt of an even better quality, and put them through 25 machine washings to simulate a normal year’s wear and tear.

Well, you know the rest. The client saw th e abysmal look and feel of the cheap shirt, the far better outcome of the original shirt and the spectacular results with the premium shirt. She gave Joann the contract back for the even more expensive product. Joann successfully had showed her client that employees would look better for far longer at a much lower cost of ownership because the better $27 shirt would last a year or more and look good the whole time.

"If we choose to upsell our clients, we have a lot of ways to do it. Our arsenal includes selling a better fabric, using a different imprint or embellishment method, or bundling additional products with the gift."

The benefits of upselling
If you look for ways to help your customers up their images, you can up your sale and profit. Changing embellishment methods is one way. When your client suggests a screen print when embroidery will look much better and last longer, the upselling suggestion has a real benefit.

Changing fabric is always an option as well. Look for opportunities to move your client from old-style cotton to a performance fabric, and show him how a happier employee will be more productive, and how the resulting gains will lower costs and make the company more money. 

Upselling usually has a positive outcome for everyone. A week after our lunch conversation, Charlie called me to gloat about her “big win.” She originally was writing an order for a cotton T-shirt with a four-color imprint on the front and back. After asking some pointed questions about the program’s desired results and the past history of these kinds of projects, she went back to the client with an audacious suggestion.

“I told my client that if he increased the budget by only $4,000, we could get a much nicer garment, package it creatively and really make it a gift to value,” she said. “He didn’t bite on the idea immediately, but two days later he called and asked what I had in mind. In itself, that was a ‘win,’ since this client usually only buys what he calls about.”

Charlie went to the next meeting and proposed doing an embroidered left-breast message instead of the gaudy color print. She suggested a heavier weight shirt with a slightly higher price point. She also suggested that the client package the shirt inside an upscale coffee mug and include a really nice pen.

Charlie is looking at her current sale in a new light. What began as a humble T-shirt order is morphing into a five-figure sale that’ll net her four times the profit and twice the commission for almost the same amount of work. By looking at ways to stretch the concept, she has stretched the revenue stream. Her client will be much happier with the product, and the employees probably will wear the garments, use the coffee mugs and write thank-you letters with the pen.

Don’t forget to look for the opportunity to upsell your customers. It’s a good tactic and a good strategy. If you do it every chance you get, then everyone will benefit.

Happy Selling!