INSANE HOLIDAY?

After the last of the red roses have been sold and Cupid has left the shop for another year, one of the most valuable activities you can do is a post holiday inventory.
What is does is allows you to compile all the invoices of both fresh and hard goods that were purchased specifically for Valentines and to compare that to what is left. Hard goods that have post holiday usage do not have to be included as they can be absorbed into daily business. What this activity will show you are areas of deficit and areas of overage. While it is impossible to hit it exactly even, a 10% swing one way or the other is good. More than that starts cutting into your profit margin especially if you have a large amount of fresh product remaining that was purchased at holiday pricing.
Areas of consideration also include did specific items sell out too early and perhaps additional stock might have been beneficial? This can have a negative effect on your profit margin the same way having too much left over inventory can. Gather input from your sales staff as to what missed sales opportunities they experienced. Was pricing a positive or negative factor in customers decision making process? How did your web site preform? Did it give enough selections and price point variations or was it too lasered and target specific without much room for financial movement? Were there enough pre-made bouquets and floral stylings for customers to have an adequate selection when they came in to shop?
Check in with design staff as well to make sure they had what they needed to produce efficiently for the holiday. Was the selection the best it could have been or was there room for improvement? What about the rotation? Was fresh product supplied several times throughout holiday production? Any quality issues? Any specialty orders that came through such as parties or sympathy work that should not be counted as holiday business as it will not repeat next year?
Transportation Engineers are an excellent source of information as well. Were the routes organized in efficient areas? Any challenges with a specific floral styling? Weather an issue? What could have made their job more easily accomplished?
By asking these and more questions, it sends the message that you value input from your staff and want to make each holiday better. Everyone feels they have something to contribute and by asking people to share what they would do if they were in charge empowers people to want to preform better. By removing these obstacles , hurdles and objections, more work can be accomplished with the same amount of staffing.
Each holiday is an opportunity to learn what worked well for your customers as well as what worked well for your shop operation. Take the good and make it better and take the not as good as it could have been and make it good for the next holiday. Remember, the definition of insanity is repeating the same action but expecting different results!