Home of Economy News

Friday, October 30, 2009

More Flyer

Here’s the rest of the flyer that went out last week.  I’ve already posted the other parts of it.

We’ve got some hunting items because this is the time for the season.

You’ll see our new line of Mr. Heater Kerosene heater.  We had to change brands because our old supplier went out of business.  These look great but you never know how the public will accept a change. 

We’ve got a great buy on Science Diet on the front page as well. 

Page two is always clothing, has been for years, except for this flyer.  With the four pages of Carhartt inserted and the four pages dedicated to deer hunting something had to give.  We have some Carhartt items that weren’t in the flyer, but sell well this time of year.

Then we have a Dewalt box.  We’re getting great growth with the Dewalt line and want to feature it in as many flyers as possible. 

Page 7 is the animal health page.  We’ve even got more science diet. 

That Ivermax is one of our biggest selling products we sell.  A lot of it must go up to Canada because when the Canadian dollar dropped in relation to the US dollar last fall sales really slowed down.  Now the Canadian Dollar’s pretty strong so I hope we’ll sell the heck out of it during November and December. 

The last page is no surprise to people who watch for our flyers.  Tire and Batteries are our #2 and #3 lines.  (Carhartt’s number one in sales and in my heart).  But I love those two as well. 

Seafoam is a product that we sell the heck out of.  That price there is as low as the company will allow us to sell it. 

It’s surprising but we’re already selling a lot of the diesel fuel additives for the winter.  We’ve really grown that category the last couple years.  Wish we had been on the ball before.  We had a trucker in here last year that was blown away by our price when he compared us with the truck stops. 

Monday, October 26, 2009

Deer Hunting Flyer

Last week we dropped our late October flyer.  This flyer actually is in three parts.  The first is the regular items.  That’s on the front and back pages and the inside front and back cover.  The second is the Carhartt insert that I posted last Friday.

The last is a four page section that’s meant to be seen as almost a separate piece just for deer hunting.  A person can pull this section out if that’s the only thing their interested in.

That Under Armour on the right hand side is a great item for deer hunting.  It’s made to wick away the moisture to keep you dry so that you don’t get chilled after a hike, a run, or after you’ve drug something.  I don’t know exactly how they do it, maybe it’s magic.

We’ve also got a lot of the orange gear.  Deer hunting is very tough for us to buy for.  The temperatures can run from in the 20’s to in the 50’s.  If it’s cold we don’t have enough of the insulated stuff.  If it’s warm we have way too much that we can’t get rid of.  Carrying too much inventory is one of those things that can really hurt a retailer.

This page is big on the do it yourself butchering.  I’m just getting into deer hunting for my son’s sake.  (He got his deer during the September youth season.)  I had my deer processed, but it sure isn’t a way to save money on groceries by any means.  We’ve got all of the stuff you need to do your processing like meat grinders but on this and the last page.  We probably should have put that stuff together, but no flyer is perfect. 

We’ve got a real hodge podge of stuff on this page.  They’re all great items.

Here’s a bunch of the other meat processing gear.  We’ve also got the Blue Rhino propane tanks.  We’ve sold new filled propane tanks in Grand Forks for a long time, but we changed over to Blue Rhino to get it in all of the stores AND to be in the refill business.  It’s really gone well.

Friday, October 23, 2009

Carhartt Flyer

Here’s our latest Carhartt flyer which we inserted this week.  This flyer is produced by Carhartt so it’s not done just how I’d do it if we were paying for it.  Still they’re paying the bills so I guess we’ll live with it.

If it were up to me I’d start off with the Carhartt Extreme winter wear on the front page of this flyer.  They don’t even include it.  That’s the difference between producing an ad for the entire country OR producing one just for North Dakota customers.  People up here know that they’ll need it sooner than later.  Our cold snap and snow earlier in the month resulted in us selling in three weeks this year what we sold in all of October last year.

Not that these aren’t great fall items.  That’s a great work jacket and you won’t get a better price on a great jean than the two for offer as well.  I’ve got to check them out because I like pants with the cell phone pockets.  I knew those were coming but haven’t looked them over yet. 

In my opinion page two is wasting some space.  I don’t think the picture of the lady working on a tree is going to sell anything.  Now, it’s a good thing to have a lady model because that reinforces that we have Carhartt sized for women. 

I don’t think that many people are aware that our Grand Forks store was one of the original test markets for Carhartt women’s clothing.

We’ve got some Carhartt footware on page 3.  I wish they had more because we sell the heck out of that line.  It’s come out of nowhere in the last couple years to become one of our largest work boot lines.  Those Carhartt Work Dungaree’s are starting to sell pretty well.  I think they’ll actually outlast jeans for a person that works hard in them. 

The back page has some great items.  I like those long sleeve t-shirts. 

I like the two products on the bottom right.  We’ve got horses, well, my wife and daughter have horses.  They already wear Carhartt work jackets for wearing around the barn and on the horses.  I think that Sherpa lined jacket would be pretty popular around the barn as would be those flannel lined jeans. 

Thursday, October 15, 2009

SNOW!

Apparently from what I can tell that I’m the only one over the age of 12 years old to get excited when it snows in October. 

Events like this get people thinking early about the stuff that Home of Economy sells for winter.

It seems that all of our top vendors have a connection with snow.

Carhartt, the premier outdoor work wear is our biggest line.  The next biggest is tires and then comes batteries.  We also sell a ton of other stuff this time of year like anti-freeze and engine store chemicals as people put stuff away.

We’re going against a very hard winter last year.  That led to a very strong fourth quarter when most of the rest of the country was struggling.  We’re sitting pretty good right now, but to finish the year right we’re going to, quite frankly, need some snow and cold by late November.

The fortunate thing for us is that we can buy winter products without a lot of risk.  When other places have a hard winter they’ll sell a lot of the Carhartts and batteries and stuff.  But if they have a warm winter they’re largely stuck with that stuff.

When we have a warm winter that just means that it’s not as bad.  People still need the same stuff, but maybe not at the same time.  A couple years ago we didn’t have hardly any snow on the ground by Christmas.  We still got a lot before New Years and we sold a lot of stuff in January.

I know it’s not the most popular thing to be happy with the snow and cold, but I have to say it’s good for business. 

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Amish Wonderland

Or something like it.

Here’s our new Amish Furniture ad.  The purpose of this ad is to build awareness of our ownership of the Amish Furniture market in North Dakota.

It’s a great line that for the most part sells itself.  We just have to let people know that we have it.

For years we struggled to get an identify for our home furnishings department. We had the best stuff, but a lot of people weren’t willing to believe that you had to go to an hardware store to get quality furniture in Grand Forks. 

But when you have Amish Furniture the consumer has a good idea of what they’re going to get.  For the people that know we have an Amish Gallery they know they have to come to H of E to at least check out their options.  For people that don’t know about our Amish Gallery we have this TV commercial.

Friday, October 09, 2009

Hunting Ad

Here’s our brand new hunting ad.  I downloaded it from the ad agency just now.

In previous years we would use our leadership in Federal Ammunition to be what we really emphasized.  Now with the drastic ammunition shortages we don’t know what we’re going to have and what we’re going to get. 

Retailers don’t make much on ammunition but we can count on it to bring the customers to the store.  This year we don’t know.  It could work out because maybe more people will be visiting Home of Economy because they can’t find what they want in ammunition at other places.  Of course since we were so strong with Federal with an huge selection at the best price that might work against us rather than help us.

I just wish we could have the ammunition the customers want.  Not this year. 

Thursday, October 08, 2009

70th Aniversary Carhartt Ad

With the turn in temperatures the Carhartt sales have really picked up. 

We really committed to a large summertime delivery order on the insulated Carhartt this year because the sales were so strong last year.  I had a buyer that handles a different product line ask me if that wasn’t overkill.  Actually when you analyze the projected sales through the end of the year we will need to be hitting the reorders hard.

Carhartt’s a great company and they’ll ship fast, if they have the product.  The problem last year was that it was cold all over so we struggled to get reloaded in a timely manner. 

Monday, October 05, 2009

70th Anniversary TV AD

Here’s our 70th Anniversary Television Ad. 

I think that 70 years is very noteworthy.  What’s even more noteworthy is that my grandmother almost made it.  Can you imagine working at the same place for 70 years? 

It’s worth noting again that Home of Economy was a pioneer in the discount industry.  Way back when there were actually laws against offering lower prices to the consumers than the manufacturer wanted.  Don’t laugh, North Dakota still has a law like that regarding selling milk.

There was an exception to the law in that you were able to offer discount to fleets, which was defined as owning 5 vehicles.  My Grandfather, Bob Kiesau, had the idea that farmers had a lot of vehicles and if he counted their tractors and combines they deserved a discount.

He sent people out to the county seats to get the names of people that qualified to receive a discount.

Thursday, October 01, 2009

The 70th Anniversary Flyer Is Out

So yesterday our 70th Anniversary Flyer hit the newspapers.  Posting it was going to be the first thing I was going to do.  I got a start at getting the pictures right and then events took over.  I was lucky to escape work with my skin intact I guess. 

So anyway without any further delay, here is the flyer.  This is a great flyer.

The front page is the most important part of the flyer.  We’ve chosen to our our founders, and my Grandparents, for building a great business that survives after 70 years.  Drive up and down the streets of town and think for yourself of how many businesses have been around for 20 year let alone 70. 

We’re excited to offer Columbia jackets for the first time ever this year.  In fact they just were putting them up in the Grand Forks store a little while ago.  This is a great brand that gives us a stylish offering in winter jackets. 

Of course we have some Carhartt clothing on the front page.  That’s our number one priority, expecially in the fall and winter of the year.  We’ve moved up in importance with Carhartt.  Last week the national sales manager paid a visit to see how he could help us keep the streak of GREAT sales growth going.

I’ve talked about Science Diet before.  We’re still seeing great growth.  Within the last month we’ve negotiated with Science Diet to come out with lower prices on the puppy foods to get people started on Science Diet.  Just like babies it’s important to get the right nutrition for your puppy to help them achieve their potential.

I told you Carhartt was our #1 priority.  On pages two and three we’ve got nothing but Carhartt.  We’re the leader in North Dakota and we’re going to keep it that way.

Page 4 & 5 are also clothing.  We’ve got our ladies and childrens Carhartt here as well as the accessories. 

We’ve also got Wrangler as well as the Berco insulated clothes. We’ve got great buys on Dickie work clothing as well as Levi and Lee Jeans. 

Don’t forget that we are the leader in fire retardant clothing.  This is becoming a real big thing where it’s required by OSHA.  We see a lot of call for it out in the oil fields as well as the electrical workers. 

Check out the Weber Section in page 6. Our revamped Weber Grill Department is up 183% for the year.  In the past the fourth quarter (October, November and December) are very strong for grills.  We think we’ve got the momentum built up to really finish the year strong.

We are back in stock on gun safes.  Liberty has been a great line for us.  We’ve got a lot of hunting clothes at just the right time to get out in the field.

One Page 8 we’ve got more Science Diet, especially some of the reduced price puppy foods.  We’ve also got a lot of the bagged feeds for larger animals on this page.  This is an important category for us as it brings the customers back as soon as the they get to the bottom of the bag.

Page nine has some of our new Val Spar paint.  We haven’t advertised house paint much this summer as we were transitioning to the Val Spar brand.  I used some of this a couple weeks ago on the outside of the house and I was impressed with how it covered with only one coat on top of the primer. 

Check out the Bunn Coffeemakers.  If you need a quality maker you can’t beat it. 

Page 10 is strong with the new Mr. Heater kerosene heaters.  We’ve sold this type of heaters for years but the sales have really exploded the last couple years.  Unfortunately the company that made these heaters went out of business last year.  But we were fortunate to have a good relationship with Mr. Heater who’s sold us propane heaters for years and years.  I think they look great and we won’t miss a beat.

Page 11 is mostly farm stuff, so its got a limited audience.  But those are some great lines.  That Cancrete cattle waterer has been doing great for us.  It weighs about a billion pounds but the guys that use them love them.

Page 12 is Batteries and Tires.  I was just looking at how our Battery sales have taken off the last 3 years.  We’re selling 70% more over that time.  We must be doing something right because it seems like everybody from the gas station to the giant discounters sell them. 

One thing that blows me away is how much of that Seafoam we sell.  It’s a great product to use when you’re storing your power equipment to help it start next spring.