Show Room Sales Few home improvement companies can claim to be getting 20% of their leads from showroom walk-ins, or anything close to that. Kostak says that he stumbled on the concept of showroom leads almost by accident. Not long after he bought the company, he began renovating its one showroom. The interior and exterior renovations immediately resulted in a significant uptick in walk-in business, including people who were simply curious. “It started bringing in more people,” Kostak says. “That caused us to think that showrooms might be a good way to generate business, if done properly.”
“Done properly,” as Kostak learned, means stand-alone locations with high visibility. No industrial parks, no strip malls. At the showrooms, which Kostak describes as the company’s “billboards,” window and door displays are professionally built and trimmed out so that consumers can immediately see the best of what the company has. The point is upselling. All-Seal operates an 8,000-square-foot showroom out of the 16,000-square-foot building that houses its offices and warehouse space. In addition, the company opened up two other showrooms, each about 4,000 square feet. Employees maintain and update displays on a regular basis to keep them looking fresh.
But whereas most home improvement companies use their showrooms to turn walk-ins into confirmed appointments — that is, to set the lead for a later in-home sales visit — the point at All-Seal is, quite frankly, to sell them.
Since customers very often came with the measurements for their window or door openings, it was clear that in many cases they were looking to be sold. “It was much better to close them,” Kostak says. Consequently, there are always salespeople manning All-Seal’s showrooms. “Obviously it doesn’t work out every time,” Kostak says, “but a lot of the time selling is done there.”
Product Differentiation Home improvement companies in smaller metro markets typically offer multiple products, rather than one or two lines. For Kostak, niche items are a key to building sales, especially with the opportunity to cross-market to repeat customers. Three years ago the company added a line of retractable canvas awnings, which became an immediate hit, first as add-ons to window and door sales, then on their own.
“It fit what we were already doing,” Kostak says. “It’s a very good showroom product and an upscale product, and we bill ourselves as an upscale company.” A typical awning sale might be about $3,000. The product offers a practical, attractive alternative to the old-fashioned aluminum awning, which, Kostak points out, higher-income homeowners don’t care for.
The company began building another revenue stream right after Sept. 11, 2001, when it got into the business of ordering and installing wood windows for custom home builders. A dedicated staff of five sells, administers, and installs the windows. Warehousing, delivery, and product nomenclature for the wood windows are similar, Kostak says, but “the salesforce has to sell differently. They’re consultative instead of going for the close like in retail.”
Service Culture In a market where no business is a mystery for long, reputations always catch up with you and friendly service is indispensable. Call All-Seal, for instance, and you will hear a human voice, not a machine or a voice-mail answering system.
A less tangible, if oft-touted, way to stand out is service. “When we have an unhappy customer, for whatever reason, we have a number of people who jump on the situation to make it right,” Kostak says. Solving the problem is imperative, he points out, even if it means taking a temporary gross margin hit in the interests of building a long-term relationship with that customer.
Kostak tells the tale of the customer who ordered 10 windows and found, once installed, that he didn’t like the way 7 of the 10 (correctly measured) windows lined up in their openings. All-Seal took them out and reinstalled them.
The need for such dramatic gestures, thankfully, arises rarely. The key to earning referral and repeat business is doing something unexpected and extra, no matter how small.
“All our people are of the mindset [that they will] do that little bit extra; look at something and take care of it if they can do it readily,” says production manager Harris. He gives an example: A customer once praised the caulking job that Harris had done outside the house, then asked if he’d be willing to caulk the shower surrounds inside. Since the caulk color matched, Harris was more than happy to oblige.
If Better Business Bureau records offer any indication, customers are satisfied. The BBB has recorded just two complaints for All-Seal during the past 36 months, and both have been settled.