 |
SOS—rescuing business customers in need |
|
As the competition between national mass merchandisers
and independent retailers rages on, Standard Office Supply (SOS) in Port
Huron continues to do a healthy business 65 years after Harry Blomquist
opened shop in 1939. Harry is retired now, but his son, Harlan, and grandson,
Eric, enjoy the challenge of running the family business despite the stiffer
competition.
Harlan attributes the success to two things: above-and-beyond
customer service and the muscle of belonging to an independent buyers
group. His store, which sells office furniture and equipment and offers
equipment repair service as well, can frequently rescue a customer who
needs same-day delivery of a product or immediate service on a broken
office machine. “Service is really the best thing we have to compete
against the chain stores,” said Harlan. “In business, everyone wants it today. Someone forgot
to plan ahead and now they need those 20 binders—not next week but
today, when the report is due. They know we can usually provide same-day
delivery, and they value that service.” If a customer needs a hard-to-find item, the SOS staff
will chase it down, using contacts all over the country, both wholesalers
and other independent stores. “Here, every employee is authorized to do what’s
necessary to provide the best service—there’s no complicated
hierarchy or corporate approval process to slow us down,” explained
Eric. “If a customer has a need, whoever is available takes care
of it.” “It helps that we have wonderful employees. They
treat the store like it’s their business, which is great,” added
Harlan. “Walk into an office-products big box and say you
need a four-ring binder—you’ll find that all they stock is three-ring
binders. They may even tell you no one makes such a thing,” said
Eric. “We’d say we don’t have them in stock but
we can get them quickly—ideally by 6:00 a.m. the next morning. We’ll
spend a lot of time locating it because that builds the relationship,”
said Harlan. The Blomquists’ approach to inventory management
goes against the current trend of “leaner is better.” “We try to stock product rather than order it in.
We want a high turn, of course, but we don’t mind stocking more so
that we will be able to fill orders faster,” said Harlan. In addition to their three four-story buildings, the business
has four old warehouses directly behind the store, making this approach
possible. SOS’s office design service also helps differentiate
it from national competitors. Although the store has offered the service
for eight years, Eric, who started full time two years ago, has enhanced
the service. It uses computer-aided design systems that allow customers
to look at the floorplan from various angles and picture the layout before
the sale. Some office supply stores have started charging for such
services, but SOS does not. As Eric explained, providing this service
actually helps them, too.
“After all, if we deliver furniture that turns out
not to fit or is wrong in some way, we’re involved in correcting
the errors. So the design service is a win-win situation and can be a
good sales tool as well,” Eric said. Eric’s other specialty is the store’s website.
It’s not aimed primarily at new customers but at current ones, allowing
them to order online and to automate their approvals, receive notifications
and keep track of budgets. “It also saves us quite a lot of time, since it goes
right into our back-end system and there’s no mistakes,” said
Eric. “Our staff is freed up to serve customers with more unique
challenges rather than filling standard orders.” At some point Eric expects they will expand the website
and use it to attract new customers, but his first step was to take a
different approach from the big boxes. “Our customers value us for our value and our service,
so we don’t want to shift attention away from that to have a snazzy
website. You can’t get away from your core competencies,” Eric
explained. How do the Blomquists attract new business? They have
an outside sales staff of six, and one of their tasks is to build business
among current customers. “We want to get all our customers to come to us for
all their needs we can supply. The core of our business is office supplies,
but since most businesses use all our products and services, we try to
broaden our relationship with each customer.” One of the biggest challenges the business faces, Eric
claims, is changing the public’s perception that the big boxes always
have lower prices. “That’s not really the case,” explained
Eric. “They’ve got a lot of overhead—a lot of trucks, advertising,
management expenses. “If you match us item-for-item, we’ll match
or even beat them on price nine times out of 10. The problem is the general
perception that bigger is better.” Through the power of an independent buyers group, SOS
and other retailers have opportunities to buy at discounts just as the
big chains do, according to Bloomquist. SOS joined a buyers group that
merged with Independent Stationers (now known as is.group), one of the
largest independent buyers groups in the world, and are very pleased with
the result. Indianapolis-based is.group operates as a cooperative—its
more than 600 member stores continue to be locally owned and operated,
but utilize common merchandising and marketing to aggregate the strength
of the organization. “They recently developed regional distribution centers,
which allow us to get product faster. If I had to buy on my own, with
my buying power, I simply couldn’t do it,” claimed Harlan. This article was written by Amy Buttery, Michigan Retailer staff writer. |
There’s
now an office products chain store about four miles away, and it’s
a daily challenge to remain viable. But Harlan, who has worked at the
family business for 35 years, isn’t worried. He knows what differentiates
his store and what keeps his customers loyal.
“By
performing this service, we know we’ve got the right measurements
and aren’t just taking the customer’s word about what will work.
We also know the questions to ask and issues to check, and can bring experience
and insight to the layout.