Making the most out of Catalog Delays by the Post Office

Grandma has been doing a great job guest commentating this week as I am knee deep in blog projects that were “due last month”.

Today’s topic deals with retail catalogs that arrive after the fact. Grandma received a catalog yesterday only to learn that the sale expires today. She got several catalogs sometimes a week after the sale expired.

What retailers can take from this:

1. Plan well in advance – I am not aware of how retail catalogs work, so I cannot pontificate on this, but I’m sure that moving a deadline up a day or two can mean the difference in sales.

2. Expect that some post offices are more efficient than others and account for that. Having the note to post offices to have “in- home from x to y” is a start. However it doesn’t make a difference if it doesn’t arrive in time.

3. Give customers some incentive – If they stated that they got the catalog after the fact, offer free shipping on the current order or a coupon good for their next purchase.

Even though we can’t control when catalogs are delivered, sometimes we can make best out of a bad situation.