A s I write this message on a Sunday afternoon in mid-March, it’s cold and slushy outside, grey, unappetizing. By the time most of us gather in High Point come April, however, it should feel like spring. Dogwood blooms, sunshine and warm rain showers!
For your consumers, spring will come with a desire to do spring cleaning. And this year, that perennial ritual comes with a twist, due to the influence of Marie Kondo and her book, “The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing".
Kondo has re-framed the spring cleaning paradigm. No longer is it about throwing stuff away (which is hard to do). It’s now about the keeping only what sparks joy in your life (which turns out to be easy).
The book is a #1 New York Time’s best seller, and to avoid un-joyful clutter, you can purchase the Kindle edition for $9.99 on Amazon.
How is this relevant? Well, your retail customers are cleaning out and tidying up their clothes closets, kitchen junk and office clutter. They shouldn’t stop there. Why not get rid of that dated sofa they coveted 20 years ago when grandma moved to Boca Raton?
Will keeping just what gives them joy make room for more stuff? You betcha. There's always room for more joy! When something is thrown away, it creates room for something new to enter. There's a huge opportunity for Furniture World readers to get this important point across to potential buyers as it relates to furniture and accessory purchases.
What’s more, why not consider applying Ms. Kondo’s ideas to the internal workings of your retail business? Does your inefficient halogen display lighting bring you joy? Does your current price/item advertising make you happy? Do you love working with every one of your RSAs? And what about that brother-in-law who works in your business? Maybe it's time to apply some of Kondo's "Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" there as well.
Got to go now to clean out my sock drawer. See you at High Point.
Amitesh Sinha is a technology consultant based in North America. With over 20 years of experience developing and deploying solutions for retail, Sinha has gained a reputation for home furnishing software solutions, furniture software, POS furniture software, and re-engineering of software with extended features. His company, iConnect offers business technology solutions that integrate with most P.O.S. systems to make them more efficient and user-friendly. For more information about this article or any retail technology question contact Amitesh at 703-471-3964, amitesh@iconnectgroup.com or www.iconnectgroup.com.