Hey, it’s Bob Negen and this is another episode of Real Retail TV. Today I’m here in the farmers market of my hometown of Grand Haven, Michigan, and I’m going to talk about three different things that three different people are using that you can apply to your business.

So everybody, of course, knows what a farmers market is. But there are three particular vendors at this farmers market that do things differently than most that make a difference in their sales and make a difference in the customer experience, and I’m going to go through those for you right now so that you can apply them to your store.

The first thing I want to talk about is Joby, and Joby keeps longer hours than everyone. The farmers market closes at 1:00 o’clock, and usually about 12:30, everybody starts packing up.

And I understand. People get here early. They work hard. They have to leave their farms early, early in the morning.

But Joby stays late. Joby stays till 6 o’clock, sometimes, when people get out of work. And I talked to Joby about it, and I asked her, do you do a lot of sales between the time when the last vendor leaves and you leave?

And her reply was that she does almost as much, sometimes as much, after the market closes as she does when the market is open and it’s filled with people.The lesson? Longer hours pay.

Second example– Farmer John. Farmer John is a great example of– you sample, you sell. When I talked to John about that– I mean, John is– he’s handing out peaches. You walk by? He’s slicing off a piece of peach. He’s giving you a little bit of apple. He’s letting you sample his wares.

And when I talked to him, he said that people who he samples account for about 25% of his business. Lesson? You sample, you sell.

Third example, third lesson is bundling. You see this farmer– they have baskets, and the baskets are $4 each, three for $10. So whenever you buy one thing or two things, they always say you can get a third thing for only $10. And bundling is a tremendous way to increase the average ticket and to sell more stuff.

So there you are. Keep longer hours. You sample, you sell. Bundle for a bigger average ticket. All lessons from right here in the Grand Haven Farmers Market.

Your action item? Take this stuff. Use it. Put it in action, and make more money.