What is in this article?:
- Retail excellence: Healthy Solutions
- Casting a wider net
- Marketing and customer appreciation
- Healthy Solutions' grab-'n'-go menu items:
Targeting crossover consumers, such as gluten-free and vegetarian consumers as well as new moms and local athletes, helped this successful ski town business get out of a slump in sales due to the sluggish economy.
More About:
Healthy Solutions opened its doors in 1994 in a remote 300-square-foot space below the groomed slopes of the popular Colorado ski town Steamboat Springs. It didn’t take long for the store to get noticed, which inspired a move in 1996 to a 3,000-square-foot location on Steamboat’s bustling main drag.
But after years of rapid growth, the store suffered a slump in sales, dipping 20 percent between 2007 and 2010 due to a sluggish economy, a construction project in front of the store and a cutback on advertising. How could the store turn things around?
Thanks to new offerings and marketing efforts aimed at gluten-free consumers, vegetarians, new moms and local athletes—in other words, crossover consumers who first venture into a natural products store for a specific need—sales are on the rebound. “I feel really positive about [the future],” says Pat Carney, co-owner of the store with Linda Carlton.
