By Tara Sanders, Touchable Tan

As of late, I am seeing more and more tanning salons in despair about sales and client numbers dropping. Though this is a never ending battle for all of us, there are affordable and creative ways to put your salon back on top in your town! My salon’s most effective strategy for staying popular is the way we work the community and surrounding areas.

I make it a point to always stay very involves and active in the local schools. By sponsoring or donating to school events or teacher appreciation week, we have maintained a large, loyal group of the schools’ staff members as yearlong clients. In addition, our spray tan sales have boosted by providing sunless tans to sports and dance teams. This past year alone, we have more than tripled our spray tan numbers because of our presence in the schools.

But the best thing I have ever done for my tanning salon has been to purchase a booth in the local festivals and craft shows. I started with a small booth in our local school’s yearly two-day festival in 2013. We broke even for that festival the first year after expenses, but within the following two weeks we had signed up eight, new clients from that festival. I was hooked! We have gotten better and better each year. Now our booth is located in the best spot of the festival. We have grown into two booths, and our profit is three times what our expenses are. We donate a basket of tanning lotions and other goodies to the festival’s live auction and that always gets great feedback. Best of all, I continue to see the new client numbers rising every year after these events.

Click here to read the entire article in the latest issue of Smart Tan Magazine online.

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