We all know that the number one reason our customers buy tanning lotion is product education. We tell them how and why it works and why it’s an important part of the tanning process. So the product doesn’t just fly off of the shelves does it? With that in mind, we need to consider just how important it is for our young operators to become truly aggressive salespeople. Sure, we can motivate them with incentives and threaten them with termination, but are we still missing sales opportunities?Consider, a lot of our operators are young people who are still getting financial assistance from their parents. Will that lotion spiff drive them past the fear of confrontation which haunts most young salespeople? Is the weekly sales contest enough to motivate them to step out of their comfort zones and into that awkward and uncomfortable sales encounter? Can we effectively motivate and manipulate untrained salespeople to step beyond the passive sales approach used in most retail environments? “Would you like any fries with that?”

Some of us are natural born sales people… confident, aggressive and driven to find a way to get that product over the counter better than it’s ever been done. But for most of us it’s hard work and it takes a lot of practice. Let us know if you’ve found a solution to finding and motivating the most important ingredient in your sales program.