Weekend Reading Leads to Industry Thoughts about Residential Products, CFLs, Purchasing & More

Weekends sometimes provide the opportunity to catch up on reading, which has a tendency to stimulate the mind. So, to start your week, some things to ponder…

• Congratulations to Lutron’s Aurora wireless radio frequency lighting system and Leviton’s home entertainment system which they have partnered with JBL. Both were named by Professional Builder as one of the 100 Best New Products. Wouldn’t it be nice if a broader array of electrical products earned recognition?
• Building Products magazine had an extensive article on lighting controls. For many markets, the custom home segment represents possibly the only bright spot in the residential market. These types of systems are being requested by homeowners and builders understand that they can help differentiate a home. With the average lighting control system costing $7,000, according to the Consumer Electronics Association’s State of the Builder Technology Study, understanding this market and how to sell it can help add profit to distributor residential sales.

Lutron’s Aurora, Home Automation Inc, Intermatic, Lightolier, Schneider
Electric’s Clipsal, Pass & Seymour and Watt Stopper were mentioned in the
article. If you would like a copy, email us (couldn’t find it online).

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  Last week the Wall Street Journal ran a small piece announcing that Wal-Mart has achieved its goal of selling 100 million CFLs this year. A couple of thoughts…

• Do you take the opportunity to promote your successes?
• If Wal-Mart sold 100 million CFLs, and Home Depot and Lowes are aggressively selling CFLs, how many CFLs have GE, Philips and Sylvania sold through electrical distribution?
• Wal-Mart announced a new initiative to sell GE CFLs alongside their own brand, Great American Values. Rumors are that GE facilitated the discussion for Wal-Mart with the private label manufacturer. Would they do that for large distributors or marketing groups that they belong to? Also, why are CFLs less expensive through retail than through distribution?
• Home Depot is restructuring its merchandising approach according to the September 24th issue of Home Channel News. In their “Focused Bay” approach, they are looking at all product categories and grouping them into categories called Leadership, Traffic / Commodity, Core Items, and Emerging Products.
• Which begs the question, have you reviewed your approach to marketing and purchasing from your suppliers? Going forward, we see companies having three strategic assets…their people, purchasing and marketing. Are you focused on each of these?
• Remember your bowling days…Brunswick can still provide us an idea of what to do with our “free” time. According to a case study in Direct, Brunswick recently built their email subscriber list by offering 1 free hour of bowling when people subscribed to their newsletter. 40% of those sent the offer responded. Since distributors typically say they can’t get customer email addresses, perhaps offer a free tool or a CFL. Capturing email addresses can help you more effectively market your company and your suppliers’ products (as well as broaden the reach of your promotions and services).

Just some food for thought to start your week.