Sophie Edwards
I’m an independent retailer, publisher and founder based at More Than Just a Gift in Leicestershire. I have been a shopkeeper for over 30 years. I am founder of greeting card publisher Petimo as well as The Shopkeeper Journal.
Help Your Customers Deliver Even More Smiles This Thinking of You Week
We all know what a card can do. It can make somebody smile, let them know they’ve been remembered, make them laugh, comfort them, or simply give them that lovely little feeling of someone saw this and thought of me. And Thinking of You Week gives us a brilliant
Stock Plan Stupidity
Say you sold 100 scarves last winter. A logical stock plan will tell you to buy 100 scarves this year. But how would you actually know whether that’ll hold true this year just like last year? You don't. Because this year’s collection probably has to be
Ask a Shopkeeper - A customer asked me for a discount and, if I'm honest, I felt quite offended. Was I being unreasonable?
Dear Shopkeeper, A customer recently spent quite a long time browsing and chose several gifts. Just as I was putting everything through the till, they asked, "What's the best price you can do for me?" I know people ask for discounts, but I found myself feeling
Four Moments in Every Card - Why the value of a greeting card begins long before it is opened and continues long after the occasion has passed
We tend to think the important moment in the life of a greeting card is the moment it is opened. The envelope is torn. The design is revealed. The message is read. The recipient smiles, laughs, cries or feels, for a moment, less alone. That is certainly one of the
greetings cards
A card IS a gift - why a greeting card may be the purest form of gifting
We commonly talk about buying “a card and a gift”, as though the card belongs in a separate, lesser category. The gift is the main event. The card is the finishing touch, picked up afterwards to identify who the present is from and say the things convention requires us to
Why July could be your most important Christmas marketing month
The AW26 buying season is hotting up. Harrogate Home & Gift is just around the corner and independent retailers across the country are turning their attention towards buying for the busiest trading season of the year. Over the next few weeks we'll all be doing much the same
The first night we met, neither of us had any idea we'd end up spending our lives running a gift shop together.
Today marks 26 years since Simon and I married on 24th June 2000. But our story started seven years before. It was September 1993 and our eyes quite literally met across a crowded room. The room in question was the bar at Ranmoor Hall of Residence on our very first
Harrogate Home & Gift isn't Just Where We Buy Stock. It's Where We Shape the Season Ahead.
Every July, thousands of independent retailers head to Harrogate Home & Gift with comfortable shoes, a notebook, and usually a shopping list. Of course, buying products is an important part of the trip. The right product, bought at the right time, can become a bestseller for years to come. But
Small Shop Summer
What happened when we decided to celebrate summer instead of just waiting for Christmas
Every year, around this time, independent retailers start talking about Christmas. Buying. Ordering. Planning. Forecasting. It makes perfect sense. Christmas is the biggest opportunity of the year. But last year I found myself wondering whether we were overlooking something. What if the quieter summer months weren't something to
ask a shopkeeper
Ask a Shopkeeper - A customer tells me they can buy it cheaper online. What should I do?
Dear Shopkeeper, I've started hearing this more and more. A customer is browsing in my shop, then they tell me "I can get this cheaper online." Sometimes they still buy it, sometimes they don't, but either way I never know how to respond. Part
Why Does My Greeting Card Department Even Exist?
Over the past three years, our shop’s greeting card sales have almost quadrupled. On paper, that shouldn't really be happening. Just two miles from our shop is one of the country's largest shopping parks, attracting more than 13 million visits a year. My customers are