If you’ve said it once, you’ve said it a thousand times – this time round, your business is going to be prepared for the bank holiday. There’s a lot of effort and thought involved to make sure your bank holiday marketing goes off with a bang, so to help you out, we’ve listed the top 7 things your business should do in the run up to the next bank holiday.
7 Days to Go
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Let employees know the drill
Is your business staying open or will it work reduced hours? There are certain rules surrounding this. For example, small shops in England and Wales have the right to open any day or hour of the calendar year. However, if your premises are larger than 280msq, it must stay closed on Christmas Day and Easter Sunday and is subject to Sunday trading laws for other bank holidays (i.e. you can open for a maximum of 6 consecutive hours between 10am-6pm.
Once you know what hours you’ll be operating your business, plan in your employees’ shifts and let them know what’s happening on the day and make sure you aren’t understaffed.
6 Days to Go
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Promote your business
Whatever it is your business is planning for the bank holiday, be it a special menu, event or sale, make sure you’re promoting it in your local area well in advance. Send flyers out locally to reach out to new customers and put posters up in store to reinforce the promotion for existing customers.
(Source: CMI Bar)
Find out the best way to market in your local area here.
5 Days to Go
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Check the weather
At this point, you’ll be able to check the weather reports for a rough idea of what to expect for the bank holiday. If it’s unseasonably warm and dry, you can plan for more outdoor activities, if it’s raining, make sure any outdoor displays like posters and signs are waterproof, and bring people inside – PVC banners are a great option for every weather!
4 Days to Go
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Refresh training
During bank holidays, businesses will often see a huge boom in footfall. Make sure your employees are trained and ready to handle whatever the day will throw at them, weather it’s an Easter egg hunt or Boxing Day sales.
Training is so important for your business to succeed – find out why and how you can implement a training process that won’t break the bank here.
3 Days to Go
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Start early and finish late
Let’s face it – you’ll face a lot of competition on the bank holiday day. If you’re holding a sale, especially around shopping holidays like Christmas and Black Friday, there’s nothing wrong with starting your discounting early a few days early to get ahead. If it’s a bank holiday Monday, cover all bases by starting your event or sale on the Friday and running it across the whole weekend.
2 Days to Go
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Set up your point of sale display
One of the key changes you’ll need to make around your business is your point of sale. In a retail store, that’ll be your banners and roller banners advertising what sections of the store have special offers and also strut cards by the till or your displays letting customers know of any special 2 for 1 or buy one get one free deals.
If you’re a leisure or catering business, table talkers are a great way to show off bank holiday deals to your customers. With three sides to advertise on, you can show multiple offers at once in a really obvious way – leave them on tables and bars around your restaurant, café or venue.
(Source: Liverpool Echo)
1 Day to Go
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Finish setting up your store
Prepping and decorating your store or event venue doesn’t have to be a chore! Especially if you’ve already created your own posters online with our free design tool. Use a checklist to tick off everything that needs doing before the bank holiday to stop any last minute panicking in the morning.
Bank Holiday
We’re not promising an easy bank holiday – but we are promising that your prep will have paid off! Instead of last-minute stresses over the set up of your store and wishing you’d promoted your event or sale earlier, you’ll be able to put your focus on the customer. And the happier your customers, the more successful your bank holiday will be!
Ready to start prepping? Check out our outdoor event collection for your big summer bash, or the indoor event range for something a little more weather-proof.
