Have you started thinking about Christmas yet? It might be weeks away but if you want to really use the flurry of present buying to your advantage, you’ve simpley GOT to think ahead.

For large clinics and salons, the 6 weeks leading up to Christmas usually bring in over 50% of their ENTIRE years retail product and gift voucher sales.

That’s something to think about! Imagine if you could generate 50% of your annual income in just 6 weeks…

Now you may or may not have a team of people to help you. You may or may not have a large line of retail items to sell. But regardless of your situation, with some advance planning you CAN get in on this.

In fact, even if you don’t have any retail products or items at all you, you can still generate lots of extra income through gift vouchers. You just need to create gift vouchers for your treatments or services, package them up nicely and start talking about them to clients.

If you are short on ideas, my favourite way of packaging vouchers is to

• Get an A4 piece of coloured cardboard
• Pop a slightly larger piece of tissue paper on it
• Put the gift voucher on top of this
• Roll it up
• Tie it with ribbon so it looks like a scroll

I used to use pretty red and gold coloured card and tissue at Christmas time and even used to sprinkle little gold stars into the scroll before rolling it up. Makes for a gorgeous gift that your clients will LOVE to give to friends. And a few of these pre-made on display by the counter, with some Christmas cards surrounding them, makes for a really cheap yet completely effective display!

It might be a bit early yet to be putting your displays up but this ‘calm before the storm’ period is a great one to get prepared...

• Do you have gift vouchers?
• If yes, do you have enough? If no, can you make some?
• Do you have gift packs or baskets of items that go with your services that you can sell at Xmas to clients?
• If no, can you go to the dollar/pound store and get a few baskets & make some?
• Is there somewhere you can create displays of all your Christmas goodies?
• If no or if you travel a lot, can you create a display at home, take a photo and put it on an A3 board to show to clients?

Get thinking early and reap the benefits. Leave it to the last minute and you’ll only get last minute sales.