Are you dying a slow death by being caught in the muddy middle?
The middle. It’s the space between no one walking in and foot traffic so fast your door never has time to lock. On today’s episode, we’re chatting being consistent (with a special shoutout to Nick Quinn for giving us the best example of how hard work and consistency pays off), measuring your value add, and how to communicate effectively. When we teach people to value sleep, they value their sleep space and accessories more and we want to make sure your hard efforts reflect in your bottom line.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Mark Kinsley
The middle is absolute death we’re going to talk about door swings dropping and what you need to do to make sure your mattress business thrives. The DOS Marcos show begins in 60 seconds.
Welcome to the DOS Marco show with Mark Kinsley and mark when were mattress and furniture leaders gathered to grow the inside scoop, tell stories and take tequila shots. The galaxy’s greatest mattress podcast has lifted off in
Mark Kinsley
got a couple of headlines I want you to check out up on fam dot news yet fan dot news that’s where all the action is. Corsicana hired an industry veteran is the new CEO you know him as Eric Ray. Also nationwide Marketing Group earns the Energy Star Partner of the Year. Check out that story. That’s a big deal. And a past podcast you don’t want to miss we got a lot of feedback, a lot of text messages to our podium number about Biophilia neuro aesthetics and the science of designing health into the home. It was really great to have Mike Peterson on the show and Linda Kafka so check all that out at fam dot news. And then also Greg left you delivering frictionless financing? Is there such a thing? How qualifies getting more customers to say yes, on the first try? Quinn. I don’t know if I’ve heard of anything that has made my day more in a long time than what you told me happened with your son, Nick, this past weekend. I mean, I’m talking to the father of one of the fastest kids in the country. The father of the fastest kid in the state of Arkansas, that’s a huge deal.
Mark Quinn
Which is shocking knowing me, right that he is my son. Like I was like, I joke I’m like, I’m solid be team like all the way right. But no, Nick’s fast. He’s actually. So in six a he’s a state champion in the 400 metre or you ran a 49. And then in the state of Arkansas, because there’s some kids at private schools. I think they edged him out. So he’s like the third fastest in the state. But one of the top you’re right one of the top in the country. But anyway, he’s just he’s so fun. But Kinsley, here’s, here’s what the best part of it was for me. Because he he set a new school record in his own PR state champion in the 400. But then he got state champion in the four by four, right. And so they took first place there to two really big things about this, this weekend for him and they apply to everyone, right? He was getting discouraged this year, because he puts so much time and effort in and he had broken 50 seconds on the 500 metre run before but this year, he had not. So all this hard work, he couldn’t get over his PR personal record of six foot four on the high jump, and he could not get past or get faster than 50 seconds. Well, here’s a kid who is working every single day beating his brains out. And the last meal of the year, he just crushes that on all the different things he had been working on. And so the lesson for him was, its consistency over time. It is you in my head, telling me it’s doing 100 podcast at podcast episodes before he ever monetize it. It’s, it’s every day going to work in and putting the effort in, and then it will catch up with you. If you’re making if you’re making the commitment and you’re doing the work, it will catch up with you. So I loved that he learned that lesson and the joy that that came from it and to see his eyes when he got across that finish line, that big hug at the end. And then the second thing was another really great lesson, which is, you know, he wanted more than anything to win the four by four because of the people on the team. It was about them more than it was for him. He got the baton he was way behind. He was the last leg he had a lot of room to make up for and all he could think about the whole way was, you know, winning because two of the kids on his four by four team were seniors. It’s always like they’re never going to get a chance to win the state championship and this event. So in his head, it’s all about let’s catch it for my friends so they can win. And so my point is there’s purpose in that and that’s a great game to play with yourself at business or in athletics. Give yourself a reason to want to win and that’s what he did. So I love it. There’s so many lessons isn’t there, Kinsley in sports and How’d they bounce back to life? It’s so it’s so cool. And I’m
Mark Kinsley
here to tell you from just an athleticism standpoint, Nick gets that you sent me the video, I watched it. Tara and I are sitting there just about to tear up because we’re so proud of him. Nick gets this baton. And he the distance, he had to cover the gap that he had to close to chase down this kid in front of him, who was very fast, was almost insurmountable. I saw it. And I thought how, how on earth is Nick going to catch up to this kid, let alone pass them, you know, get within steps of him would have been a remarkable accomplishment. But Nick, I mean, just chipped away, chipped away, chipped away, and this kid is blazing fast up front, Nick starts closing the gap, they go around that third turn, and you can hear it in your voice, you get excited. And Nick has a chance at this point. He’s closed the gap enough where he has a chance. And then he just turned on the afterburners. And you could see, he left every ounce of himself on that track to make sure that he wanted it for his friends. I’m so proud of him. And I mean, you and your family have to be proud of him. He’s such a good kid.
Mark Quinn
Yeah, thanks, man. I am so proud of them. And here’s the funny backstory. He said, Because I asked him a lot. I’m like, what were you thinking during the race? He’s like, Well, I thought I was screwed, because I had a lot of makeup in the kid. He was chasing down. He had been racing all year. And they, they, Nick has beat him consistently, but not by a lot, right? So he knew to catch that kid who was a great runner. So he said about 200 metres into the 400. He’s like, I was so tired. It was my fifth event of the day. And he said, I thought, man, you know, second is really good. We’re gonna get plants and then he thought about his friends. He’s like, bullshit. And like he dug down. And on the third turn, he started closing the gap to your point, I’m like, he’s gonna win. Because at that point, he saw that, you know, in you hang in there, no matter what the race is, and you don’t let your brain tell you no, and you say no, I’m gonna in. So it’s just that perseverance. It’s when when when you start feeling the pain, you start feeling tired, you start feeling discouraged, you know, the lessons he’s learning as a kid and an athlete, I’m just so thrilled and that’s why I love when kids are competing in any way not just not just athletics, but could be academic contests or, you know, you know, debate clubs or band competitions, any kind of competition, it just teaches you so much and I love that for kids. And I love to see them growing from it. So man, thank you appreciate I showed him your tax. He loves you Tara so much so thanks for spending that I showed it to him but he loved that.
Mark Kinsley
And what a great lesson to as we just like think about this podcast and the encouragement that we try to give people that Nick really wanted that race with his friends because the four by fours with you know three other athletes it’s not just you out there running for the glory with the flag draped around your back at the very end it’s your entire team. And you know you and I talked about the joy of writing the book many times and the joy of doing this podcast is you know if something good or bad or indifferent happens we have each other to celebrate with and to have a track team with with so many individual events and Nick wanted to give that to his friends and to celebrate with his friends just speaks to his character speaks to his father and his mother and his sister to and his grandparents so, so proud of you Nick. Man don’t do not he’s our he’s gonna be our like our guy let’s take him places and be like this kid or ratio. I mean, he’s you know, will tell Nick to kind of like act like he’s got some rocks in his shoes and then just let him do his thing. Well,
Mark Quinn
he gets out there and I don’t know man He does it so I don’t know how he does it but I’m so impressed with it I just can impress for his commitment but anyway, and thank you for that. How are you doing? You you got on your bike today and you had a gear go bad on you or the shape shifting gear binder bots or whatever the hell you call it?
Mark Kinsley
Yeah, the rear derailleur here is pretty much cracked at this point. My I need a new chain and so I literally was going over this little kicker and something went wrong. And so luckily I skidded to a stop and I’m good to go. The next place I’m skidding to stop, by the way is going to be Orlando coming up for the furniture today bedding conference, baby. Yeah, so our good friends at furniture today. I know I’ve been working really hard. I’ve seen a lot of emails from Jessica Byerly and Sheila Longo Mara and they’re just getting everything ready man getting the speakers lined up. Our boy Magnuson is going to be taking the stage Mike Magnuson was good bad.com He might try to convince us that reviews are helpful for brands so we definitely want to listen to that. Of course, Magnuson has a bunch of past episodes on fam dot news if you want to go listen to him. So I’m I’m jazzed up for that because that world is constantly evolving. What else we got? I mean, what’s the focus? What’s the theme?
Mark Quinn
So the day one so you get in and it’s cocktails, but then got Scott Demings Scott’s The ultimate customer service experience. So he’s going to talk about the common tilt towards customer service based communications, and how companies really have their teams aligned around that, which is so true, right? And so what is the really like the customer sort of experience and how are you game planning for that? And I think, no matter what Kinsley it’s like, you know, companies can always actually do well to hear some of that. And then I guess president is going to be sponsoring the break there. So thank you to resident yet like it the cocktail party the night before, which hasn’t changed much as what we were doing that when we were there, and then you got state of the industry, you got retailer sharing real world experiences with consumer shopping habits, a big discussion with TSI. So temper is going to be there and for retailers regarding today’s interactions with mattress customers, and how they shop and the knowledge that they have they bring into the store before they ever make the purchase. Kinsley now we’re in the information age, right. And it gives consumers potential power. And so they all come into the store is like knowing everything. And so I think they’re going to talk about that, but that’s just a one.
Mark Kinsley
That’s just day one, you got to be on site boots on the ground for day two, and beyond. And so I’m excited to number one, you know, make sure that we’re as an industry sharpening the saw, aware of what’s happening in our field and beyond, because sometimes we get in this little echo chamber, and I’m excited just to see people see friends, see friends from the industry, the networking that happens is always, you know, a favourite part of mine. So we’ll be there. I mean, England is going to be there. I know, you got a crew coming in from Houston, that’s going to be there. And I know a lot of a lot of our friends are going to be there in Orlando. So excited for that, hey, I’m also here’s a little here’s just like a little follow up almost to pass podcast, but they do a really great job on the mattress industry network Facebook group, I think we got almost coming up on 1500 members. And so they did a really nice job. And so there’s been some good discussion. And there’s a little little commentary going on around an article that went live on the fan. And I think the headline was fish for rich people when door swings drop, average tickets need to increase. And so I think people were talking about the fish for rich people, probably the more accurate headline to represent the story that Alex did did a great job with would be fish for bigger tickets. That’s kind of the spirit of the story, because he actually got into the group and talk to a mattress industry consultant in Texan mattress owner Lawrence Hellyers. And Lawrence just was really making a case for if fewer door swings happen, how you going to increase those average tickets. And I’ve been talking to some of our reps, even just today, in the Pacific Northwest, we were talking about how the low end. And really the more premium price points are doing okay, and the middle is really getting squeezed the middle tends to be death. And you know, people have money, they got money, they want something good. They want it now. But if they’re more budget conscious, they’re coming in, and they want something at the lower end. So some of those middle price points seem to be getting squeezed out. And as we have seen retail foot traffic dropped some. We’ve been trying to help with that, by the way, last podcast when and I brainstormed a bunch of stuff for you. But as we’ve seen that happen, you’ve seen the barbell effect, I guess, if you will, what? What’s your take on that? That idea of fishing for bigger tickets?
Mark Quinn
Yeah, you know, I see some of the pushback was fair, because they’re like, Hey, rich people aren’t the only people that can afford a good bed. So I totally buy into that idea. Because people that buy expensive beds are people that value sleep. And if they’re not into buying an expensive bed, then maybe they haven’t been coached up or educated about the importance of the decision they’re about to make. So we’ve talked about that many times. But when you’re fishing for the big tickets, if you don’t, if you don’t ask for the big sale, if you don’t give them perspective, if you’re not educating them, if you’re not giving them if you never take them to a bed, that is out of their price range, call it five, six, that $7,000 Or even somewhere a little bit south of that, then there’s no measuring stick, right? So you have nothing to compare that to. So I think it’s okay to not count their money. I think Janaka even said that let’s not count our customers money. I agree, don’t count their money, show everyone give everyone the opportunity to lay on those bits. But the point of the piece was make sure that you’re adding to the ticket right with other things. And and you’re, you’re you’re doing everything the right way to increase tickets on either the mattress cost or the add on cells after that. So that was the gist of it. And I think there there were some observations on both sides that were probably fair and accurate.
Mark Kinsley
I agree. I agree. And I think Lawrence did a nice job of really trying to help people understand. Absent value people make decisions on price. So we need to build value in everything we do. And really he was talking about from a marketing strategy standpoint, you know, shifting over to in stock, long term financing, delivery and removal, largest assortment of choices, all these different things that if a consumer in the marketing phase gets the message that it’s a, you know, an $99, twin, or a 199, queen, or whatever it is, that’s the priming that you’re doing. And that’s the customer you’re fishing for. So they’re coming in thinking that, you know, sleep is cheap, you know, I’m gonna get cheap sleep. Whereas if you’re building value in what you have, and the differences between shopping in a brick and mortar location versus online, for example, or just forget about online, just build value in who you are, what you do, and what you deliver for people. That’s the priming of the customer that you want to come into the store, somebody who somewhat guess appreciates that value, and will allow your team with their expertise to share more about that sleep system, about the accessories about the sleep environment, and build value in your products. And I think that’s the, that’s the gist of it for me. And then, you know, you fly that pirate hat flag high enough, you’re gonna get your pirates, right, you’re gonna get the people that want to hop on that ship and buy something from you. Because they value it, it’s not about the exact money in their bank account or some monochrome of rich or not
Mark Quinn
know it, but no, you’re right, it’s not about the being rich part, it’s about how they view sleep. And that’s why it’s so important. That’s why it’s all of our jobs. You know, I think we sound like a beat, like a broken record when it comes to some of this stuff. But, you know, here’s a good filter to put this here. If you’re listening to this, I don’t care if you’re a retailer or a bedding brand. Or if you’re selling sleep essentials doesn’t matter. The filter is go to your website, go to your advertising, go to your social media. And for every post, every ad, every line of copy, I want you to bucket everything into it builds value in something, we do something we sell a process or people something it builds value, or it doesn’t. Two buckets, that’s it. And when you get done, you’re gonna be shocked at probably the imbalance on the ledger, right? So much is communicating at people without building value in what you’re communicating to them. And so if if you’re, if you go through that exercise, and you’re kind of thin on the value build, then you got to think about your strategy. Because if you want a consumer to spend a bunch of money with you or to value sleep differently, then all you got to do is help him you got to teach him, you got to educate him, you got to bring them along, you have to bring them down the rabbit hole. And then when you do, it’s an amazing thing that happens it is a true transformation, when they value sleep differently and they value the bed differently. Kinsley, we do a crappy job, we know connecting the dotted line of a mattress to sleep. It’s got to be a solid line connection, not the dotted line,
Mark Kinsley
and matches to sleep, sleep to wellness and health that needs to be firmly established. And I would also add to that Quinn, challenge your suppliers, your your vendors, your manufacturers to build value in what they do. You know, one of the things that we started asking for in the families, you know, what is this? Why is it different? And how do I sell it, because we’re trying to speak to a retail audience and help them take these products and better sell them at retail? Well, you got to get that stuff to cascade down from you as a mattress manufacturer all the way all the way to falling out of out of an RSA is mouth, and then it making sense to a consumer. So if you go to your manufacturers, websites, and there’s not information there, that builds value, and then helps you build value in those products, it’s a fail. And I had one of the greatest compliments recently, whenever I got my hands on a PDF that was a training document around our England or line of products. And this retailer said to me, there’s so much great information on englander.com that I didn’t even remember was there, I had to go back through the site, extract a lot of that repurpose a little bit for our selling environment, but the information stood on its own. And if you don’t have a story to tell, you don’t have anything to sell. And so that was a great compliment. But do this with I don’t care if it’s accessories people mattress makers or somebody that’s supplying something they need to build value in what they do, because you’re going to be able to bake that into something meaningful for your retail and your consumer environment. So I think if we do this as a whole, like everybody in that chain of communication can help each other along the way.
Mark Quinn
You know I love I love about what you said there mark is that you’re like okay, go to your suppliers and have them do what they can do. Right? But like where my head went there also is also ask them as people outside that aren’t even in the category say here’s my company, here’s my website. What do you think the value is of what Will you do or you’ve been shopping with us? Tell me what? What is it that you like about what we do or what we could be doing differently? If you don’t understand your own story, ask other people to let you know how they see you and your story. And you’ll be shocked probably what you hear how many times do we sit down with people, Kinsley that want to come in and be sponsors of the famine? We hear their story, and we’re like, oh, my gosh, and then we go to their websites or like, where’s that? Like, that story was awesome that you just told us why. On your own site.
Mark Kinsley
Yeah, and most of it sometimes ends up being like, synergistic. gobbly gook thing is, you know, more like, that’s all hollow stuff that nobody cares about when they might care about it, but doesn’t make any sense to most people. And it’s always funny whenever you have two people from the same company, trying to explain what they do. I did this with a supplier one time, there were three different people that have been in the industry for a long time. And I said, Okay, I want you to explain face change to me. And I had each of them go individually. And it was the most complicated, convoluted trip over your shoelaces mishmash, fallen out of your mouth, jumbled disaster. And so I literally, it took us a while to like, boil this down to its component part. But that’s the thing. You need to ask your people and you need to ask other people, how would you describe us. And then once you figure out that message, and who you are, whether it’s your product or your selling store, whatever, then you need to make sure and market your marketing at that point. Make sure everybody in your organisation is saying the same thing. That’s branding. That’s reinforcement. That’s consumer messaging. This is funny this is this is a constant problem for people. And I think people are getting better at it though. I mean, I see some really good examples come our way.
Mark Quinn
Good question. So built tickets everybody built value. That’s the message for today. Kinsley
Mark Kinsley
All right, well hey, head over to Sam dot news. Make sure you’re subscribed to the email newsletter. Give us a rating on Apple podcasts or Spotify rate rate Quinn’s performance today is five stars play because I That’s my rating for it
Mark Quinn
well you can you can rate my tan I mean I was out in the sun you can you can rate the the light glistening off my balding head. No. Yeah, right. And rate and rate is if you don’t mind that would be very helpful. But also more importantly, guys, tell a friend like let’s get people to this campfire, as many as we can have. If you’ve liked an episode we’ve done in the past, send it to them, share it with them and let’s keep the conversation going. Love to the fam You guys are awesome. And until next week, Mr. Kinsley we are out of here.
