How do you fill slow days in a shop?

To fill a slow day, give your regulars a concrete reason to come on that day: double stamp on Tuesday, an offer on a time slot, something new available only that day. You need two things: to know which days are slow and to be able to reach your customers at the right moment.

Here is how to spot your quiet times, seven ideas that work in a small shop, how to announce them without nagging, and how to check that it works.

How do you spot your genuinely slow days?

Start with the facts. Look at your till receipts or your diary over a few weeks and note the days and hours with the fewest customers. A pattern often appears: Tuesday afternoon, Wednesday evening, the day after a busy weekend.

Tell two cases apart:

• A gap you can fill. Your team and your premises are there, but customers are missing.
• A natural gap. Weather, school holidays or a public holiday sometimes empty the streets. No point fighting it. The marketing calendar helps you anticipate these periods.

Pick one or two time slots to work on. Trying to fix everything at once often fails.

Which ideas fill a gap?

1. Double stamp on the slow day. The customer gets two stamps instead of one, that day only. It costs little: you only reward visits you would not otherwise have had.
2. A time-slot offer. For example a drink and a pastry at a reduced price between 2 pm and 4 pm. Limit it to the hours you want to fill.
3. A preview of something new. A product to taste or a new menu, available only that day to members.
4. An offer for two. “Bring a friend” brings one extra person and perhaps a new member.
5. A perk for booking. A small extra for booking a quiet slot, for a hair salon or a beauty salon.
6. An event. A tasting, workshop or small activity that makes people want to come on that very day.
7. A message to customers who no longer come. A short note to those you have not seen for a while, with a small reason to come back.

How do you tell customers without nagging?

A good offer is useless if nobody knows about it. You have three channels that complement each other:

• At the till and on a poster. Your team mentions it at payment. It costs nothing.
• A message on the card. With Fidelia’s Pro plan, at €59 per month excl. VAT, you write a title and a short message that shows on the lock screen, in Apple Wallet and Google Wallet. You choose who gets it: all customers, those with a reward waiting or those you have not seen for 30 days, and you can schedule it in advance. See push notifications without annoying customers.
• A newsletter. An email at the start of the week announces the offer: read a local shop’s newsletter.

Messages and emails only go to customers who agreed to hear your news when they signed up. To reach a customer near your shop, see also location-based notifications.

How often should you offer something?

Often enough for customers to remember the rhythm, rarely enough for the offer to keep its effect. “Double stamp every Tuesday” becomes a habit; a new offer every day becomes noise. One fixed offer on a fixed day is easier to remember than ten different ones.

Be careful not to cannibalise your busy days. Design the offer to draw people into the slot you want to fill, without pushing current customers to move their usual visits.

How do you know it works?

Compare the same day before and after, preferably over several weeks. Look at the number of visits, not only revenue. If visits rise on the slow day without falling on other days, you have gained visits. If not, change the offer or the slot. Also check what the offer costs: see the real cost of a reward. To reward your best customers on top, read about VIP tiers, and to track returns, measuring returning customers.

In short

You fill a slow day with customers who have a reason to come. Spot the empty slot, choose a simple offer, announce it at the till and on the card, then measure. Start small: one day, one offer, and keep what works. Plan prices are on the pricing page.