Investing in the Future
Such expenses get harder to justify with every new drop in housing starts, and Waite says future trips “definitely will be smaller.” But some dealers say they still find value in the big gesture.
Tindell’s, the Knoxville, Tenn.-based dealer, hosts an annual customer-incentive trip every March that typically draws about 200 customers and their spouses. The junket, which company owner Carl Tindell chooses, will head to Mexico next. Past destinations include the Caribbean, Italy, Switzerland, Rio de Janeiro, and a tour of Austria, Hungary, and Germany.
“Our current thinking is ‘for the future,’ ” says Tindell president Johan van Tilburg. “Keep and build on the relationships we have, so that when normalcy resumes, our customers will remember us.”
At Rufus Deering Lumber in Portland, Maine, the entertainment is more modest–not to mention cheaper–but still quite popular: Every Christmas season, employees host a lunch for contractors at a local hall. They bring a dish or two and typically entertain as many as 200 to 300 contractors. “The contractors seem to really appreciate it,” says Darryl Raven, sales manager at Rufus Deering and a 15-year veteran of the company.
Because numerous employees or their spouses have hunting permits, hamburgers and cold cuts aren’t the norm at this luncheon. Rather, contractors are likely to sample some type of game, such as sweet-and-sour venison. Raven himself contributes moose chop suey each year. (See recipe sidebar, page 32.)
During the spring and summer, Rufus Deering routinely gives contractors its season tickets to the Portland Sea Dogs, the double A baseball affiliate of the Boston Red Sox. The dealer might also treat customers to tickets to a Boston Red Sox or Celtics game.
Erie Materials of Syracuse, N.Y., is no stranger to helping important customers attend sporting events. It has season tickets to Syracuse University football and basketball games, essentially the biggest sports draw in town and comparable to having a couple of pro teams in your backyard. When executive vice president Chris Neumann asked a customer which game on the football schedule he would like to attend, the response was quick and direct: Notre Dame.
But Erie has learned to be selective when it comes to entertaining most of its customers. The nine-unit dealer once held an annual golf outing at each of its locations. Instead, it now holds golf events sporadically and focuses on upscale courses.
“The customers you truly wanted to be there stopped coming,” Neumann says. He cites the timing of trips as one reason for a downturn in attendance from key players: Spring and summer are busy times of year for contractor customers, who choose work over play.
“Sometimes they would send a foreman, or maybe the foreman would bring his brother in law,” Neumann explains. “The next thing you know, you’re playing with someone who is not a decision-maker.”
Steve Lowery, purchasing manager at Central Valley Builders Supply and an organizer behind some of the St. Helena, Calif., dealer’s customer events, ran into similar problems. “People would show up, but you didn’t know who they were. The contractor can’t go, so he gives away the tickets to his buddies,” Lowery says. “And summertime is work time, so you have a lot of no-shows when it comes to the decision-making customer.”
In comparison, van Tilburg says the turnout for this year’s Tindell’s golf tournament was quite good. “Apparently, everybody has time to play golf right now,” he surmises.
Central Valley also cut back on its barbecues for contractors when it learned it wasn’t contractors that were being fed. Rather, members of the local secretarial pool were showing up for a free lunch, among other regulars.
“They knew we did it every Friday for years,” Lowery says. “Once we realized it was not our customers that we were feeding, we cut it out.”
Some of Erie’s locations now hold golf events on an individual basis, scaled down to 20 players or less. The more intimate setting gives Erie personnel a better chance of making one-on-one contact with the customers they want to see. “That seems to be the way to go for us in the future,” Neumann says.
The dealer is using the same strategy for other events, gearing them toward the customers’ needs. “We’re picking and choosing so we can make sure that we have the right venue for the customer,” Neumann says.
