Closer Connections
More pro dealers are shifting co-op dollars in support of marketing that puts them, and their vendors, in front of their customers.
- Business and pleasure mixed: Dealers are asking vendors to support marketing that engages builders and contractors in more-relaxed settings such as sporting events, hunting, and even snowmobile outings. Alpine Lumber is among the dealers that take customers on visits to vendors’ plants and mills, with some golf, fishing, or skiing mixed in. Vendors also sponsor trips to places like Alaska and Baja California in Mexico, which dealers use to reward loyal customers.
- Online delivery: The Internet is a more important avenue for co-op spending. VNS Corp. in Georgia has vendor links on its new Web site. Bridgewater Wholesalers encourages dealers to use its list of builders who have gone through a van that serves as a millwork showroom to contact them with e-mail “thank yous” and follow-up promotions.
- Share and share alike: Vendors sometimes allow dealers to let builders use some of the co-op allocations dealers have earned. For example, builders have used dealer co-op to defray the cost of a program Andersen Windows offers that provides 360-degree videos of their homes that are posted for viewing on a specified Web site. One large Southeast-based dealer says his company has taken ads in builders’ catalogs, but it draws the line at supporting brands in those catalogs that, in this dealer’s estimation, are less well known by home buyers.
- Direct contact: For many dealers and vendors, a golf outing for builders and contractors often turns into a mini trade show, where suppliers set up tables, show products, and distribute brochures. Kuiken Bros. Lumber for years has held “beefsteak dinners” that allow sponsoring vendors to make direct presentations to pros in attendance. Hayward Lumber prefers vendor-sponsored events with an educational twist about product knowledge or green building, which help burnish that dealer’s image.
- Conventional marketing still works: Wolf Distributing’s marketing includes support for newspaper, magazine, circular, and promotional ads. Wolf also allocates some co-op dollars to dealers that are upgrading their stores’ merchandising presentations. Jaeger Lumber recently ran two successful mass-marketing campaigns: a direct-mail program to between 95,000 and 110,000 households, and a newspaper circular program that reached 250,000 households.
–John Caulfield
