Posts tagged Stacy Elofir
University Store Sends Students on Scavenger Hunt
May 16th
The following article was written by Stacy Elofir, director of University Store, for Towson University’s Division of Administration and Finance blog, Dollars & Common Sense. Elofir shares her store’s latest promotion and how it helped bring various departments on campus together. It definitely sounds like a fun way to collaborate as well as connect with students! Check it out:
Right before Spring Break the Office of Student Activities and the University Store decided to bring a little March Gnome Madness to Towson University. This was the idea…10 crazy days, 10 student winners, 10 hiding gnomes all over campus. A daily scavenger hunt to find those escaped gnomes. What a fun thing to do to get students involved before Spring Break and partner with departments all over campus.
One of the TU gnomes used in the scavenger hunt. Photo Credit: University Store
All of the departments that we contacted were excited and willing to participate. Each hiding place had its own set of clues given from each area. I was so glad that I didn’t have to write the clues; I am really bad at that sort of thing. What I didn’t know is how great each clue would be and that each clue would reflect the flavor of the department.
Cook Library wrote, “You can always get help wherever you roam. Just Ask a Librarian how to locate a journal and you’ll find that gnome.”
The Glen wrote, “In a room all made of glass, I am in the center of attention, Hansel and Gretel would not venture near.”
Student Affairs, Center for Student Diversity, Athletics, the Center for the Arts, Burdick Gym, The Career Center, and HRL all got involved. I had this clue from one auspicious office, “This aspiring gnome is learning how Towson’s executive office runs.” Can you guess where he was found? I am inspired by the teamwork and the ability for us as staff to do something fun for our students and that showcases the spirit of our school. Thank you, all who participated, helped, cheered and laughed with us. Now let’s come up with something else we can do together. It breaks up the day and it inspires us to do more!
Oh…and these guys are available at the Ustore. Give a Gnome a Home!
Defensive Strategies Series:
Stacy Elofir’s Advice on Creating a Community
Sep 28th
We understand that competitors have invaded your market share. That’s why, as your ally in the industry, we created the Battle for Books webinar to offer you defensive strategies that you can use to overcome those e-tailers and rogue buyers. We believe, however, that there’s often no better source for novel ideas than amongst your own colleagues, so we organized three of the most innovative collegiate retailers to share their experiences with you. This week, we’ll take a look back at some of the highlights!
Today, let’s take a look at what Stacy Elofir had to say!
A Little Background
Stacy is the director of University Store at Towson University in Maryland, and has been in the collegiate retail industry for more than 20 years. She was previously the associate director at Loyola University and then director at American University in Washington D.C. She’s presently been at Towson University almost two years. Her main message is that you can’t wait for someone to tell you what to do; talk to the resources on campus and talk to your community. Once you make your move, make sure it’s a decisive one.
“We’re a University Store serving about 22,000 students so we’re very busy!” she said. “I wanted to focus on how we changed the perception of students on campus and how partnering with them has allowed us to maximize our course material business.”
Stacy’s Main Points:
- Talk With Your Customers
“How do you connect with students? The answer walks through your door every single day! Your students punch in at the time clock, they come in and buy snacks, they bring their parents in to buy a new t-shirt, and let’s not forget they at least come in and look at your textbooks! We, as service people, can’t just open the door and not speak with our guests. They have the vital information that we’re searching for!
Poll your students both individually and in groups to get their opinion on everything you’re doing. I speak to my student employees daily!
In fact, in the fall, we allow each employee to choose a piece of our clothing to wear. The caveat is that only one person can pick each piece of clothing, they have to wear it, they have to tell people where they got, and most important of all they have to really like it!
It costs me a couple hundred dollars but I get so much goodwill from of each of them! We employ over 60 students a year, and when they’re feeling good about their job, they’ll share that with 5, 15, or even 20 friends. I’ve definitely seen an increase in job applications, and I think that’s an indicator of their positive experience.”
- Get Your Students, Faculty and Staff Involved
“You should always model your sales floor and services to reflect the wants and needs of your clientele. We’re servicing a school; they’re not here for us. So, if you can listen and act on what they’re telling you, then you’ll see many returns.
Right now, we’re promoting our Faces of Towson Marketing Campaign, which means all of the people in our advertisements are faculty, staff, alumni, children of alumni, and others modeling our items. People like to go online and in the store to see their friends’ faces! It’s been great for traffic and for goodwill! We post these pictures to Facebook, use them in our catalog, and put them on everything we can.
We’ve started doing in store candid pictures, too. We have a card made with a QR code which directs students right to our Facebook page so you can “like” our page and see your pictures. It’s been really cool and we’re going to continue it the rest of the year. I mean, who better to promote the store than the people that are already there? It’s just another way to connect with our students.”
- Use Your Resources
“Our art services department has been a terrific resource for us in this project and helped us create many of our marketing materials. We also have art and marketing students help out, too. I think when you look under rocks you’re going to find a lot of really great resources on campus that won’t cost you a lot of money.”
Get Social
“Yes, we are on Facebook! I actually have students contacting us on the page with questions, and not just about sweatshirts, but as you can see here, about textbooks! She sent us this message at 12:41 and we were able to respond by 12:50. If you’ll read our response, we’re trying to speak in direct language just as if we were having a conversation. Obviously, she’s watching because by 12:51 she had responded back and thanked us for our help!”
- Be Engaging
“That’s sometimes easier said than done! You know at first we started out with 10 Facebook fans and thought to ourselves, ‘Oh gosh, how do we get more?!’ One of the things we’ve done, besides putting pictures up, to engage our students is Win-a-Prize Wednesday. We just started it back up a few weeks 
ago because someone actually posted on our Wall asking when we’d be doing it again. That just goes to show that they are listening and communicating!
For the contest, we ask students a question and the first correct response receives a prize. You can see that we had 21 comments in 32 minutes and that’s actually very low. Last week, we had 160 comments in just about an hour; I really love the interaction!”
- Borrow Ideas
“I’m going to tell you a secret; I do go online and ‘friend’ many of you, either personally or as the University Store. I stalk you and I borrow what you’re doing! I go on your website or your social media pages and I look at how you’re creating graphics and in what ways you’re marketing to see how I can make that work for us. I suggest everybody do that; steal ideas from the best of your peers. Feel free to steal whatever you’d like from us!”
- Make Textbooks Sexy!
“Now, let’s cruise to textbooks! I told someone the other day, textbooks aren’t very sexy; Facebook and sweatshirts are kind of fun, but how do you make textbooks sexy? I think that if you hit at all angles, using both offense and defense, you can achieve that.
We wanted to showcase all of the options that we offer: new, used, rental and eBook, so we again partnered with Art Services to create this really great poster. We’ve used it in ads, hung it in our window, put in on every endcap, and posted it to Facebook. It just really illustrates all that we do to help students save. You have to put it out there and show students what you’re doing to help them!
Last year we hit the rental road pretty big. We went from 2 titles in the summer of 2010 to over 650 titles with over 10,000 books rented this fall, and counting! It’s been really successful and we’ll continue to incorporate it as much as we can! But, that’s not where it stops. By letting your customers know that you offer every option available, you’re showing them your value and proving your worth.”
- Be Transparent with Price Comparison
“We added this great price comparison shopping application to our e-commerce site through the MBS-Verba integration. We know that everybody price compares, whether it’s you looking for the cheapest bottle of milk or a student buying textbooks. So, being transparent is just another way to prove your value to students and faculty.
Let’s not forget the faculty, either, because if they tell their students to buy from the store, more than likely they will come here. There are faculty members that will say ‘Go to Amazon, it’s cheaper,’ so if you can prove your value to them, it’s a win-win!
This program also allows you to really build trust with your customers by providing a service while capturing at least some of their business. I did want to say that it was really cathartic this year to be helping a customer and hear them say ‘Oh I can get this cheaper from Amazon or Chegg or wherever,’ and for me to just release myself and say ‘Go ahead! In fact, let’s go to the computer and I’ll help you check it out!’ It went such a long way!
In the future, we’re planning to put QR codes on the shelves to take students directly to each book’s specific comparison page, too.”
Add Fun Merchandise
“We just got a new t-shirt that says ‘I Love Towson Because’ and you can write in your own reason why, with a QR code on the sleeve that directs students right to our website. It’s been very popular!”
- Thrive Together
“MBS has a loyalty program and I thought that was really cool, so I started investigating ways that we could structure this for our students. So, I went to my favorite shoe store and checked out how they ran their program and used their parameters.
Every dollar that you spend earns you a point which can be redeemed for gift cards to our store. It turns out to be about a 5% return on your purchases, which is really amazing if you’re spending $500 on textbooks.
To get the message out, we speak to every single customer at the Point of Sale. We tried to make our program as easy as possible to entice people to join. We track points through a phone number, rather than a student I.D., because we wanted the program to be open to the community, rather than to exclude anyone.
Since we started mid-January of this year, we have about 5,000 members! We’ve only had around 10,000 points redeemed so far, which equals to about $500 in nine months, so it’s not a big expense for us at all! I’ve been pretty pleased with the numbers.”
Final Words of Advice
“I guess my overall message is to be visible, be vocal, and be your community. You can impact your store by listening to your greatest allies and acting on the demands of your customers!”
Don’t miss out on Jon Neil’s excellent advice in tomorrow’s final installment of the Defensive Strategies Series!
University Store Aims for Straight A’s
Sep 12th
The cover of Elofir's report fits with the look and feel of the store's marketing efforts.
Every semester, students receive a letter grade measuring their progress and success in various classes. Stacy Elofir, director of University Store at Towson University, believes college stores should be no exception.
After a transformative year, Elofir wanted to find a new way to showcase her store’s hard work. That’s why she decided to compile a summary of their accomplishments in one easy-to-read document.
“It’s our report card; our time to shine,” she said. “We’ve done so many things this year that had never been done before. My staff and I work really hard to reach that goal and I think it’s important to review the immense amount of we achieved with limited resources.”
Although she had presented similar annual reports for previous positions within the industry, this was a first for University Store.
“We’re operating in an increasingly challenging and dynamic industry,” explained Elofir. “As the director of an independent store, I feel constantly challenged to show my store’s value and prove that we are competitive. This is just one more way to demonstrate that effort.”
As a first step in the process, she designed a structure for the report.
University Store's many new initiatives paid off in traffic.
“I knew that NACS offered templates, so I started by looking through their resources,” she said. “I really wanted to include the store’s graphics, however, so that the final result looked as though it could stand alongside our marketing materials. I ultimately used their suggestions but created my own hybrid version.”
Based on a series of strategic initiatives, Elofir then had to decide which content to include, which proved to be no easy task.
“Honestly that was the hardest part!” she admitted. “There was so much to include but I knew it was important to keep it as simple as possible. I integrated a combination of text and graphics to visually balance the page and provided as many statistics as possible to back up each point.”
Elofir began the report with a broad summary of the various ways the store provided value to their students as well as to the University throughout the year. She then elaborated on those areas she felt were integral aspects of the store’s success including expanded course materials and savings, clothing and gifts, new products, online sales, and marketing, with more detail.
Elofir highlighted the store's new comprehensive marketing campaign.
Although each of these components work together to enhance the student experience, the store’s rental program is one service that sticks out as most significant this year, according to Elofir.
Starting with just 4 titles in July of 2010, University Store has seen tremendous growth in their program with over 500 titles available in the spring of 2011!
“We took a significant risk by restructuring our textbook department over the past year,” she explained. “Because we rent books at 45% of the selling price, fiscally it looks like we’re losing money. But, our program has been so successful that, at this point, 75% of our titles have been rented for 3 semesters or more. So, I was excited to be able to show that all of this hard work has paid off in dollars.”
Saving students more than $600,000 over the cost of purchasing textbooks new, their rental program has also made great strides at enhancing student perception.
“It’s been a resounding success,” said Elofir. “I’m very proud of our numbers and the impact they have made on our students. Our store has integrated basically everything MBS has available, from price comparison to a campus marketplace, to help us stay competitive, and the rental program is just one example of how that has paid off!”
Services such as their rental program helped the store experience a 90% increase in total textbook units sold compared to last year.
Their program isn’t stopping there, though.
“I left for vacation and asked my textbook manager to submit a list of about 500 rental titles,” she added. “I came back and she told me we were going to have 640!”
It’s that strong dedication that Elofir believes has made the store what it is today.
“I’ve been blessed with an extraordinary staff that’s been so receptive to my energy,” she elaborated. “I think it’s really important to trust your employees and allow them to do their jobs. It’s amazing what can happen when you’re passionate about your job and you surround yourself with people who are just as passionate, too!”
After presenting her report to the campus’ vice president of Auxiliary Services, Elofir received such positive feedback that she has since shared it with others.
“We have a unique entity on our campus called the Incubator, where small businesses can pool their resources in order to perform at a higher level,” she explained. “So, I sent my report to the director to help identify areas of growth for our store. I’m determined to make our foothold so strong on campus that no one would even think of replacing us. “
In October 2010, Online General Merchandise Sales were integrated into the store's MBS POS system improving response time, fulfillment, and security.
Based on this input, Elofir and her team identified several ways the store can further develop their success in the future.
“We’re planning to update our website with customer friendly graphics, partner with the Athletics department to link from their site, create web-only sales and promotions, integrate Google Analytics to our webpage, and expand our mobile options, including the use of QR codes,” she said. “You just have to be fearless and take the leap. If you wait, it will be too late.”
Along with those plans, Elofir has one major area in mind that she also hopes to expand.
“My main goal is to make this the students’ store,” she revealed. “We already have 65 students working in the store, which is huge; but that’s a number I want to keep increasing. I’m hoping to eventually have students involved in every process of the store from picking out new products in focus groups to volunteering to run events. The more that we allow them to be a part of our store, the more likely they are to be loyal to us.”
Elofir will talk more about making her store a destination for students in MBS' upcoming webinar, Battle for Books.
For others in the industry looking to better their business, Elofir suggests first finding a focus.
“Identify one or two things that you know you can do,” she said. “That alone will have a significant impact. You don’t have to do it all at once.”
But, above all, she advises stores to refer back to one simple rule they likely learned long ago.
“The best way to get an ‘A’ in school is to do what your teacher wants you to do,” she explained. “Working at an independent store is the same. If you can find out what both your school and your students want, then your success rate will be that much higher. It’s all about providing the value that your customers are looking for!”
Want to know more about how Stacy is overcoming obstacles to position her store for success? She’ll share her exclusive defensive strategies to combat the competition in our upcoming webinar, Battle for Books. Join the rally; register today!
