Ideas, information and industry news for collegiate retailers

Good faculty relations are critical to collegiate retail success. Of course, you need cooperation from educators when it comes to adoptions, but, far beyond that, faculty evangelists can boost your store’s campus profile and its bottom line. In marketing-speak, an evangelist is someone who spreads enthusiastic word-of-mouth about your store and services — and they do it for free.

These days many college stores are joining the fight against student anxiety. Searching for ways to offer students more than just a place to shop, collegiate retailers have found numerous innovative strategies   — from hosting de-stress events to bringing in therapy dogs — for reducing stress among college-goers. Those who invest in promoting student well-being know it’s a worthwhile effort: students’ outsized anxiety not only precipitates other health concerns, it interferes with academic success, driving some out of school altogether. Most higher education institutions are aware that anxiety is a problem. What’s less obvious is why.

In the changing educational landscape, colleges and universities need ways to improve the student experience, increase retention rates and revenue, and meet the student demand for a more affordable college education. The bookstore can play a significant role in supporting your institutional mission and helping students achieve long-term success.

College stores are a misunderstood part of campus. Tasked with supporting students and generating revenue, stores are caught in the middle of two conflicting goals. For those who don’t live and breathe the industry every single day, it’s easy to lose sight of how the store enhances day-to-day campus life and all it does to help students, faculty and the school. That’s why it’s important to share more of what you do to enhance affordability and student life with the campus community.

The image many of us create in our minds when we think of a college freshman is an 18-year-old student fresh out of high school who is financially dependent on her parents and unmarried with no children. This student attends school full-time, lives on campus and joins organizations to get more involved. However, that isn’t reality for most of today’s students. On many campuses today, the nontraditional student is the new normal.

“Print is dead.”

“Digital will never last.”

Everyone has an opinion about the print vs. digital debate. Facts and figures can be quoted for both sides, making a compelling argument for each. The cost of print can be too much for students to shoulder. Retention is harder to achieve with digital. Back and forth, the argument can go on forever because the truth is neither platform is inherently bad or good. Both have unique pros and cons that make the decision about which one to choose nearly impossible.

As spring rolls in, course material adoptions come back to the forefront of concerns. Finding ways to communicate the importance of early adoptions to faculty can be a challenge. Are you doing enough? Are you doing too much? Students, faculty and college stores benefit from working together. Finding that happy medium where the faculty is informed enough to understand the importance to the student and the store, but does not feel harassed about the subject requires finesse. Here are four best practices when building professional relationships that will create a lasting rapport.

Students continuously cycle through campus, but is one group of students really that different than the next? According to generational research, yes. Each generation has different expectations, goals, preferences and views of the world. Gen Z is no exception. Even down to social media habits, this group distinguishes themselves from their millennial predecessors. Understanding Gen Z’s relationship with social media and retail will help you improve the way your store uses social media to connect with the students on your campus.   

First, an apology: Before I started working for MBS, I spent more than a decade in college classrooms oblivious to the needs of campus retailers. Although I can’t speak for all faculty members, I doubt my ignorance was unique.

Most collegiate retailers love students, and faculty and administrators share that passion. It’s one of the reasons campus citizens choose a career in a learning environment where profit, however vital, is not the only goal. The ever-changing population of young people arriving on campus challenges older adults to stay sharp, creative and open to learning. Lately, the students coming to college have campus authorities searching for ways to help them find relief from mental health issues, too. Young people born after 1995, known collectively as Gen Z, have the highest-ever reported struggle with anxiety. Thankfully, campus retailers have a variety of resources at their disposal, which can help students become loyal customers and turn their retail experience into a source of refuge.