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Press
William Glen Named National GIA Winner
By Michelle Moran
Publication: Gourmet Retailer
Date: Saturday, April 1 2006
Owners: Privately Held/Family Owned
Number of Locations: Two
Store Size: 30,000 (William Glen) & 9,800 (William Glen Christmas & More)
Location: Sacramento, California
Number of Employees: Full Time - 45, Part Time - 15, Seasonal - 20
Web Site: www.WilliamGlen.com
Two Boys & A Couple of Chevies
Who could have known that a couple of French horns and two Chevies could have birthed a business as successful and loved as Sacramento's William Glen. The store has been voted by the readers of Sacramento Magazine as The Best Place to Buy a Special Gift for seven years running.
Founded in 1963 by William Snyder and Glen Forbes, William Glen began as a decorating studio and candle shop. Through the years, it has evolved to include a product mix that includes: gifts, decorative accessories, housewares, tabletop, and collectibles. The store's leaders have successfully predicted the needs and desires of its customers and community, while still honoring their initial mission -- "to provide customers with merchandise of the highest quality and finest design at fair and competitive prices, along with service that goes beyond their expectations in a nurturing environment that is pleasant, congenial, and efficient."
Snyder and Forbes met over two French horns at California State University, Sacramento. The two were supposed to be each others' competition -- they ended up being partners in a business that would see them through more than 40 years.
"After two years as a music major, I switched to business but after six weeks of doing macro and micro economics and accounting 101, I said 'I'll hire someone to do that for me,' and walked away from school. The next year, Glen and I thought about having a store and we formulated rough ideas of what we wanted to do. We started by traveling up and down California selling the Danish candles we were importing," explained Snyder.
In 1963, the pair ended up in a space three blocks from where Snyder had grown up.
"I worked out a deal with the landlord of a dime store for us to come and meet him," Snyder began. "Glen and I were both 21 years old. We put on suits and ties, dummied up a financial statement, and brought along cigars so we could impress them that we were old and mature."
They used their two Chevys as collateral for a $2,000 loan, rented the 1,211-square-foot site and opened it as an interior design and gift store. And the rest, as they say, is history.
"We have what you would call a very organic business plan, probably because it's the way that my mind works," Snyder said. "Our business goals were primarily driven by a desire to provide better-quality goods at a competitive price with excellent service, which is still our philosophy."
Today, William Glen, Inc. consists of two very different stores with completely different product offerings presented in fundamentally similar ways. William Glen, with 18,000 square feet of selling space and another 12,000 square feet of office and warehouse space, is the home division. Its focus is on tabletop, gifts, collectibles, home décor, and housewares. William Glen Christmas & More, approximately 4,800 square feet with an additional 5,000-square-foot offsite warehouse, is a seasonal shop that offers collectibles, as well as changing seasonal décor.
The Store
Forbes retired in 1998, but Snyder still works the store, the shows, travels the world, and tracks trends for his customers.
A destination for a loyal base of customers, generations have shopped the store, eventually introducing their children and even their children's children to the location. Snyder can recall weighing babies on the old product scales at the grocery store were he worked in his youth.
"Now those babies are shopping the store with their grandchildren," he said. "We have third and fourth generations shopping the store, and while it doesn't make me feel old in any way, there is a relation to time and energy that illustrates our history through our customers."
William Glen's product mix goes well beyond traditional housewares to include gifts, decorative accessories, tabletop and collectibles. The William Glen Market further serves customers' needs and continues to foster growth with cross-promotion of the housewares side of the business.
William Glen is a destination for both consumers in the Sacramento area, as well as for online consumers. The store successfully carries an enormous inventory for an independent retailer. On display and in stock are over 1,300 china patterns, 600 stemware patterns, 400 flatware patterns and the best in cookware and small kitchen appliances.
Both stores work on the principal that face-forward merchandising should change frequently, while staple goods or destination items should be merchandised to the rear. Customers are presented with new displays that cleverly feature specific product on their way to finding destination items. Snyder's grocery background helped formulate this idea of enticement buying to either add to customers' purchase goals or to introduce new products.
The stores are divided into logical and specific merchandise groupings that are designed as small individual shops within the larger physical store. Each of the eight storefronts has a distinct facade and interior that pulls from the product mix to create a memorable themed environment.
From the formal china room with its high ceilings, weighty crown moldings, and gallery rooms to the ever-changing central pavilion, each room presents merchandise as if it were a stand-alone store. In addition to the eight specific shops, William Glen's back half is presented as an open-air marketplace. This quasi-outdoor forum features the housewares, serveware, cards, and candles departments.
Each mini shop has its own front entrance and front display windows complete with bay windows and mullions. Though the entrances and windows are false, they create the illusion of solid storefronts and allow the store merchandisers to create window displays in each department. The shops all look out onto a main street leading from the front doors through the store to the Marketplace, ending in the dining area of The Bistro at William Glen and the rear entrance.
The Bistro at William Glen is a sit-down restaurant that first opened in 1987; recently, it has undergone a makeover, a menu change, and a name change. The entire store received a facelift in 2005. Each room was given a completely new, yet still distinct color scheme. In this way, William Glen is innovative in that its store layout is easily adaptable to fit current trends without requiring large-scale remodeling.
Dedicated Commitment to Customers
The focus at William Glen has always been on the customers.
"Taking care of my customers and fulfilling our mission statement has been our primary focus," Snyder said. "Profitability has been a secondary motivator."
In 1985, the William Glen Market was opened to further fulfill customers' needs. That has since evolved into the current deli/cafe/market structure; in other words, a full-service market with indoor and outdoor seating.
"Our philosophy was to do the best we possibly could and carry items that other stores didn't. We took the risk of stocking categories that we personally like and our customers wanted but that weren't in the marketplace," Snyder explained.
To put things in perspective, most cookware was sold in hardware stores when William Glen began, and department stores carried mostly ready-to-wear. There were no Macy's Cellars.
"We started bringing in cookware and became essentially one of the first cookware stores in Northern California," he said. "When Calphalon started, we were one of the first stores to carry it." <
William Glen was up to 4,250 square feet in 1969 when they began demonstrating products and cooking techniques to customers.
"We began cooking evenings to show customers how to do flambé or to use a Cuisinart. Eventually, it turned into a cooking school. People paid $45 for nine lessons. Through the years, we've had many notable chefs . . . Jacques Pepin, Macella Hazen, Diane Kennedy."
William Glen immerses its customers in a world of fantasy and theater in which they experience the "Wow" factor and have fun. During the year, the store's main aisle is transformed into many enticing vignettes ranging from small trunk shows to extravagant and oversized trees that appear to shoot through the roof and into the sky. Each room also has a focal point around which product is bulk stacked or shelved for purchasing ease.
Integrated displays may combine china, crystal and flatware with beautiful table linens and floral sprays. Such combinations offer useful suggestions for dressing a table, while allowing the promotion of florals in bulk display.
Interactive, multidimensional displays entice customers to walk through, around, and in between them for a full immersion experience. Experimentation with the senses of sound and smell to garner customer involvement has been extremely successful. Whether conducting in-store cooking demonstrations or merchandising scented product, it is believed that each of the senses may be used to stimulate product interest. Sound has been added, thereby contributing to the "full immersion" experience. An example of this merchandising approach involved a lively Halloween display in the center pavilion that not only included a recreation of a haunted attic with life-size, animated creatures and lighting, but also the broadcasting of macabre music, as well as the production of simulated fog.
At William Glen signing events, product demonstrations and table displays become much more. An otherwise standard signing event was enhanced with a cocktail party featuring Waterford's Chief Designer, John Connolley. A Faberge trunk show was enriched by hosting top customers at a private dinner with Tattiana Faberge. A product demonstration highlighting quality craftsmanship becomes a semi-circus event complete with media coverage by strategically placing Wedgwood bone china teacups under a Jaguar automobile and displaying it outside the store's entrance. Finally, table displays are given artistic flair by incorporating tabletop dressing classes with local artists and charities to create William Glen's "Fantasy Tablescape's Evening."
Beyond having a dedicated commitment to its customers, William Glen as a family-owned and operated store is also dedicated to community involvement. In 2004 alone, the store made donations to 96 different charitable events. Besides personal involvement of William Glen personnel, the store often donates merchandise.
Team Approach
William Glen is also committed to its staff — it provides them with the appropriate feedback/resources necessary to continuously improve. An anonymous professional shopping service evaluates the entire shopping experience at William Glen. A formal reward system includes eligibility for quarterly drawings for rewards and prizes, such as beauty services, restaurant gift certificates and movie tickets. The entire staff celebrates individual successes much the same as a baseball team celebrates one member's home run.
William Glen's Christmas store is another example of management's commitment to staff. For several years, William Glen Christmas & More was simply called The William Glen Christmas Shop. Originally, it was only open seasonally and the location changed from year to year. But in 1996, William Glen Christmas & More was given its new name and a permanent home.
Snyder explained, "The most valuable commodity retailers have is qualified devoted staff who know the product. The Christmas Shop team was dedicated and involved, so instead of closing it down, we stayed open all year and developed a year-round customer base. That team began designing events around more holidays and making the store a destination. So now we have a separate 5,000-square-footChristmas store."
Located a mere 50 feet from the main store, it imparts the feeling of being a distinct part of the original store by maintaining the same principles that made William Glen a successful and innovative retail store.
Innovation at Work
William Glen is innovative in retailing through its "team" approach to leadership and its goal of continuous improvement based upon data and customer feedback. The management team consists of nine senior employees who oversee the various operations and business segments of William Glen, Inc.
The team, called the William Glen Advisory Team (WGAT), focuses on resolving management, policy, and process issues, and operates on the philosophy that a strong team working collaboratively and cooperatively can create a better product than one individual working alone.
William Glen was one of the first cooperative independent retailer catalog services. Beginning in 1976, the company offered services to independents across the country, printing catalogs as a collaborative effort.
"We had 32 independently owned stores across the U.S. known as the William Glen Catalog Association. We all picked out goods together," said Snyder.
Although the service stopped in 1999, it's just one more example of the innovation and forward-thinking business sense of Forbes and Snyder.
Further innovation is evident in William Glen's marketing efforts. In 1990, they expanded on the common industry gift certificate concept and introduced William Glen "Gold Coins." Forged from solid brass, emblazoned with the William Glen wheat sheaf logo and offered in a green felt gift pouch, each gold coin is worth $10.00 toward purchases at either store. So well was this unique concept in gift certificate merchandising received that since the first offering, the store has minted over $200,000 worth of the coins.
Gift registries have been in use since the 1970s. Unable to find a suitable gift registry program, William Glen developed the William Glen Gift Registry Program.
The latest version offers a full web-based registry program with up-to-date information that includes quantities, price information, a full description, and a photo of items. In 2003, William Glen launched a proprietary registry link that serves as a bridge between the point-of-sale system and the web-based gift registry itself. This fully automated process runs hourly as a scheduled activity to not only update items featured on the company's web site, but to also read sales files to update each purchase or special order made against a gift registry.
The Future
William Glen has been at the cutting edge of retail for decades. As they approach the future, the store and Snyder show no signs of slowing down that pace of innovation.
William Glen actively seeks to be on the cutting edge of retail technology and relies heavily upon data gathered primarily through it to identify effective strategies for target marketing and marketing media. By utilizing the demographic data captured from their point-of-sale system, a determination of spending methods, as well as the target customer base has been successfully defined.
"I have always been interested in technology. In 1987, I was trying to play with a computer application to serve my customers better and the first machine I bought used 8-inch floppy disks. I have invested 16 small fortunes in retail programs, but the system I have now, Retail Pro, is excellent," Snyder said.
This use of the "POS" customer data coupled with "Customer Feedback Form" responses has led to a reduced reliance on newspaper advertising. The data has been instrumental in an increase in local promotional events, personal telephone calls, radio, and TV ads.
When Snyder began venturing into cyberspace, he again relied on his own inventiveness to create a site deserving of his customers.
"We started trying to develop an interesting web site, but didn't want to use a canned program. I have had four programmers building it and am finally now at a point where it's becoming what I want it to be," Snyder said. "Again, it was another long, expensive process. So if my primary motivation was to make money fast, I could have bought a canned program, but our motivation was to have something that would work better than other sites, provide more information, work quickly, and be user-friendly."
Snyder believes their web presence is another integral part of growth.
"I think that the Internet can expand the brick-and-mortar store," he began. "It's primarily developed in the interest of taking care of the customers' needs — whether its gift registry or providing the products people are seeking."
And it's this expansion, this customer service, this innovation that keeps William Glen ahead of the curve, making the store a front-runner in the field of specialty independent retailers.
"I think the independent is always going to be the innovator. They are the growth of the industry. They are the ones who become the specialty chains," Snyder concluded. "I would humbly suggest that the Crates, William-Sonomas, and Restoration Hardwares all began as specialty independent businesses. There will always be a place for people with the entrepreneurial spirit to take advantage of whatever gifts they have, interests they have, and passions they have . . . and focus them on their market. These passionate people have a much, much better chance of success."
After 40 years of successful independent retailing, William Glen is the perfect example of that sentiment.
Moran, Michelle. "Retailer Profile: William Glen Named National Gia Winner." Gourmet Retailer. 1 Apr. 2006: 1-9.