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Shopping in Naperville

Watching the Naperville area grow over the past 36 years, and being one of many shops that grew with it has truly been a retailer’s learning experience. Most stores learned that the underlying concept of success was to expand on what you sold by including full and extended service practices. This gave your customer the added advantage of one-stop buying for all their needs. The idea was to provide a quality product, professional installation and maintenance of their purchase so it would last for years to come. This concept in business, especially in the carpeting industry, was rare. However, over the years, it built respect, diversity and many multi-generational and repeat clients for us. Much of my social life is spent with fellow business owners discussing area demands and strategy. We compare notes to come up with ways to offer Naperville the best possible products, backed by the best possible service. What we have found is this: if something is not available in Naperville, or within a reasonable distance, it probably does not exist.

Trends in Naperville follow the national wave of what is and is not popular. The community is very cutting-edge and fashion-driven, with Naperville offering a very high standard of living. Fortunately, for all of us in the local retail market, customers have found that although the Internet is a great source for information, many of the faddish items purchased online just do not perform well and getting orders corrected could be a costly endeavor. Customers’ shopping habits have also changed over the years. Many businesses have noticed fewer evening shopping trips on weekdays and weekends are more family-oriented with other activities to occupy their time. However, Sundays are more laid-back and have become a very enjoyable day for retail and shopping in general.

Naperville residents tend to be upwardly mobile and want to use their homes as a future investment. They count on local companies, like ours and other full- service retailers, to help protect this investment. This type of perceptive business planning has helped many retailers to keep their customers satisfied.

When I first entered the business arena, a two-year survival rate pretty much told the story of success or failure. Over the years, that slowly changed to a five-year life expectancy. Today every business owner needs a detailed plan for overall success. Planning for market fluctuations is vital to the life of any business. Many times a retailer might have a plan in place for prosperous times but nothing for those possible recessional cycles. This spells retail suicide for a business. A large percentage of individual-owned businesses do not make it past the first 10 years because of this lack of planning. Keep in mind, though, that even successful plans need to be adapted toward the future. When your business reaches a retail summit and everything is going smoothly, what’s next? This is not the time to hesitate, but rather seek out the next retail-mountain’s summit. A business is alive and growing thanks to your own hard work. Many times, you will hit plateaus where things seem to be running smoothly, but it is important not to be lulled into a false sense of security. It is like the old adage of paddling upstream in a canoe — when you stop it is peaceful, but in reality, you are going backwards.

A strong business plan, quality products, and service with your name on it spell success. When you are passionate about what you are selling and stay true to it, customers will stay true to you.

David Martin
President,
Russell Martin Carpet and Rugs, Ltd.