Marketing is key to sales
growth
Personality, savvy key ingredients for successful
retailer
 By Joyce M. Rosenberg /
Associated Press
NEW YORK -- For Diane Bromberg, a cellophane-wrapped
basket filled with cookies, jams and chocolates is more than a calorie-laden
delight; it's a symbol of her success.
Six years ago, Bromberg, in
need of a job and with two children to support, started her own business -- not
the dot-com dream many other entrepreneurs pursued, but a more traditional,
one-woman operation, putting together gift baskets in her home workshop in
Wayne, N.J.
Now, "I'm finally taking a deep breath and saying to
myself, 'I'm really supporting myself,' " Bromberg said at the height of the
busy holiday season and just one day after buying herself a new Land Rover.
In truth, Bromberg has been successful not just because of the
thousands of baskets she packages and ships each year. As she built her
business, using a mix of her personality and marketing techniques straight out
of a textbook, Bromberg discovered other ways to make money, by teaching other
people how to make baskets and running events to help small business owners
network.
Networking has been the driving force behind Bromberg as an
entrepreneur. In talking about her work, she talks about networking, not
baskets.
"I'm consistently marketing, consistently networking," she
said. "That brings me back to the basket boutique."
People who have
worked with Bromberg say they admire her ability to network with so many people.
"She probably spends 70 percent of her time networking," said Richard
Magid, who runs support groups for small business owners in New Jersey as part
of the New York-based Let's Talk Business Network. "She knows the value of
communicating and keeping in contact with people, and it comes back to her at
this time of year, the busy season."
Bromberg, whose background was in
art, had a comfortable life, living in what she describes as a beautiful
million-dollar home, raising two children and working part-time. But by the
mid-1990s, that life had disappeared amid financial problems and a divorce, and
Bromberg had to find a way to support herself and her family.
In early
1996 she started International Basket Boutique, putting together gift baskets
and shipping them. She actually had the idea before her marriage broke up -- she
had put together baskets for her husband's company, loved it and got a lot of
compliments for her work.
But you have to sell a lot of baskets to
make a living, and so Bromberg began building her business by forming contacts
with as many people as possible and finding creative ways to give her name and
her company exposure.
"I joined every group, became a chamber of
commerce member, every support and networking group to let everyone know this
was my business," she said. "I gave baskets to people that had a lot of traffic
in their stores, gave them baskets to raffle off for the holidays."
Networking also led to offshoots of her business. She started getting
calls from people who had read about her or who had met her as she networked.
"Women found found me and said, 'I want to do what you do,"' Bromberg
said. "Being the entrepreneur that I am, I figured I help could women start
their own businesses."
So Bromberg began selling a marketing package
that's a how-to for setting up a basket business and began selling it on a Web
site http://intlbaskets.com.
She has written several books, including one on starting a home-based business
and runs seminars on running a basket business.
She also founded
Networking Events Co., which puts together educational events for business
people. Bromberg lines up speakers on topics such as "How to work a room" or
"How to close a sale."
The business was strong enough that Bromberg
was able to buy herself a townhouse three years ago and have a lifestyle that
she enjoys.
But like many other entrepreneurs, she still worries, and
that drives her to keep networking.
"I always think that it's not
enough ... I'm still a process in the works." |
