Contributed by Mark Honeycutt, Franchise Coach
Ladies & Gentlemen, meet Maggie Firlotte! Maggie is a server at our Birkdale location in Huntersville, NC. All Maggie managed to do was sell a grand total of $10,267.30 worth of Brixx gift cards during our recent contest! By herself!
I recently had an opportunity to sit down with Maggie, who has been with Brixx for almost 3 years, to ask her about the secret(s) to her success.
I inquired as to what Maggie considered to be the main reason for her success, and she stated that she believed that her consistency was the main reason. When I asked her to elaborate, she said that she mentioned it to every table, and did not rely on them receiving the message from posters or table tents. She also alluded to the importance of informing all of her ‘regulars’ about the additional $25 IHP card that we offered for each $100 gift card sold. Since her average gift card sale was over $100, I would say she was quite successful using that pitch!
Another key to her success was fact that she had a plan, and she set herself a goal to sell $500 gift cards sold per shift. While she may not have reached that goal every shift, she did manage to sell an average of over $250 per shift, and that’s remarkable if you ask me!
She also mentioned that her management team of Rae, Krish and John were instrumental in getting the staff fired-up about the contest. Each shift, they touched on the gift card campaign, and even had daily contests to motivate the staff.
The lesson here is simple. It doesn’t take magic tricks or a slick sales pitch to be successful at selling Gift Cards or selling any of our LTO’s or Specials. The main key to success is to simply inform our Guest that they are available!
Thank you, Maggie, for making the Brixx gift card contest so successful!
Let’s look at a few facts regarding this remarkable feat:
Maggie worked 41 shifts during that period, at an average of $250.42/shift.
Her $10,267.30 worth of sales were more than 25 of the 29 restaurants in the entire system. We’re talking about ENTIRE STORES, people!
Maggie sold 101 gift cards during the period. That’s an average gift card of $101.66.
Maggie’s Total Net Sales during the period were $30,695.99. Divide that by the amount of gift cards sold ($10,267.30 in case you forgot!) and you get 33.5%. The store with the highest gift card to net sales percentage (Chapel Hill) was 15.3%. That’s more than double, folks!
Maggie received a bonus check of $1,026.73! By the way, she used that money to purchase a plane ticket to London in February!