Busy Offices Busy Office Suppliers

We have heard it all economy this economy that. Jobs lost, investment curved, no business lending and let’s be honest most of us have seen it have an effect in some way shape or form on our businesses, whether that’s customers that couldn’t continue trading, suppliers raising prices, competition becoming more aggressive or payments taking longer to get to us – apparently the Royal Mail take longer to deliver cheques in poor economies!

Office supplies dealers have seen more than most how the downturn in the economy can mean customers spending less regardless of the industry they are in. There is an apparent relation between the amount of office staff that a company has and the amount that a company needs to spend on office supplies and stationery to run efficiently and if offices are not as busy then the offices either loose staff or simply don’t have as much to do – a quiet office means a less consuming office.

With this is mind office products resellers face limited options to improve the situation; they can either raise their price to compensate the fall in volume, however in a competitive market place like office supplies this option could be very risky. They can canvass to win new business (although every other office supplier will be doing this too) – or they can be creative and take advantage of vertical markets within current customers; this means looking for opportunities with those who already deal with them; ranges like facility management, print, janitorial supplies, printer consumables and health & safety supplies are all mainstays of most businesses purchases but do dealers make the most of these opportunities?

As with any form of selling the real trick to creating these opportunities and avenues is to ask questions, to probe into your contacts within an organisation and to have something on offer to engage the customer once any interest has been made. Office products wholesalers marketing teams are geared up to this way of marketing rather than the typical approach of selling commodity office stationery as a first approach.

Here at OfficeProfiles we have invested heavily in the extended ranges on offer to become the complete office procurement solution for business rather than the usual online stationery store, a member of our marketing team at OP commented “Years ago general stationery and everyday office supplies took up the great part of sellers offering but with the influx of competition in the UK market, particularly from overseas corporate stationers it’s more important now than ever to make yourself different in the marketplace, to offer something that the competition doesn’t and to be able to say yes we can whenever possible”.