It happens. You plan and prepare. You anticipate. Then life intervenes. That happened to me a weekend ago. I had been looking forward to attending the Southern Illinois Made Expo since I first saw it advertised. Unfortunately, my body needed rest after maintenance chemo on Tuesday and trying to push through my regular schedule. Consequently, I spent Friday night in the ER and missed church, the farmer’s markets, and the expo… So I did not fill up my business card pages with info as I had planned to do.
I had high hopes of putting names and faces with products made in Southern Illinois that might fit well into some of the gift sets that I am creating. Specifically, I will be looking for small quantities of wholesale pre-packaged Southern Illinois items like teas, snacks, serving dishes, spices, non-alcoholic beverages, and possibly some locally authored books. I am open to other suggestions. Please email me at asliceofsouthernillinois@gmail.com if you would be interested in this type of exposure for your product.
Another mission I had for the expo was to meet with people interested in being part of the inaugural Slice of Savings Passport Program. The Slice of Savings Passport is designed to be a win-win situation for both customer and the business. It is inexpensive advertising in the form of coupons and will be accessible via the ASOSI app and this blog/website.
There seems to be a lot of evidence out there that people are more inclined to try something new if they have an incentive, even small, such as a percentage or flat amount off of a purchase. Others just like the sport of couponing.
Still, there is no need for that to leave the business with a loss. It is possible to offer a deal that is a win for both the business and the customer.
If you have a locally owned (roughly, South of I-70) small business that would like to participate or know someone who does, please email asliceofsouthernillinois@gmail.com
(If you use a marketing agency, it can appoint someone to be your authorized representative to place your coupon ad. A Slice of Southern Illinois is not an advertising agency but is offering a simple, inexpensive tool meant to be accessible to small, local businesses. We would love to work with them as an additional tool they might utilize to better serve you and our community.)
See the mock Savings Slice ad for an example:
https://asliceofsouthernillinois.com/savings-pass/
