News

March 21, 2018
National Stationery Show adds new all-day education seminar package

The Growth Strategy Essentials will make its debut at The National Stationery Show®. The new one-day conference will be held Friday, May 18, immediately prior to the show May 20-23, 2018 in New York City.

“We’re very excited about this day of programming and our industry experts who will be sharing their knowledge and experience,” said Kelly P. Bristol, the NSS show director. “We saw a need for exhibitors and makers at the NSS to learn advanced skills and strategies to help them grow their businesses, particularly in an ever-changing marketplace.”

The program includes five seminars lasting an hour each. Time is also provided for networking and the sharing of ideas. Topics addressed range from optimizing your website sales, safeguarding your business and maintaining a strong brand, to working with a production partner, the difficulties of growth and more.

Register early, as a minimum of 30 registrants are needed to hold the program. The session fee for the full day (including lunch) will be from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The cost is $75 for NSS exhibitors and $95 for non-exhibiting designers, makers or companies. The lineup includes:

  • ADVANCED E-COMMERCE: OPTIMIZING YOUR WEBSITE FOR SALES with Arianne Foulks, Aeolidia. Arianne Foulks is a blogger, consultant and founder of Aeolidia, a web design studio that helps clients increase conversion rate, average order value, and customer retention. Foulks will share top tips from 14 years of ecommerce strategy, focusing on specific steps to get more online sales, through simple conversion rate math to calculate sales based on traffic, purposeful website content, user experience and website performance, optimizing the navigation menu and more.
  • Relationship Dynamics: Amazon, Your Website and Your Wholesale Customers with Ari Lowenstein, Emergent Workshop. While staying competitive is essential, selling through Amazon can easily harm brands, lead to price erosion, lost sales and lower profits. Safeguarding the business depends on maintaining a strong brand strategy and preserving unique offerings. It’s vital to understand the number of both digital and brick-and-mortar stores available to the industry and how they interact with each other. Having firm control of an on-line presence by controlling access to product, managing brand image and fully vetting opportunities is to everyone’s benefit.
  • How to Work with Manufacturers’ Reps to Grow Your Business with Matthew Katzenson, CEO Fine Lines. The Rep Agency model is one of the cornerstones of our industry. Understanding it and how it operates as the sales arm for companies in the Stationery and Gift markets is essential. How the relationship works, the important steps to take to identify the right individual or group(s), establishing a successful partnership and what it takes to foster growth and longevity will be discussed.
  • Making the Most out of a Production Partnership with Ronnie Williams, General Manager, DeFrance Printing. Production partnership is the key to a successful stationery and gift business. Learn what a good production partner is and how they will improve a business. Product development, artwork preparation, print processes, finishing options and warehousing and fulfillment will alslo be discussed.
  • GROWING the HARD WAY with Beth Snyder, owner, 1canoe2. Snyder will review the pros and cons of rising rapidly in your industry, hiring your team and finance for art majors — how to put your money in order right from the start.

Exhibitors and makers participating in the NSS can register here.

Another new offering for exhibitors and attendees of the NSS is Broadway Bound, the opportunity to see a Broadway musical at the specially discounted price of $109, a savings of more than $60 over the normal price. Tickets for “Beautiful – The Carole King Musical” on Sunday, May 20 at 7 p.m. are available for purchase through the website. A limited number are available on a first come, first served basis.




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