I have been a little slow with blog posts over the last few weeks because I’m enjoying summer. Really enjoying summer! Yesterday afternoon, I went to a birthday party with my youngest daugther. The party was at Playground World. I was the only Dad at the party. I think everyone must wonder what I do for a living because I’m always with my family. Last week, we took my oldest daugther to her first Orthodontist appointment. The Orthodontist was shocked because a "Dad" came to the appointment with the family.

It’s too bad most Dads are working all day long.

The neighbors must think I’m a drug dealer because I never go to work. Right now, I’m "working" from my home office. My administrative assistant brings checks for me to sign and other items from the office to me at home. I never go to the office. Call me lazy :)!

Back to the birthday party…

Playground World is a pretty neat little business. Well, actually its a business within a business. Or one business that sets up sales for the other business. Playground World is a large indoor showroom for massive outdoor playgrounds. They must have 10 large playgrounds setup up for display in this showroom. The real business is playground equipment sales.

However, they created another small side business that delivers boatloads of customers to their store. The side business is a party or play business for kids. They setup a small party room for kid parties in the back corner of the showroom. They also host open play hours each day during the week. Kids love playing on all of these massive playgrounds.

Guess what happens when parents bring their kids to parties or open play hours?

They shop the showroom. This is exactly what my wife and I did. Here is a partial list of what they had in displayed in the showroom:

  • Basketball hoops
  • Skateboard jumps and related equipment
  • Mailboxes
  • Garden storage centers
  • Trampolines
  • Brio Toys
  • Step 2 Toys
  • Picnic Tables
  • Rubber Multch
  • Zip lines
  • Oh and I forgot to list "Playgrounds"

We almost bought a $200 mailbox during the birthday party. I happened to pick up their catalog and noticed that their playground sets range in price from $4,000 to $42,000. Yes, a $42,000 playground. I asked the person working in the showroom how many playgrounds they sell to parents attending birthday parties and this big smile flashed across his face. He said, "We do pretty well."

Simply beautiful.

A small party business delivers buyer after buyer to the store. More importantly, they get paid for the parties. Most businesses try to reduce their cost per lead. This business figured out how to get paid to generate leads.

How can you use a similar strategy to deliver client after client to your business?

Happy playing!!!


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