Transcript

Will Hanke (00:00 )

All right, everyone. Welcome to another episode of marketing panes, the podcast where we talk with real window treatment and awning service providers or business owners about their strengths, about their successes and struggles related to marketing their business. Today is our Q2 preview. We’re going to talk about what happened in Q1. We’re going to talk about what we think is coming up in Q2. I’ve got two guests with some great insights that I’m excited to interview.

First of all, we got Joe Kendall, president

of Made in the Shades Eastern Shore. Joe owns Kendall Furniture, a Made in the Shade dealership. He went from 58th place to fifth place in the Made in the Shade franchise, then second place, and in 2002, 2024 became the number one volume dealer in North America. Joe, thanks for being on the show today.

Ryan Gilberts (00:31 )

Okay.

Joe Kendall (00:40 )

you

You’re very welcome. We’re happy to be here.

Will Hanke (00:57 )

Thank you.

We’ve also got Ryan Gilbert’s Ryan owns Shaded Window Coverings in Montana. Shaded Shaded Window Covering started in May 2022 after Ryan was working for some other businesses in the window covering industry over the last 10 years. He wanted to. He first started in the industry as a part time installer, then moved to lead installer position and eventually a hybrid role of installer and salesperson.

Ryan Gilberts (00:58 )

you

Will Hanke (01:27 )

Now almost

three years later, there’s really no turning back. He’s just started his largest sixth figure project, 1900 shades for an apartment building under construction. Ryan, thank you for joining as well.

Ryan Gilberts (01:39 )

Thanks, Will.

Will Hanke (01:40 )

1900 so you’re going be a little bit busy I guess for at least the next couple days right?

Ryan Gilberts (01:44 )

Fortunately, it’s being built out in stages.

Will Hanke (01:46 )

Awesome. Yeah, that’s great. Congrats on that. So I want to start by talking about some different industry trends. What emerging trends are you guys seeing in the industry right now? And how can other window treatment dealers kind of align with these trends to stay competitive?

Joe Kendall (02:02 )

Ryan, think what you’re doing is, Ryan and I spoke a little bit beforehand, Will, and we really love that the exterior market is exploding. you need to make sure you’re talking to your clients because they don’t know all the cool things you know as far as that goes. I was talking to Ryan and we were discussing how you might go into a customer wants to get some roller shades up on four windows that are consecutive.

Ryan Gilberts (02:12 )

Yeah.

Joe Kendall (02:28 )

And you leave the house with an exterior roller shade motorized. their beautiful in-tort, their trim on the inside is left alone. It’s gorgeous. And they can have that true builder look, but yet get the results they need when they need them. I think the exterior, and people, great too. I think they expect to pay more for exterior blinds.

And it’s with the warranties that some of these manufacturers are offering, it’s really a great way to go.

Ryan Gilberts (02:55 )

Yeah, I got to agree on that too, but.

Will Hanke (02:57 )

Yeah, I like that.

Ryan, are you seeing something similar?

Ryan Gilberts (02:59 )

So yeah, I mean I like the exterior products They’re definitely a little bit more sleek, but they’re definitely a touch more expensive than some people anticipate But the cool thing is there’s a vast majority of dealers or I should say vendors that are starting to manufacture those and get into the market so I Don’t think price points all gonna be all that

Will Hanke (03:21 )

I know when we talked with some of our guests on the Q1 podcast that we had talked about, they mentioned the luxury buyers are really popping up more. Are you guys seeing that as well?

Ryan Gilberts (03:32 )

Absolutely.

Joe Kendall (03:33 )

yeah. Yeah. Our average ticket for the last six months is up about 15%.

Will Hanke (03:38 )

Okay.

Joe Kendall (03:38 )

You know, we were in the $4,400 average ticket. We’re now in that a hair over 5,000, 5,200 area, which I think is just people are buying nicer stuff.

Will Hanke (03:48 )

Yeah, I think that’s a great point. when I started in this industry as the marketing guy, about seven years ago, we niche down specifically just to the window treatment and awning industry. The average job was 2,500, 3,000. So obviously part of that is, I guess you could say inflation, but also I think it’s just people are buying better quality stuff.

Ryan Gilberts (04:03 )

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Joe Kendall (04:11 )

And, you know, there was always… Go ahead, Ryan, I’m sorry.

Ryan Gilberts (04:11 )

Absolutely.

no, I was just saying absolutely. But I would probably say a year ago, I kind of crossed over that bridge with Hunter Douglas and became one of their dealers. But I will say that going into that bridge and are going into that realm of the market and being able to offer those very high quality products, my ticket sales have definitely increased tremendously. And I’m also getting a lot of those larger ticket deals and showing them.

The cool stuff, I guess you can say.

Joe Kendall (04:40 )

You know, and I train, we have two full-time salespeople. I still train them and remind them of the famous, you know, Bloomingdale’s three bread maker stories about a good, better, best versus just a good or a best. And, you know, I encourage my people that when they’re presenting a product, and let’s say they’re talking about a Roman shade or they’re talking about a roller shade, and you pop out a Hunter Douglas vignette, you know, I’m a big believer in telling the client straight up,

hey, this is a more expensive product. There’s a decent chance, you the average salesperson might think, God, they’re going to be bummed. But really they go, cool, this is what I want. And I always like to tell people, because obviously if a roller shade was $49, we’d sell everybody we talked to. But not being afraid of the more expensive products and sharing with your customer, hey look.

Ryan Gilberts (05:18 )

Okay.

.

Joe Kendall (05:32 )

This is

a more expensive product, but let me tell you why and what you get. And then it’s like, well, this makes perfect sense. selling higher up, it takes work. But if you do it right, it really, really can pay off.

Ryan Gilberts (05:37 )

Okay.

I gotta agree with you on that. Definitely education with your customers or clients is I think gonna make you stand above the crowd and definitely show your worth and then also get those larger ticket items.

Joe Kendall (05:56 )

Definitely, definitely.

Will Hanke (05:57 )

I love the idea of upselling, right? You already got them on the hook. Now if you can walk out with 10 % more than you thought you’d get or something like that, it’s a fantastic growth strategy for your business.

Joe Kendall (06:08 )

You know, I’m going to share a quick story if I could, Will. When I first started selling 30 years, 35 years ago, I was selling roofs and my closing ratio was excellent, but my gross profit was just barely average. So the owner says, Joe, I want you to go out to dinner tonight with Zeke, who’s our highest profit guy. makes a thousand dollars or more than you a week. He’s going to teach you how to sell higher. And I was like, my God, this is going to change everything.

We go out to happy hour drinking, long story short, we get to midnight, we’re at 7-Eleven, we’ve had some cocktails. And I said, Zeke, we’re gonna be in deep trouble, you didn’t train me t