Another 30% off is not a strategy

Every week the promo calendar fills up again. Thirty percent off this brand. Thirty percent off that category. A deal to match the deal down the street. Somewhere along the way, a discount stopped being a decision and became a default.

I’m not against promotions. I approve them every week. But when every brand is on sale, nothing on the menu is saying anything to the customer, and nothing in the sales data is telling the buyer the truth.

Every promo needs a job

A promotion should have a reason to exist that you can say in one sentence. Introduce a new SKU. Move aged inventory before it becomes a problem. Support a launch the brand is actually investing in. Bring a lapsed customer back through the door.

If nobody can name the job, it isn’t a promotion. It’s a price cut with a graphic on it.

What it really costs

Margin is the obvious cost, and it’s real. The less obvious costs are the ones that stick around after the promo ends.

Customers learn to wait. If a brand is discounted every other week, full price starts to look like a mistake, and the shopper plans around the sale instead of the product.

The brand flattens. Consistent quality is what builds a brand on a shelf. Constant discounting tells the customer that price is the most interesting thing about it.

And the buyer goes blind. Sell-through during a deep discount doesn’t tell you whether a product sells. It tells you whether it sells at that price. Run enough of them and you no longer know what your real velocity is.

“A promotion should earn its spot on the menu the same way a product does.”

The questions I ask before saying yes

What is this promo supposed to do? What does it do to margin at the shelf, not just on the invoice? Who is funding it? How will we know it worked: sell-through during, and just as important, sell-through after? And what is the exit, so the discount doesn’t quietly become the new price?

If those questions don’t have answers, the promo isn’t ready. That’s not being difficult with a vendor. That’s protecting the menu both of us depend on.

Better levers

Most of the time, the better move isn’t a deeper discount. It’s a better assortment decision: fill a real gap instead of adding another version of what’s already there. It’s consistency: products that deliver every time earn the reorder without a sale. It’s a cleaner menu: missing prices, duplicate listings and broken links cost sales that no discount will win back. And it’s the budtender who actually knows why a product is worth the price.

Promotions still have a place. Used with a job, a budget and an exit, they work. Used as a habit, they train everyone, customers, brands and buyers, to stop paying attention.

Facts first. Then decide what the discount is for.

— John Hirsch, Director of Purchasing · 20+ years in cannabis