Using Postcards to Promote Your Food Stand

If you have a good food stand that you set up at festivals, county fairs, street side or anywhere else you know it can be difficult to market to new customers. Most food stand customers are incidental passers-by, unless you've been enterprising enough to place posters in nearby areas to attract more customers to your food stand. Perhaps, like many food stand operators, you've never considered printing postcards as a powerful tool for marketing your food stand to new yet enthusiastic customers. Here's how it works.

Know your customers

First things first, you have to know and understand your customers. Consider your best customers now - regulars, those who spend the most, etc. See if you can identify common traits such as what they order, if they come alone or with a guest/as a family, how much they spend, etc. Make conversation when possible, and listen for clues for insight into geography, income, careers, goals, hobbies, etc. This information will help you identify your target audience so you can tailor your postcards to attract more customers.

Get a mailing list

Once you understand who your target customers are, you have to find out where your target customers are. Use a mailing list service such as the instant mailing list generator available at PsPrint or hire a print broker to help you locate the best list at the best price. The quality of your mailing list is one of the single most important determining factors to your success and is unfortunately one of the most often overlooked.

Create a compelling offer

The quality of your offer is equally important and should speak directly to your audience. Do you sell elephant ears at fairs? Mail a $1 off coupon to fairgoers a week before each event. Do you sell hot dogs to local businesspeople? Offer one free hot dog on the house, or offer a "buy one, get one free" day. Perhaps you sell ice cream by a local beach or tourist attraction; you could offer an incredible day at the beach by working with another local, but not competing, business with the same target audience. How about a sight-seeing boat tour and an ice cream cone "family fun day" deal?

Follow up

Track your response rate by making your offer only redeemable if your postcard is presented - you can even include a space to leave a name and address/e-mail address so you can send future promotions to your customers. Repetition is key to direct-mail success. If your target audience is local, you can send several postcard mailings to the same mailing list. If your target audience is not local (such as with a tourist attraction), you can get great exposure by inserting your postcard in with your local chamber of commerce's or convention and visitors bureau's mailings. Postcards are a great way to promote your food stand, not just because they are highly effective but also because your competitors are probably not employing the powerful promotional punch of postcards. Make sure you print your postcards on high-quality 16-point gloss or 13-point recycled matte for the most professional look possible. You can get instant postcard pricing at PsPrint.