Professional merchandising should play an important role in the overall success of your school. With the Christmas/Holiday season, you have the best opportunity of the year to sell merchandise.

Your students, their friends and families are going to spend many thousands of dollars during the holiday season. You need to position yourself and your school(s) to be able to provide as many opportunities for these people as possible to purchases products and services from you.

It is during this time of year that you need to have the widest variety of materials available for your students to choose from. Remember that you have a relatively captive audience in your students.

They are not usually able to go anywhere else to purchase the products that you have available through your school. Keep this in mind when your are developing your fall and winter lines of products that you will make available to your students.

Try to provide as much apparel and products with your name and logo on them as possible. If it comes with your name and logo on it, then your school is the only place that the item will be available. Also remember, when an item has your name and logo on it, it becomes a specialty item and then it has a greater potential value to the student.

Many retail stores make between 70 and 90% of their total annual profits during the Christmas holiday season. During much of this season, people are looking for opportunities to spend their money.

They will be much more open to suggestions than any other time of the year. You should be able to do three to five times your normal monthly merchandise volume during the holiday season. But, to do this you must start planning NOW!

You must begin planning now to make the holiday season a successful and highly profitable one. If you follow the guidelines for running a “Friends and Family Shopping Day” you should be able to have your most successful holiday season ever!

Decide today everything that you are going to make available to your students that will come with your logo on it. This includes shirts, hats, coats, watches, mugs, pens, clocks, backpacks, uniforms, safety equipment, etc.

Next, you need to decide what other items you want to make available. Some of the items you may want to stock a sample and others you may just want to have available through catalogue order. If you are going to do catalogue ordering, be sure that you order plenty of catalogues well in advance.

Once you have decided what you want to sell this season, you now need to decide what and how much of each item you are going to stock. In some cases you will only stock one sample or a sample of each size. In other cases you may want to stock a good number of certain items.

This would especially be true of some smaller items that you could use as ‘up sell’ items to fill out their buying list. Plus your shoppers could take these items with them immediately. Many times these smaller items will be impulse buy items. Example: mugs, water bottles, hand targets, pens, watches, etc.

Besides your regular stock of items that you have available, you should have a few items that are only available at the special shopping day. These can be purchased as special surprise gifts. You may also want to have a couple of unannounced specials available on that day to encourage additional purchases.

Don’t hesitate to come up with additional ideas to stimulate the desire to buy. Example: How about offering an additional special FREE gift if someone buys a big ticket item, like a stretching machine.

It is essential that you begin promoting your Christmas/Holiday items as early as possible. Remember, children begin planning what they want already in September and October. That is when you need to begin promoting the products that you have available and what they need to do get them.

If you are going to use catalogues, you need to get them out in early October. This will give the students an opportunity to put martial arts related items at the top of their list. Your pro-shop should be at its fullest by the beginning of October as well. Try to get all your samples in by the end of September and ready to be displayed by the beginning of October.

Try to be especially creative with your displays during this time of the year. You may also want to put up a special display in your front window for passersby. You will be amazed by the number of people who are drawn in by an exciting display, people who otherwise may have spent their money elsewhere.

We recommend that you give or send out copies of the “My Martial Arts Wish List” during the month of October.

You need to choose a day or evening in November to be your actual “Friends and Family Shopping Day.” We recommend a date between November 13th and the 22nd.

Remember, the day after Thanksgiving, the 24th, is typically the busiest shopping day of the season. You want togive the friends and families an opportunity to do their shopping at your school before

they do the rest of their shopping . On the evening or day that you choose to have the event, you may want to cancel classes on that day to emphasize the importance of the event for the students and their friends and families.

Try to make the shopping day/night a very special event by providing beverages and snacks for everyone that attends. Be sure to have enough staff on hand to help everyone. If you promote the event correctly, you should have an excellent response and you will need all the help you can get.

Also, don’t forget about selling upgrade and private lesson programs during this time.

A private golf club with a pro-shop and around 300 members will gross around $300,000 in merchandise sales in a single year. While that may not be a realistic figure for any martial arts school it does show just how much income can be generated from a small captive audience.

You have a small captive audience eager to buy. The question is do you have anything to sell? And if so does anyone in your school Know?

The main reason that merchandise sales in martial arts schools are so poor in comparison to lesson income is simply that the merchandise is usually not made available to customers. If it is it is seldom presented in such a way as to create a desire which is essential for any type of sale to happen.

Where to put the pro-shop?

The best place to locate your pro-shop is just inside the door of your school. If the office is on the left then locate your pro-shop on the right. In this way, the window display becomes a part of the pro-shop much like a mall store.

You want to put it here so that students, parents, and passers-by can easily see the merchandise that you offer. If they can see it easily and get to it easily then they can buy easily.

How to set up the pro-shop

If you need help in how to set up a pro-shop or what yours ought to look like go to the mall and look at stores like the Limited or the Gap. Better still find a Tennis pro-shop, they are very similar to what a martial arts pro-shop could be like.

They sell mainly shirts, shorts, and caps. Along with rackets, balls, books, and videos and yet despite having a smaller clientele than a successful martial arts school they sell well over $100,000 of merchandise a year. Golf shops are a more sophisticated example but the principles are the same.

The most effective way to sell merchandise is to put it on display. A good display rack is an excellent way to display uniforms and equipment. Buy a glass showcase and put it in the lobby.

Keep your eyes open in the local classified ads for stores selling their display racks. Stores go out of business all the time, so it’s not expensive to pick up some used racks or displays.

Display t-shirts and patches in your lobby walls at eye level. Use a grid to hang clothes on. Set your pro-shop up with walls or grid work on three sides and the front open so that people can walk in and see and feel the merchandise.

Change your displays on a regular basis, at least every couple of months. Even if you don’t change the actual merchandise, rearrange it.

You will be surprised just how many people who have gotten used to seeing a piece of merchandise in one place for two months, will suddenly notice it as a brand new item when its location is changed.

Change creates interest. Take some merchandise off the display and rotate it so that it never appears to be the same old stuff

You can have the best stock of merchandise in your state but if people don’t know you have it, don’t see it or can’t touch it, it’s not going to sell.

You will find that certain times will offer the opportunity for a quick and easy sale of a t-shirt or stretch rack. because of a students heightened state of emotion. Remember that people always buy out of emotion backed up by logic.

When the student first enrolls his interest is at a peak. Give him a few days to get into the program and recover from his initial investment in your lessons. By then he should already be expressing interest in one or two products and is almost certainly open to “cross-selling.”

The first major “high” in a student’s experience in your school is after they pass their first rank test. This is another period of time when their emotions are high and therefore a prime time to sell them products. Books, videos and equipment related to the new material they are going to learn would clearly be well received at this stage.

One time a student really appreciates some suggestive selling is if they get hurt. A barefooted student who has just stubbed his toe will be very receptive and appreciate a suggestion of martial arts shoes.

When someone gets a bruised shin, forearm or bone, let them know that protective pads are available. Consider also, carrying dit dat jow, a Chinese herbal preparation of some repute. It significantly enhances the healing of bruises. Stretching machines and books and videos on stretching can be sold as a preventative measure to strained muscles.

Keep your eyes and ears open at all times. Opportunities to serve your students will present themselves on a daily basis. When you order and stock your merchandise, pay attention to other factors that influence spending habits. For instance, don’t load up with t-shirts in January unless you live in a warm weather climate. Instead, buy school logo sweatshirts and warm-up suits.

The same is true when approaching summer; sell off all those heavy sweats at a pre-summer sale using the money to get your new line of t-shirts on display. Remove any leftover winter stock until next season so as not to clutter up your display. This also will serve to keep seasonal merchandise from getting old.

Sparring equipment will traditionally sell better in the winter than in the summer. One reason is because people tend to workout much harder when it’s colder and also because you normally will have more students in the winter than in the summer.

Books and videos sell best around Christmas and well into the New Year. This is partly because they make good gifts but there also is another reason. Just as the New Year is a great time for new student enrollments, it’s a great time to sell. When people engage in a new activity, they are hungry for information.

Feed that desire with a good selection of related books and videos. This hunger for information can actually be helped by severe winter weather. There is a lot of time to read and watch a video on a new form or other subject of interest.

Halloween is a good time to display uniforms in your front window. Depending on the latest fad, some years you may sell a lot of uniforms for one time costume use only. Of course with each person who comes in off the street to purchase a Halloween costume, you will give a guest pass and offer them a free trial lesson.

You may get several students a year from this type of approach. It may even pay to take out a small ad in your local paper advertising that your carry such uniforms.

Prospective students will come to you in a variety of ways; capitalize on this in any way you can.

Look at your own school and try to see how trends develop. Some things will just sell better at one time of the year than another. This may vary from area to area. Analyze these trends and order your merchandise with these in mind. With attention to detail in this area you should be able to keep your inventory under control and at the same time enjoy increased sales and profitability.

Outline of a Level 1 Rank Test

Prior to the Physical Exam
Parents are required to turn in parent permission slips with the box marked, “Yes, my child is behaving at home and at school in a way that I feel qualifies him or her to test for their next belt rank.” Students should arrive for the exam in clean and pressed uniforms with their belts properly tied and school patches in place. Students also have gym bags containing their personal items such as clothes, shoes, water bottles and any materials instructor requires for their participation in regular classes.

Physical Exam Requirements

Students must be able to quickly and efficiently line up in straight lines and properly utilize the available floor space. Students must be able to perform the procedures for beginning a class as a unit (bow in and other formalities) with unity, confidence and enthusiasm.

Students must be able to then recite the “Three Rules of Concentration” and demonstrate to members of the audience and or to each other the “polite greeting.” The instructor then chooses one child to role play the polite greeting to emphasize its importance and to point out to the audience the benefits and value of refined social skills. Students then perform the step-by-step the exercise of Form #1.

Next, the instructor calls two or more children out of the testing group to “compete” against each other in intensity, speed and precision. The instructor briefly addresses the children and audience about the power and value of healthy competition.

Students move into lines for a line drill where assistant instructors challenge students to defend themselves against padded “blockers” using the four-corner blocking technique. The instructor then asks at least two students to demonstrate the same skill in a “spotlight performance.”

Next, the instructor inquires whether each participant’s bedroom is clean (if the student’s room isn’t clean, they can get their new belt, but they can’t wear it until they’ve cleaned their room thoroughly). The instructor congratulates the students, awards their belts and dismisses the group.

Approximate Test Timeline

5 Minutes Students line up, bow in, and recite the “Three Rules of Concentration.”

3 Minutes Polite Greeting

5 Minutes Form #1

5 Minutes Line Drills and Highlights

2 Minutes Wrap up

Total time: 20 Minutes.

THE USE AND MAINTENANCE OF SAFETY EQUIPMENT

By Scot A. Conway, Esq.

Martial arts are innately dangerous, and over the years many students have been hurt learning the arts. Punching makiwara boards or hard heavy bags with bare knuckles had bloodied many hands, and the damage done to the bones and nervous system has made some types of work difficult for old-school martial artists.

Working with sharp weapons has cut many of us, and training without proper sparring gear has gotten noses broken, legs fractures and, in more cases than any of us would like, debilitating head injuries. Even simple but incorrect stretching methods have have resulted in serious injuries in the past.

Ballistic stretching, universally condemned today, has led to an industry-wide epidemic of torn knee ligaments among veteran black belts who started their training back in the 1960s and ‘70s.

Modern martial arts training is not like that. A litigious society, ready to sue even for the seemingly stupidest reasons, should motivate us to make things much safer than they once were.

Not only are modern teaching methods better for business (with an apology to traditionalists who feel the art should never be about business), they are safer (same apology to those who feel “safe” and “martial arts” ought to be a contradiction in terms). Safer means “less risk to the student,” and less risk to the student means less legal risk to the instructors and owners of schools.

With so many training aids and an incredible array of safety equipment, a Court of Law might find it unforgivable if you don’t use them.

Imagine the presentation to a jury of safety pad after safety pad, of safe heavy bags, gloves and kicking shields presented to them, and catalogs from two or three major martial arts suppliers handed out to each juror. Imagine the blistering accusation of recklessly endangering students by refusing to use any of them.

What defense could your attorney make? “It’s martial arts. It’s tradition.” What do you think a jury of ordinary citizens will think about tradition when faced with a former student seriously injured or permanently disabled, because tradition was more important than safety?

Use of Training Aids and Safety Equipment

Most martial arts studios have some training aids and safety equipment. These must be used, and used properly, to minimize risk. The responsibility falls to the instructor to make certain that the students are properly trained in the use of equipment. The instructor should also make certain that students are appropriately matched when practicing sparring and even self-defense techniques.

Do the students know how to hold the body shields? A frequent problem is students holding the shields away from their bodies, then the impact drives their arm and shield into them. Another problem is holding it at improper angles for certain moves, such as roundhouse kicks, and getting kicked in the hand or arm.)

Do the students know how to hold focus mitts? Shoulder injuries are common if focus mitts are held to the side, and if a student holds one in front of his face, he/she may get hit by his/her own hand.

Is the skill of the students equal to the drill? Practicing roundhouse kicks on a small shield may lead to kicks to the knees or other body parts not protected if the students don’t have the necessary skill.

Is the piece of equipment the proper training aid for the drill? Using a small shield for a drill that should have a large shield may result in serious injuries.

Are the student pairs or groups suitable? If a child is hurt holding a shield being kicked by an adult, you may be liable because of the danger in which you placed the child. If mismatched pairs are unavoidable, the child should practice power techniques while the adult practices control.

Has anyone been hurt in the drill before? If someone gets hurt in a drill, the drill should not be used again until the instructor staff has carefully evaluated the drill to see if there are innate dangers in the drill, and those dangers should be eliminated before the drill is used again.

Safety Measures for Unsafe Lessons

When the class is practicing any kind of training drill, proper safety equipment should be used to minimize the risk of injury. Anything done that is potentially hazardous should be clearly related to the skill being taught or practiced, and students should have the right to excuse themselves. Whenever possible, however, some measures should be taken to make unsafe lessons as safe as possible.

Some martial arts practices do not lend themselves to excessive safety, such as breaking. However, even in that endeavor, rather than having students pound concrete on the first day they learn breaking, have them practice on easy rebreakable boards, or let them put substantial padding on the bricks (a folded up towel, for instance) so they cannot hurt themselves while they learn how to break. Then steadily reduce their padding until they are breaking the way you would like them to break.

Also, never permit students to attempt breaking feats beyond their level of skill. A white belt, for an exaggerated example, should not be trying to break boards with an advanced kicking technique. Likewise, the degree of difficulty created by the number and composition of the material to be broken should always be closely monitored.

Do not allow unqualified students — no matter how big and strong they are — to attempt to break too many boards or dense objects like bricks, cinder blocks and ice. And permitting any student to break objects with his/her head could be a shortcut to disaster, legally and otherwise.

Once, at a tournament, a competitor nearly knocked himself unconscious by smashing his head into a pile of bricks that didn’t break. If such advanced breaks will be attempted, then instructors had best know what they are doing and be prepared for the consequences.

On other lessons, start safely and build from there. If students are learning rolls, for example, start simply, on the ground, and then work steadily to kneeling, standing then jumping rolls. If students are learning breakfalls, start them practicing from a roll, then a trip, then a dive roll, then a hip throw, and finally a shoulder throw.

Many of the skills and teaching techniques discussed in other chapters throughout this book are also excellent for risk management. They help introduce students to skills slowly, guiding them to greater skill, helping them grow as martial artists. As so many of them help students learn safely, they also help to reduce the risk of liability as well.

Maintenance of Safety Equipment

Most of us have seen an old kicking shield, battered by years of use, wrapped with duct tape that is separating. Some of us may even have them in our schools. If you kick them wrong, you could catch a toe and break it. Even if you hit it right, you could hit the soft spot and really hurt your partner.

If it’s old, if it is no longer serviceable, get rid of it. Keep it as a souvenir if you like, but when it becomes easy for you to imagine a first-day student hurting him/herself on it because of it’s condition, it’s time to retire it.

Likewise, torn mats can be dangerous. Replacing them can get expensive, and taping them may add a few years to its life, but at some point, the benefit is not worth the danger and the mat must be addressed.

At one school, the original mat covering the floor was brand new — a decade ago. The tarp covering the mat had torn in some areas and separated in others. From time to time, a student would catch his feet and stumble or fall.

The instructor, as wise as he hoped his student would become, saw that the mat was now more of a danger than a training aid, and he got rid of it. Soon, double-padded athletic carpet replaced the mat.

Keep up on your equipment. When you see a problem, fix it. When a student or a parent brings a problem to your attention, fix it. If you address problems when they are small, the repair can be simple. Other problems might be more difficult to fix, and you should try to maintain a fund for those, or parents and fundraisers can often be a tremendous help when something big needs to be done.

Sparring

A young man was sparring in a martial art in which the groin is a primary target. He had forgotten to wear his cup, but neglected to mention that to anyone. Then, wham! He got hit in the groin and landed on the ground. As far as anyone knows, he recovered completely.

A cup cannot protect you if you’re not wearing it. Neither can chest pads, head gear, gloves, shin pads or anything else. Equipment must be used to be effective. Students should have sparring equipment with which to spar, whether provided by the school or purchased by the students. If the school owns the gear, the school is responsible for keeping the equipment in good condition and disposing of it when it is no longer effective.

Instructors should maintain a policy of requiring students to inform their partners when they are missing important pieces of equipment that are not obvious, such as groin cups. The time for discovery is not when the kick lands.

Likewise, students should be required to inform others of any physical limitations or injuries they may have, such as a headache, shin splints, sore shoulder, etc., that might affect the techniques used. Students should also be required to tend to their own limitations, by wearing knee braces, wrist wraps, bandages, etc., as their condition warrants.

An instructor that maintains a “No excuses!” policy might generate tough students, but he is just as likely to generate seriously-injured, sometimes permanently-disabled students.

It is better to forbid a student to spar without proper equipment than it is to allow a student to go ahead and fight without an important piece of protective gear and get hurt.

Adult students can be granted more flexibility in what safety gear they use, especially in extra-curricular sparring (before and after class), if they have the experience and skill to take care of themselves. Anyone, though, who injures another, must be severely limited in what he is allowed to do.

Allowing someone with a known track record of hurting others to fight without gear, may be construed as negligence on the part of the instructor. If the sparring partner did not know about the tendency in his/her partner to hurt people, and the instructor did, then the instructor could be held responsible.

Safety Equipment is an important aspect of modern martial arts instruction. From a risk-management perspective, it is critical to have safety equipment for any exercise that may be dangerous without it. 

Tradition will not be an excuse in Court if a student is seriously injured.  It is likewise important to remember that equipment must be in serviceable condition, and, finally, that safety equipment must be used to protect the students from harm, and to protect the instructors and school from lawsuits.

Of course, most schools don’t allow shoes in the classroom. That doesn’t mean the school doesn’t allow show SALES though. Shoes are one of the best selling products in any martial arts pro-shop that offers them. Light, athletic, sharp looking martial arts shoes are very popular with students and parents of all ages and rank.

1. Martial arts shoes have an almost signature look about them. They say “martial arts” without screaming it. They are subtle in their appeal and connection to the arts.

2. If you have certain classes or nights where shoes are not only allowed, but encouraged your will see shoe sales jump. Why have such a class? Most of us don’t get attacked in our bare feet. Plus, training with shoes as a dimension of change to a form or a drill that makes it interesting and exciting for the students. The result is higher sales and happier students.

3. We hate to say this, but when students wear shoes in class, the schools smell better! There are few things worse than going into a martial arts school that stinks of sweaty feet. It is a major turn off to everyone but the school owner, because he can’t smell it. He’s too used to it!

Sell each student a pair of shoes that cost $39.95 which you bought for $19.95 and you make $20 over the course of the year with 200 students that’s a net profit of $4,000. When it comes to martial arts shoes, sell only the high end shoes.

Not only is there more profit dollars for you, but people are used to spending much more than the most expensive martial arts shoes cost anyway.

Besides, Nike and Reebok won’t miss the sales you get from them with a good shoe program.

Sparring equipment is the easiest sale in your school since it is mandatory for all students who are involved in any type of sparring.

Most schools seem to introduce some kind of sparring at the gold belt level 4-6 weeks into the program. Not only might that be too late, but you can sell the gear much earlier than that. Just don’t get them sparring that early. You can get them doing drills instead.

Not only is this a safer way to teach and keep students, but the equipment is built into the class content, so if you don’t have it, you can’t participate.

White belts work defensive blocking and punching drills with headgear, mouthpiece and hand pads.

When they make their gold belt in about eight weeks, they need shins, foot pads and a cup because the drills will begin to include kicking.

At the orange belt level after about three months, they need a rib protector because they will begin to make body contact during light sparring.

At the green belt level, after six months of training will they finally actually free spar and make head contact. As much as this flies in the face of the way many of us were taught and continue to teach, it is proven for creating better fighters and much, much higher retention. Plus the gear sells itself.

Safety Gear is the Right Gear for Any School Regardless of Style

1. If your students are protected with a full complement of protective equipment, there is far less chance that they will sustain injuries. Injuries keep them out of the school, decrease their motivation and can cause them to quit coming back.

2. Should a properly supervised student get injured while wearing a set of protective equipment, your liability should be lessened.

3. Most school insurance policies require that students wear such equipment in order to obtain the insurance.

Many schools keep sparring equipment lying around for students to use. This not only hurts sales but it’s very not very safe, hygienic or dignified. A headgear is not like a baseball bat.

To make the selling of the sparring package easy, you can group the items together selling them at full retail but throwing in a free sport bag to keep their gear in. The bag and the sparring equipment, of course, has your logo and website url clearly imprinted on the bag.

The Gillette Company turned itself around when it made the marketing decision or, came to the realization, depending on how you look at it, that the real money was not made in selling a blade holder and razor.

The real money was made with the repeat sales of the razors. The money in cleaning teeth is not in tooth brushes, it’s the tooth paste that people use and have to replace that creates huge cash flow.

The in-house seminar business can take a lesson or two from these examples. Your students will receive a free product/weapon/training aid for enrolling in the class. The item is presented as a freebie that is included in the price of the class, but in reality, you are selling the item for 10 to 20 times your cost in exchange for taking an hour to teach a group of people about it.

If you charge $25 for a padded nunchaku seminar and have 20 people enroll, that’s $500 gross. They each get a pair of chucks which cost you $2 each for a total investment of $40. That’s a $460 profit for a one-hour class that you’ll have fun teaching. A class like that once a month will add nearly $6,000 to your profits.

At Christmas time, you can sell packages of seminars, three for $60 so the student can pick which classes he attends throughout the year.

1. Run a padded nunchaku seminar at $25 for the class. Each person who signs up gets a free pair of padded nunchaku.

2. Run a self-defense class and charge $35 for the class. Each person signing up receives a free My Defense Tool®.

3. Run a bo stick class for $25 and include one of the several available books on the subject “absolutely free”

4. Pick the weapon or creative form and you can build a seminar around it. You don’t have to be an expert in the weapon to teach a group of beginners. Pick up a video or call one of your buddies who will show you a solid one hour step-by-step class you can teach.

Think about it. History, how the weapon was created, common misconceptions, etc… will take the first 15 minutes. Then, the basic blocks and strikes for 20 minutes. Then some two person drills such as blocks and counters followed by actual target practice on focus mitts will take another 15-minutes leaving 10-minutes for a short form followed by Q n A and a review.

The possibilities are endless! Check our downloads area for sample flyers for these classes. They are easy to teach and great profit makers.

Despite the fact that you are, in a roundabout way, selling merchandise, your students will perceive added value because you are advertising the actual merchandise as free.

Another excellent way to increase merchandise sales is by simply incorporating a particular training item into your regular class. For example, teach a class on speed and timing utilizing focus mitts.

Tell students they should practice this drill at home with a friend on a regular basis. One will invariably ask ” But how do we get the focus mitts?” This gives you the perfect opportunity to tell him “Right here!”.

Over a period of time you can do the same thing with a speed bag, heavy bag, kicking shield, stretching machine, video or almost anything else. A

s you teach, simply continue to state the benefits of training with that particular piece of equipment. With this method, you need say or do nothing different from what you might normally say in class.

Note: Because many schools do not offer weapons training or offer it only to a select few, weapons seminars may offer you an opportunity to pull in students from outside of your school.

These may be students or people who have no time or inclination to participate in a full course of study, yet have a specialized interest in the particular seminar topic that you are offering.

The Power of Suggestion

It is actually easy to sell someone merchandise without even asking them for a sale. It’s called suggestive selling. You simply recommend an item either verbally or on paper and most of your students will come back to you and request the item in the near future.

This, of course, starts with you, your staff and your black belts. Make sure that you and your staff are always wearing the golf shirts, T-shirts and other item that you want the students to buy.

Your students look up to you, they respect you and they want to be like you. If you are always wearing a school T-shirt of golf shirt then they to will soon want to be wearing one. Never allow your staff to wear anything in the way of shirts expect your school ones.

For years, is was a badge of honor to have a worn out uniform, gear and belt. It showed you had been around for a while. Think about that as an example.

The last thing you want is your students thinking they should use their gear until it falls apart. They’ll never buy anything! Make sure your staff is always using new, clean and sharp looking uniforms and gear.

How to Sell More Books

Books and videos are the perfect items to sell in your shop. Students are studying your art and study typically involves reading. But, here is another example where you can’t just put the books on the shelf and expect them to sell by themselves.

You have to create a scenario where the students buy the books as a matter of course.

Each time a new student enrolls, hand them a simple photo copied sheet of paper with a list of recommended reading. On it list the 10 books you think will be most useful to your students.

The recommended reading list along, with a simple suggestion that they would find these books of great help in their training will boost sales big time.

Video Sales

The idea can be taken further by adding a few video titles to the list of recommended material. Videos offer an excellent source of income since most sell at a 40 to 50% mark up. Some schools have curriculum videos included in the exam fee.

When a student tests and passes a green belt exam, he pays a $40 exam fee which includes the next level video. The video won’t cost more than $5 with production and duplication. Just make sure you do a good job in producing the video. Make it something to be proud of as it reflects directly on you.

Sell Merchandise to Everyone

Students aren’t the only prospects for pro-shop sales. Here is a “check list” of potential sales in a student’s first year. How many of these sales are you getting?

Student Year-One

• Headgear
• Hand pads
• Feet pads
• Mouthpiece
• Rib guard
• Shin pads
• Cup for guys
• 2nd uniform
• School patch
• Three-five different T-shirts with your school name and logo
• Martial arts shoes
• Sweat shirt
• Logo school bag
• Baseball cap
• Misc. Books and videos applicable to your system

How did you do? If you got them all, good for you. Now, here’s the real test.

Parent Year-One

• Logo school golf shirt
• Logo school T-shirt
• Sweat shirt
• Baseball cap
• Coffee mug
• Kicking shield for practice with child

As you can see, the key to good merchandising is to get an idea of what you want to accomplish. When you look at these two lists, and multiply those products by your entire student body, and their families, you can see how a good pro-shop can add up to a serious profit center.

January/February Strategy

Theme: Start the New Year Right!

Background: Get in shape theme. 
Sell: Sweatshirts, shoes, headbands, fitness videos and books. Heavy bags and other home training equipment

March /April

Theme: Kids in the Martial Arts.

Background: Paintings by children from your school, and good report cards.
Sell: Patches, children’s books, videos

May

Theme: The Tradition of the Martial Arts.

Background: Bamboo, a bonsai tree, sand and pebbles.
Sell: Uniforms, practice weapons

June/July

Theme: Patriotism

Background: Two large flags of your country, toy soldiers. 
Front: Uniform with flag colors stretched on wire. 
Sell: Equipment with flag colors plus, headbands, flag patches, T-shirts, etc

August/ September

Theme: Martial Arts Movies.

Background: Movie posters 
Sell: Everything! Posters, DVDs and videos of the films are great choices

October

Theme: Halloween.

Background: Orange paper and two large pumpkins. You can also use Halloween props.
Front: Ninja suits stretched on wire

November /December

Theme: Holidays.

Background: Small Christmas tree surrounded by gift-wrapped ‘presents’ and Christmas stockings.
Christmas items: Books, Videos, and Shoes.
Stocking stuffers: Patches, key chains.

Christmas Shopping Day!

The first step to increasing your product sales is to logo everything in sight. Harely Davidson now makes more money selling t-shirts and jackets than they make selling motor-bikes. That’s the power of a recognizable logo and a good line of merchandise.

Disney, Warner Brothers and Coke-a-Cola make huge sums of money selling their logo merchandise. If it works for sugar water, it will work for us. Of course, you have to have an attractive logo that people won’t be embarrassed to wear. Be sure to read the report on how to create a good logo.

Logo-wear works on a number of levels:

1. People like to show they are an accepted member of a group. The more prestigious and “cool” the group, the better. Given a choice, most people might prefer to show the world they belong to the Harvard Athletic Club than the South Emerald City Community College Athletic Club.

2. Provided you do a good job, students and parents will be proud of their association with you and your school. When someone is proud of their association they typically want others to know.

3. A “School Logo Only” policy helps to reduce the temptation for students to purchase items outside the school. When a student or parent buys product through the mail or at your local sports discount store this cuts you out of the profit loop.

Logo your uniforms, sparring equipment and t-shirts but don’t stop there. Logo hats, sweat shirts, pens and anything else you plan to sell or give away.

What Items Can You Sell in Your Pro-shop?

• Sparring equipment
• A full line of Logo t-shirts, tanks and sweats
• Caps, headbands and visors
• Polo style embroidered shirts
• Warm up suits
• Martial arts shoes
• Regular gi’s, colored gi’s and custom gi’s all screen printed with logo
• Black belt club specialty items
• Books and videos pursuant to your style
• Kicking and punching pads 

Selling Training Aids

Training aids are not just for use in the school. Their purchase and use at home could be encouraged by you and all your staff since this not only helps profits but also aids in retention.

Few schools that I know of make much of an effort to sell training aids for use outside the school. This is usually simply because they have not created a system to do this.

If you enroll 20 students per month, let’s create a plan to sell 20 kicking shields to them. Kicking shields are used extensively in the school but do all of your young students have a kicking shield at home?No, but they have a baseball bat a ball and a glove. They have a soccer ball to play with. You can be sure mom or dad enjoys throwing or kicking the ball as well!

Think about it! What is the best way to show a parent that the child is really interested in martial arts?

What is the best way to get the parent emotionally bonded to their child’s success in his martial arts program? Get the parent involved. While you may not get every parent to enroll you can at least encourage the parents to buy a kicking shield and work out with their child on a weekend for ten or twenty minutes.

What if you had a five page booklet with photos of you showing the parent how to hold the target, what techniques to practice and how, plus tips on what to remind the child to focus on? What would that cost you to produce? With a digital camera, a computer and a printer, next to nothing but the time to put it together.

Heavy bags, blockers and focus mitts are also idea for encouraging practice at home and interaction with another member of the family. Each time a parent sees his child practicing at home it reinforces that child’s commitment to martial arts and re-enforces the parents resolve to continue investing in lessons.

Other training aids such as stretching machines are more adult in their appeal but should also be promoted for home use especially around Christmas time.

Wouldn’t it be great to be able produce and sell t-shirts for your school and events that would make you money with zero risk? Here is the answer. Teespring.com

Teespring allows you to design your own shirt, offer a variety of styles and colors, PROFIT from each one sold and handles everything from shipping to customer service.

There is a low threshold of shirts that have to be sold. Typically that level is 5 shirts have to be sold before any are shipped. If they don’t sell, you have zero cost or risk. Create shirts for your school, style, special teams, events, intra-school tournaments and so on. You could even have t-shirt design contests for your students.

Here are some quotations regarding styles from three of the most influential martial artists in history:

“The art does not make the man. The man makes the art.” – Gichin Funakoshi

“You limit a style by labeling it.” – Bruce Lee

“The style serves the student. The student doesn’t serve the style.” – Joe Lewis

Despite my roots in tae kwon do, my responsibility is to my students, not tae kwon do, kickboxing, Joe Lewis Fighting Systems, or any other source of information. My job is to create the best black belts possible in a school that authentically represents what I believe in. In large part, that responsibility is expressed through my curriculum.

When Does a System Freeze?

The history of the arts, however, is the tendency to freeze a curriculum and then resist any change or suggestion of change. I love Shotokan and know that the reason I did so well in forms division was my adaptation of the core elements of Shotokan, which is deeper balance and more powerful and crisp blocks and punches than my root system of tae kwon do.

We have the great system of Shotokan because of the work of Gichin Funakoshi. In fact, the genesis of Shotokan is in the massive change Funakoshi’s made to Okinawan karate. He radically changed the recipe book, yet for the most part the book has not changed since.

It’s also entertaining to me to see modern Jeet Kune Do teachers argue over what is real JKD. If anyone didn’t want his system to freeze, it was Bruce Lee. He was way ahead of his time in his approach to creating a practical martial art that was not confined or restricted by history.

Joe Lewis is someone who has continually updated his material. Recently we trained one-on-one for the first time in over a decade. He had me fire some of the excellent Joe Lewis Fighting Systems’ combinations on the bag in my garage. He stopped me and started to show me how to throw a straight right hand. My mouth kind of dropped, my eyes got wide, and I shook my head in disbelief. He said, “What?” I said, “That is the exact opposite of what you taught me in the 80s!” He said, “What? I’m not supposed to evolve?” It was the perfect response.

Here was a 60-year-old black belt who was in his fourth decade as a worldwide recognized pioneer and superstar, but in his mind, he is in his fourth decade of evolution. While I’m on the subject of Joe Lewis, let me also mention this. Joe is a very traditional martial artist. I am, too.

We don’t express our traditions by holding on to techniques or rituals. We express them by making sure our students: execute with proper form, can defend themselves and develop the tenacity to never quit.