Retailers Put Free NRHA Resources To Work

Retailers are putting free NRHA marketing materials to work, using new research to encourage customers to shop at local home improvement stores.

The research comes from the Home Sweet Home Study, which NRHA and Independent We Stand, a national shop-local advocacy group, commissioned. The study looks specifically at the economic benefits independent home improvement retailers offer their communities.

NRHA provides press releases, an economic impact calculator, printable posters and other resources so independents can leverage the study findings to benefit their businesses. For free marketing materials, go to www.hardwareretailing.com/shoplocal.

In Arlington, Minnesota, Dick Thomes of Thomes Bros. inserted community-specific information in an NRHA press release and sent it to his local newspaper. He included statistics from the NRHA study, and got the release published in the Arlington Enterprise (see image below). Keeping shoppers in the small town benefits all of the businesses, because if consumers travel to a big box to buy hardware they will likely go to other out-of-town stores while they’re at it, he says. “Any customer we can hold onto is better for the entire business community in Arlington,” he says.

Another retailer, Chad Koep of Fairmont True Value in Fairmont, Minnesota, is using NRHA’s cash register decal to educate customers about the economic difference they make by spending money at the locally owned store.