The Framers Forum

Hi everyone,

i'm Mary's eldest son, Grahame.

i'd like to take some time and share my experience of refurbishing and revitalising our shop here in Edinburgh. I hope it can give you some useful tips that may come in handy for you all.

a little background

we have been in business since 1991, FATG registered since then too.
originally my mother worked at home, part time, while my brother and i were at school. In 1997 she realised that the business was expanding too much for her to continue working from home,

so, Blackhall Framing Gallery was born, situated in an old bank, on the main road between Edinburgh and the Forth Road Bridge.

Business was steady at first then began to grow, and we coped with an average week turnaround, and 2 part time staff members, and my mother full time. and so it continued until early last year sometime. (i was down for Easter Break from University

Setting foot off the bus, (bus stop right outside) i realised that the fascia was tired, and too hidden, the interior was tired and inadequate for the task of choosing framing, (design area was at a south facing window). We most certainly weren't making enough of our location. we had also diversified too much, into ornaments, Jewellery, Craft Kits, Craft materials, Cards etc. this photo perhaps will give you an idea of what the shop looked like before



So i decided pretty much there and then something had to change, but i knew being a small business cashflow is always tight.

i came up with an action plan to return to our core business, Framing

I designed a massive 16ft*5ft central island design area for our picture framing, with a 6*5 ft main surface area, and a pillar at one end with two sellwyns moulding display panels either side, built in storage cupboards, etc. All singing all dancing, and two people can serve at once. - this makes an impression on you as soon as you walk through the door.

we repainted all the interior wood from their horrible black gloss which had been the same since 1997 and invested heavily on more interior lighting, to make the place brighter.

We also had a major declutter, all the ornaments got passed on to a charity store, we lost some card stands. and we lost a few free standing Slatwall Units in favour of decanting the ready made frames onto the slat wall which adorned the walls already. basically the whole place has been opened up to feel airier and a much nicer comfortable place to spend time in and choose your framing.

a major improvement was adding Estlite - John, you've done wonders for us with this package. also, when we have enough money scraped together PreView will be getting added.

Outside, we changed the fascia colour, from Burgundy red, with gold letters to a nice Royal Blue with a Massive Sign, that just stated who we were, none of the nonsense we had on the windows before stating we sold originals, prints, art cards, and artist materials.

( I hated how we were always reffered to as "The Art Shop" by locals, just because it was above the door we sold art materials.)

Before ( sorry, only picture i could find)


After, taken last night after going in to do some work, (cricket bats anyone?)


i've also added energy saving lights to the outside, (when it was dark we could never be seen before - Which made us less visible in the winter months).

Tomorrow morning i am going in to the printers to order a new freestanding pavement sign that holds A1 posters, so we can catch pedestrians unawares. ( our last one was a swing sign and it had a tendency to fly away in a small breeze) and also new business cards featuring the royal blue standard.

I'm not done yet, may more things i can do.

However, we have seen :

Increased footfall since the new signage was erected.

Lots of new customers coming in who haven't seen us before, even though we've been there for 10 years

an increase in demand for framing.

comments about how nice and welcoming the shop is.


anyway i could go on and on, and i'm sure you guys are fed up of hearing about our shop. its fast approaching bed time for me.

i'll leave you with a few words of wisdom, - declutter, don't diversify too much, make the most of your fascia, and above all have fun!


hopefully i can provide more pictures of what the place looks like inside, unfortunately the digital camera is locked up in the shop overnight, and if i go in i'll only end up doing some framing.


thanks for listening to me.

Grahame

Grahame,
What an interesting story!
It desreves a wider audience.
You should send it to Anabelle Rushton or Mike Sims at ABT.
Good chance they might print it.

Keith Hewitt
Slater Harrison

Well done Grahame,

Great to hear a success story.

It must be a generational thing though, my daughter is forever removing what she calls my clutter. My theory is that it is not out on display then nobody is going to buy it, so I am always sneaking stuff out of the storeroom to find a spot for it, either on the wall or on the floor resting back against the wall, with no regard for the themes she has developed. I have no problem with plonking a garish abstract in the middle of a group of say, local scenes. I kind of like the higgeldy-piggeldy approach to picture display.

I say it's interesting and quirky.

She says it's untidy.

I'm sure she's right, but old habits die hard, so while she is off on maternity leave things have been gradually reverting. A few more weeks and my work will be complete, but is there enough time left, must check the calendar...

Nice job!

Not easy to take a step back, asses and then put a plan into action.

My own framing design area has been 'painted' into a corner, which is mad as it accounts for 60% of turnover. One day we'll have a re-shuffle, it'll be at the expense of about 15 print browsers.

Either that or the estate agents next door will move out and it'll be all mine - same landlord and I have first refusal. Was once part of this shop, before our time.

Sometimes wonder if we've diversified too much, but the good thing is the diverse types of customers we get and the distances they are prepared to travel to buy what we have, passing many many other framers en-route, but only seeing our framing service, and other stuff that they did not come for but ........

Dry Cleaning anyone?

a great read. Thanks for posting that! Very interesting and inspiring. A job well done.

Well done, after reading your posting I am looking around my own workshop trying to sort out and tidy up.

Super job.....give yourself and all the rest of the crew a big pat on the back...

What sort of budget did you have for the revamp.....

Well, budget wise, we spent between £1000 and £1500, including the purchase of ESTlite.

the most expensive parts being the lighting, the new desk area and the fascia signage.

i've included a few photographs taken today, unfortunately the shop is a bit untidy right now, as i've been up at university and only just come back down again, and my mother has lapsed back into her former cluttery ways. (why does she insist on having everything out at once? - a cramped display doesn't do you many favours)

anyway, Pictures!


The "Choosing Area". This has become the Hub of activity in the shop, its large size helps when we've not got enough space through the back in the workshop, (one proteous desk is about all we can fit in there as far as workspace goes)

Two sides of Samples, and 4 Lion Upright Mountboard display stands, which are cleverly hidden in this image.
Just spotted some clutter that may need to disappear tomorrow!





This is the left hand side of the shop, mainly for Hanging Prints, we tried originals since we opened until a few years back, but they didn't prove to be popular in our area. People with money who don't like to spend it.




looking down the other side of the shop, this is unfortunately where all the craft and cardmaking materials are, with readymades nearest the window ( all made from scraps and with our company branding all over them) - theres still an Emafyl Peacock design frame thats been there since we opened. I'd like to standardise the moulding used, and we are currently looking at the Lion Minerva Range to provide suitable contemporary designs.

there we go, back out to the shop tonight to do yet more work, we're trying to get our turnaround time down, because right now its a wee bitty excessive at 3-4 weeks, also seeking a new member of staff to help cope with demand, unfortunately the correct person hasn't found us yet!


cheers,


Grahame

Just thought I would put in my tuppence worth after Grahame's posting. I'm absolutely delighted with what he has done to and for the shop. However it did take him several months before he browbeat me into doing something and like John I do try to sneak things in behind his back when he has gone back to St Andrews but he always catches me out when he comes back. His philosophy is "less is more". His window displays are a homage to minimalism but they work. His latest and best piece de resistance has been the Est-lite pricing system. The customers love it, we love it and 3 months on we still discover new things it can do every day. My only complaint is that sometimes I am so busy playing with it that I don't get all my work done!!.
We said that the budget for the revamp was £1000 to £1500. The reason I don't know exactly how much is because we have done it in stages, starting last May and hopefully ending next week when we take possession of our new pavement board. Doing it this way has meant not having to fork out a big outlay in one go, and no panic attacks from me because I don't cope well with change!!
Next thing on the agenda is the celebrations for the shop's 10th birthday in May. Grahame's already in full swing planning all the events for the day. To be honest I'm quite happy for him to get on with it. I just don't have the energy!!!!

Thanks for the plug guys, your cheque's in the post.

Perhaps Sarah is right, maybe the uncluttered look does attract a more sophisticated customer, and that's OK - just as long as they are not expecting to be served by an equally sophisticated shopkeeper!

Just worked out what our budget was for the revamp. Shocked to realise it was £2400 but so far the feedback has been positive and turnover has increased, so I reckon it was well worth doing. The effect we wanted to give was of a friendly, welcoming place to shop and I hope we have achieved that. Of course a friendly, welcoming staff helps, but then I'll speak to anyone. In fact sometimes I can be a bit too chatty!!

Mary & Grahame,

What a wonderful story and as Keith mentioned, you should print this forum page and mail it off to ABT and Picture Business, both. Let one of them pick it up. I would say your shop is worth a visit to anyone heading your direction.

I like that you've kept some of the extra merchandise worked into the displays. Your shop retains a comfortable atmosphere this way....allowing customers to poke around and discover new things.

You never want to get too Sterile....that can be an equal turnoff.

All the best,

John