http://dennyhatch.blogspot.com/2019/12/78-uline-family-owned-direct-marketing.html
Posted by Denny Hatch
A
Family-owned Direct Marketing Business Doing Everything Right!
780-plus
Pages. 36,000 Products.
$3.6 Billion a Year Revenue. Wow!
$3.6 Billion a Year Revenue. Wow!
Whenever I get into conversation with a
stranger, the subject of what I do for a living frequently comes up.
“I write a weekly blog on direct marketing,” I say. “For about 20 years I published
a newsletter called WHO’S MAILING WHAT! and was the world’s foremost
expert on junk mail.”
Invariably the person’s nose wrinkles in disgust. “I hate junk mail,” is
the typical response.
“Do you hate catalogs?”
“Oh, no! I love catalogs!”
'nuff said.
Confessions
of a Catalog Nut
I adore catalogs!
These are the equivalent of wonderful retail stores coming directly to me—FREE—filled
with fascinating merchandise from all over the world at great prices (and often
FREE DELIVERY!).
This is not the electronic trickery clogging my Yahoo in-box that
(mercifully) is one-click away from oblivion.
Catalogs are full-color tactile experiences filled with beautiful
photographs and imaginative copy that caring marketers, writers and designers
spent a lot of cash—possibly up to $5 a pop in the case of Uline and
Restoration Hardware—in order to get my attention.
In short, catalogs are a lot of fun. The bigger they are, the more fun
they are!
And one of the biggest—and best in its class—is Uline!
In my opinion, every marketer of products and/or services—consumer and
business—should study the Uline business model and strive to do likewise.
Below Is the Uline Manifesto.
Over 36,000 Products Always in Stock
• Huge selection. No need to look elsewhere.
• Fast delivery.
• No matter how crazy your hours, we’re
here for you 24/7.
• “A knowledgeable customer service
rep is always available to assist you.”
• Guarantee of excellence.
• Low delivery costs.
• 30-day no-hassle return guarantee
for refund or credit.
A Typical
Information-packed Catalog Spread—
Easy and Quick to Navigate and Order Any Time.
• Good illustrations.
• Complete descriptions, dimensions,
prices.
• At the bottom of every spread:
—Order by 6 p.m. for Same Day Shipping
—PHONE 1-800-295-5510
Uline’s
Fascinating Backstory
In 1980, (à la the Donald Trump family business model) Dick
Uihlein borrowed money from his father—the grandson of a Schlitz Brewing founder—and
launched Uline from the basement of his home in Illinois.
Today Uline has a
headquarters campus in Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin with 579,000 square feet of
warehousing space plus 11 distribution centers scattered around the U.S., Canada
and Mexico.
What’s more, Uline’s
6,000 employees are well-paid:
“Average Uline hourly pay ranges from
approximately $17.00 per hour for Data Coordinator to $30.00 per hour for Lead
Mechanic. The average Uline salary ranges from approximately $45,260
per year for Warehouse Worker to $122,573 per year for Distribution Manager.” —indeed.com
A low-key, hands-on manager,
Dick Uihlein—now in his mid-70s—was
described by long-time friend Chris McDaniel as “the kind of individual who
will leave his office and walk down to meet somebody.”
Dick and Liz—An Extraordinary
Partnership
Liz is president of Uline;
Dick is vice president.
In the pantheon of
Conservative politics, the Uihleins are at the top, up there with Sheldon Adelson, Robert
Mercer and the Koch family.
Both The
New York Times and Politico
describe them as the Republican megadonors “you’ve never heard of.” They give
tens of millions of dollars to dozens of candidates plus the Great American PAC
and Donald Trump’s inauguration.
The Uihleins bought a vacation home in Manitowish Waters, a rustic
Wisconsin lakeside community. Over the years Liz bought up a number of
down-at-the-heels business, renovated them and gentrified the town. The
feathers of some old-time residents were ruffled. But as she once emailed to
her critics:
“You all should be happy there are folks like my husband and myself who can afford to buy old, dilapidated buildings, rehab them and put businesses
in them without worrying about a profit.”
Takeaways
to Consider
• Have you created
a Manifesto for your business—a complete description of the features, benefits,
and personal philosophy that is front and center in your professional life and in
the lives of every member of your staff? If not, why not?
• Have you
condensed your Manifesto down to a Unique
Selling Proposition (USP)?
• Over the past 45 years, I have studied
and written about myriad catalogs—Lilian Vernon, J. Peterman and Sharper Image to
name three. All started with a single item that was tested in
small ads and grew turned them into multi-million dollar enterprises. They
offered “items”—gifts, electronic goodies, outerwear, kitchen stuff. Every catalog
was a new shopping experience. All three ran into trouble and wound up in the
hands of venture capitalists and became shadows of their former selves.
• One reason for Uline’s great success:
it is a catalog of consumables. These are the items continually reordered that
enable companies to remain viable.
•
By the turn of the 20th century, the Sears Roebuck catalog put a
giant department store on the bookshelves of millions of hinterland homes.
•
Fast forward to the 21st century and the mantra is, “Why print a
catalog when everything is available online?”
•
The
Wall Street Journal’s Elizabeth Holmes wrote in 2014 that catalog mailings were increasing. The reason:
“Shoppers spend more online after browsing through lavish print spreads.”
• Do Dick
and Liz Uihlein make mistakes? Astonishingly,
I don’t remember having ordered from ULINE in the last 35 years—if ever. Yet I
continue to receive this humongous catalog that must be folded in order to fit
in our teeny post box in the mailroom of our Philly apartment building. My bet is
each catalog costs $5 to print and mail. Two issues a year for 35 years is 70 catalogs
or $350 wasted on me. Ouch!
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Word count: 1016
NOTE: Randy Swartz gave me the okay to reprint this email:
ReplyDeleteWe love Uline and we are a continuing and happy customer. Just one problem. We receive up to 10 of their 10 pound catalogs with each new addition. I cannot imagine the wasted cost in printing and postage involved. They do a lot of things right, monitoring what they mail to whom is not one of them.
P.S. It is worse than that. We get 10 every time they issue a new catalogue. My guess is we get more than 50 a year. Post it.
Randy Swartz
Randy,
Thank you for taking the time to comment. I had no idea Uline released 10 or more catalogs a year. Whew! That’s 7,000-plus pages! I guess with customers who don’t buy anything Uline sends a couple of catalogs a year to keep the account alive. When we assume room temperature, the USPS tells Uline the mail was UNDELIVERABLE and Uline deletes us. A good way to keep lists clean. Cheers.
NOTE: Joe Doyle (who bills himself as “The fellow in Northeast Florida that built a shrine to your article and Books”) gave me the okay to post his comment on today’s post.
ReplyDelete= = = = = = = = = = = =
I agree Denny
There’s an old mentor Charlie Binger (of Reply-O Envelopes and perhaps of your generation) of mine once said, “There is no such thing as junk mail, only junk mailers.”
= = = = = = = = = = = = =
When I was young in the BI (Before Internet) years, the mantra was, “Junk mail is what goes to the wrong person.” —DH
Never once ordered from them, yet always wondered why they sent those huge / heavy catalogs to us once or twice a year.
ReplyDeleteGreat story which gave me huge respect for the Uihlein's. Just like you, I don't have to agree with their politics to have great respect for the Uihlein's and their passions.
I'm going to place an order with them tomorrow. I want to feel like I contributed to their commitment to Manitowish Waters!
Thank you Denny!
Will,
DeleteThanks for taking the time to write.
If you order from Uline, would you kindly keep track of the fulfillment material—letters, follow-ups, etc. This is the guts of direct marketing and a Post for the near future.
“The most important order you ever get from a customer is the second order.”
—Maxwell Sackheim (1890-1982). Copywriter, co-founder (with Harry Scherman) of Book-of-the-Month
I too have wondered how Uline makes a buck when sending out such expensive catalogs. Yet why not? If you need their products, you order from them. Far easier than having to do the shopping and ordering from a local outlet.
ReplyDeleteWe did a repeat mailing for a client years ago involving kraft boxes. Rather that store the boxes at the agency, we ordered them from Uline as needed. The mailing proved a 3-year running success. We could use more Ulines; if only they spent their political money more sanely.