6 Business Lessons I Learned From a Market

When you enjoy what you do for a living, you have a hard time disconnecting from it.  You tend to see the world around you through the lens of your “work.”  Last weekend, I unwound by visiting Marché Jean-Talon, a large local farmer’s market, with my better half.  Despite being as disconnected from work as I could be, I still managed to see small business and marketing lessons all around.

Here is the story of my day, and the lessons I learned.

1. Customers are willing to pay more for quality and service

After hunting for parking for fifteen minutes, we eventually found a spot and walked two blocks to the market.  The lack of parking was no coincidence.  The place was packed.  I thought local farmers couldn’t make a living anymore because everyone wants to buy their food cheaper at big box supermarkets imported from some banana republic?  Apparently, these consumers didn’t get the memo.  They were out in droves.

Even someone as inept at gardening and farming as me could quickly tell that the produce on display here was of higher quality than the stuff I had bought earlier that week at the supermarket.  Not only that, at the supermarket, I’m lucky if I can find a clerk who isn’t running away from me.  Here, nearly every person working in one of these stalls had a smile and was pleasantly chatting with a customer. Sure the prices are higher, but I for one am willing to pay a little more for a decent tomato and a human interaction. Judging by the crowd, I’m not alone.

2. You must differentiate yourself

We immersed ourselves in the throng of people and started perusing the aisles.  It wasn’t long before I was overwhelmed with options.  If you’ve ever been to a large farmer’s market, you know that pretty much everyone is selling the same thing.  Sure, different farms sell different things, but there is always at least 3 people selling the same fruit, vegetable or other food, and oftentimes far more.  There must have been ten stalls selling tomatoes.

So, in such a situation, how do you convince people to buy from you?  Price won’t work, because people who are shopping for high quality produce, don’t care about price.  Quality is important, but arguably everyone around has quality products.  You need something to differentiate yourself.

One stall had built a fruit sculpture.  Another stall was actually boiling corn on the spot and selling it with butter and salt.  Another stall was staffed by a woman who had bright red hair that was sticking straight up.  These stalls caught my attention, and they were the ones that had the best chance of getting my business.

3. Free samples work

As we continued to wander around and fill up our bags with fresh produce, I noticed a trend.  Just about every stall I had bought from, had first let me sample their produce before I bought it.  There are two lessons to be learned here.  The first is that if you’re hungry on a Saturday afternoon, and don’t feel like spending any money, you can probably eat your fill off of the free samples at a farmer’s market.  The second is that offering a free sample of a quality product works, as my bags of veggies could attest to.

Many businesses are very scared of this practice, because of the cost of producing free stuff, whether in time, or in money.  The fear is that if the product exists for free, why would anyone buy it?  The internet has aggravated this debate with its easy access to free information, making content publishers cry foul.

Despite this, the fact of the matter is that free works. It works especially well when you give away a small piece for free and then charge for the whole thing.  Don’t be fooled, though.  Samples will only work if the product is good enough to make someone want to pay for it.  The sample is just the mechanism of distributing the knowledge that the product is that good.

4. If everyone else is doing it, and you’re not, you lose

As I came to my realization about the free samples, I began to pay more attention to the stalls that were doing the free thing.  The vast majority of the stalls were doing it.  There were only a small handful that were not.  It’s no coincidence that those stalls were the ones that had the smallest crowds around them.

Sometimes the market (no pun intended) forces you in a certain direction.  Even if there was a time when those farmers could have still sold their produce without giving samples, that time ended when most of the other farmers started doing it.  Follow the market, and don’t get left behind.  You might not always like where it’s going, but you still need to stay on top of it, otherwise, your competitors are going to leave you in the dust.

5. Customers value personality

After a couple of grueling (and delicious) hours of shopping, we decided to stop at the crepe stand in the middle of the market.  Crêperie du marché could probably make a lot of money, simply by existing in its current location.  What made it truly special, and something that I don’t mind telling you about, is that they went the extra mile.

I waited in line to order order our crepes, and as I did so, I noticed the gentleman taking the orders wore a striped shirt in the Parisian style.  When I finally began speaking to him, it was plainly obvious from his accent that he clearly was French.  The shirt wasn’t just a gimmick to sell more crepes.  It was who he was.  Unlike the majority of business transactions that I perform on a regular basis, where I’m lucky if the person on the other side even bothers to say hello, and a “How are you?” is an unexpected courtesy, I actually had a conversation with this gentleman.

He told me about the business, how long it had been there, informed me that they would be moving locations for the winter months, but would be staying open for that season for the first time since they opened.  He was genuine, and friendly, and had personality.  Then he handed me a loyalty card, and asked, “Do you come here often?”

“I will now,” I replied.

6. If you’re human, customers forgive ineptitude

We sat down at a bench as we waited for our names to be called out to collect our freshly-made crepes.  The entire process was visible to everyone in the market.  The man who collected the order would write it down on a scrap of paper, and hand it to the guy who would make the crepe or waffle, who would then pass it to the guy who filled it with the right sauce and/or fruit.  The part of me that used to manage operations cringed.  Their workflow process needed some work.

In the fifteen to twenty minutes that we sat there waiting for, and then eating our crepes, the four person staff managed to make at least three or four mistakes on orders.  Despite this, not a single customer got angry.  How is this possible?  Aren’t customers supposed to get enraged whenever a mistake is made?  Not necessarily.  Not if they see your business as people, and not as a machine.  People are fallible.  We make mistakes.  Everyone recognizes this implicitly, and so, when a person – especially a nice person – makes a mistake he is more likely to be forgiven.  When a corporate machine makes a mistake, we get angry, because these corporate machines are supposed to be infallible for the sake of efficiency.  If you’re human, you get a second chance.  If you’re a machine, you get replaced by a better machine.

Business lessons are all around us every day, we just need to keep our eyes open, and we’ll notice what works and what doesn’t.

What lessons have you learned from everyday life?  What other non-traditional sources of learning do you use?