Set Customers to Collect Items

According to the New York Times, a number of retailers are profiting by offering collectible snow globes each holiday season. Neiman Marcus maintains a registry of standing orders. Henri Bendel has upped the snow globe design sophistication along with the prices over the years.
     During the Great Recession, sales of high quality collectibles held much better than with most other retail product classifications. When it comes to collectibles, the urge to possess the whole set means there is less consumer sensitivity to price and more drive in the shopper to buy now.
     You don’t need to appeal to a luxury market, limit your merchandising of collectibles to the Christmas season, or sell elaborate snow globes in order to benefit from the shopper psychology of the collector. For any merchandise lines aside from those consumers consider to be necessities, think about giving the items the appeal of collectibles:

• Feature items in groups, each one a distinctive member of the family. If parallel products are available for different age groups, have those items in the same ad and on the same sign. Stock them on the same end cap. 
• Introduce new items in the set regularly, at which point you rotate out older versions. This encourages shoppers to buy now. 
• Take special orders and publicize resale markets. When your customers are having trouble getting that special item to fill in the missing spot in the collection, help them buy it from you or from a collectors' group. Keep your customers as dedicated collectors. 

     Then encourage all shoppers to become collectors. Here are three motivations:

• Fantasy identification. Researchers at University of Minnesota, University of Arizona, and Notre Dame University found that collectors often view each item in their collection as a fantasy image of themselves. In selling collectibles, give each item a personality the customer wants. 
• Reminders of experiences. University of Minnesota researchers pointed out how some items in a collection gain special importance because of the wealth of the owner’s personal experiences that have become associated with the items. 
• Sense of completeness. University of Nebraska-Lincoln research found that as children approach age 11, their desire to have complete collections grows. In most adults up through middle age, the urge for completeness often comes to play less of a role in purchasing behavior. To sell to the adult collector, you might want to redefine what constitutes a complete collection. 

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