Shop of the Month

We recently won Shop of the Month from the wonderful Cherry Orchard. We’d like to thank them for all their support. Here’s the feature:

Staff at a greetings card and gift shop on the bustling High Street in Cudworth  are celebrating after learning their efforts have been recognised for the great range of cards, gifts, and accessories they offer to customers.

Wishes, of 254D Barnsley Road, has received the prestigious Shop of the Month award from greetings card publishers, Cherry Orchard, which is given for having a great range of products, clearly presented and displayed, with excellent customer service and a focus on encouraging customers to support independent retailers.

Business owner Julia Keeling has been running the shop for just over a year. Inside a clean and tidy, well presented, store you can find a wide range of quality and affordable cards, as well as gift bags, wrapping, party wear, banners, candles, scarves, foil helium balloons and bath cosmetics.

On receiving the news that they had won the award, Julia said: “We are very pleased to receive this award. We try to go the extra mile for our customers, with things like late night opening in the run up to Christmas, Christmas markets, an online shop and a very active Facebook page where we offer regular competitions with some fantastic prizes as well as give details of our latest products.

“We will soon be introducing our Valentine’s Day competition where customers will have the chance to win a great prize as well as being able to give a special message to a special someone. Details will be available in store and on the Wishes of Cudworth Facebook page.

“We offer a great range of quality products  and our focus is on providing excellent customer service. Happy customers often leave very positive reviews on our Facebook page, but to have all our hard work recognised in this way is indeed an honour and a credit to our dedicated team.

“The award doesn’t just represent our shop displays and friendly customer service, but also the attention to detail and focus on quality in the production of the cards and accessories that our suppliers provide us with.”

The Shop of the Month competition is being run by Cherry Orchard Publishing to encourage their independent retail stockists to promote their shops.

The competition is a way of rewarding and promoting shops that provide a wide range of good quality products and high standards of service that bring people back into the independent sector.

To enter, each shop has to submit on to the publisher’s social network sites, which retailers can then share with their customers to promote the business and its range of products. The judging panel at the publishers consider the presentation of the products, the service to customers and any other incentives that are on offer to encourage shoppers.

This award recognises the dedication of the team behind the shop counter. It shows to the consumer that buying from independents offers a unique shopping experience and it will encourage more outlets to join in and get recognition for their own shop.

Each Shop of the Month winner will be entered into a Grand Prize Draw in December with a chance to win a prize with a value of £1000 worth of stock (based on RRP) from the greetings card publishers. The winner will be presented with the prize at The Spring Fair at the NEC in February.

Julia added: “We work closely with our suppliers to ensure our customers can find exactly what they are looking for when they come into the shop.

“The latest consumer report shows that the UK greetings card market has grown to £1.6bn card sales and is the highest per capita greetings card market in the world with the average person exchanging 31 cards a year.

“We know that the greetings card industry is thriving, and we like to think when a customer leaves the shop, they’ll soon be back to complete their next purchase.

Achieving the Shop of The Month Award lets our customers know that they are being served by a committed team of people who are dedicated to what they do. It’s a great achievement”.