PEMBROKE, Mass. — Every dry cleaner should have a slogan to go alongside its name.
“With all the things I have to worry about, you want me to spend my precious minutes creating a silly tagline?” you ask.
“That’s the stupidest piece of advice I’ve ever heard,” you might declare. “What a waste,” you could add. “What good does a slogan do? Just adding more BS will not win me one more customer.”
The only thing is, slogans do work.
A slogan adds to identity. A slogan creates a mental dream in customers’ minds, which helps them identify and bond with your store. A slogan is a way in, emotionally, for a new prospect to try your store.
BEAUTY MATTERS
Customers see themselves as sharply dressed, self-confident, and feeling good about themselves. So in a sense, you’re not selling clothes processing, you’re selling attractiveness. Just as John Deere is not selling a machine but rather is selling smooth, reliable performance.
So your slogan should focus on the end result: appearance. Here are some suggestions:
- Erickson Cleaners’ “For the sharper look.”
- Saffler’s, “Lookin’ good, day after day.”
- Quality Drycleaners’ “The million-bucks look.”
- Town & Country Cleaners and Laundry’s “Always looking your best.”
- Reading Drycleaners’ “Look great, every day.”
- Seth Bros. Cleaners’ “Where your appearance is our business.”
Maybe you want to be clever with your words. Like the Deere slogan, you might want to make customers ponder over your slogan.
How about Fabric House’s “The image that can’t be fabricated”? The two similar words, fabric and fabricate, cause the customer to pause. What can’t be fabricated? So you patronize Fabric House.
Or Professional Drycleaners’ “Feel like you”? The customer thinks, “What does it mean, ‘Feel like you?’ Wait a minute, I know what it means. It means feel totally yourself in your clothes, feel like you belong in these clothes.”
The thinking makes you realize your true goal: to feel totally at ease in your clothes. So you patronize Professional.
And Goolby’s’ “Where beauty matters”?
This makes you think that dry cleaning is not really about beauty. “But, wait a minute. Yes, if truth be told, I am interested in being as beautiful, or as attractive as I can, and, yes, my dry cleaner, Goolby’s, helps.” Alternately, the slogan could be, “Where appearance matters.”
These are just a few suggestions to stimulate thought. Think about what you are all about and what you offer customers, and come up with your own unique slogan.
Your slogan needs to suggest a real benefit. You want the words to sound poetic, so they reverberate in the person’s mind.
You need the slogan to stick out in the marketplace and to call attention to your unique offering. Finally, you want your slogan to be memorable.
Put your slogan to use. Over time, incorporate it in everything customers and prospects see. Go through the effort and create the perfect slogan for you.
To read Part 1, go HERE.
Have a question or comment? E-mail our editor Dave Davis at [email protected].