What kind of results can good event marketing get for holiday sales?

In the case of Mudpuddles Toys, the daylong open house at the Kerrytown Market on Sunday set the stage for what looks like a brisk year-end.

“Yesterday was our biggest day of the year in sales per hour,” co-owner Jan Benzinger said a day after the sale.

Coming up next will be the downtown-wide Midnight Madness sales on Dec. 4.

“That’s our biggest day of the year,” she said.

It fits that the two days during the holiday season the specialty toy retailer marks down inventory - giving shoppers a 20 percent discount - generate the most sales.

Toys are a staple of the holidays. And for toy retailers, the holidays drive the results for the entire year.

“Toy stores are a big gamble,” Benzinger said. “You do more than half your business in the last 6 weeks of the year."

This year, Mudpuddles is heading into its second holiday with an expanded upper level at its 2nd-story retail space in the shopping district just north of downtown.

Shoppers find more arts and crafts items, a bigger “girl” area with dolls and dollhouses and more books.

The additional inventory adds options for customers, yet Jan Benzinger and her business partner, Sharon Plumley, say they’re able to manage the space without adding staff.

“Even though we’re not double the size, we’re not double the income yet,” she said. “But our expenses are not double. One person can run the store on a quiet day.”

However, Sunday was anything but quiet.

Shopper traffic stayed heavy as the market filled with special displays, musicians and a festive holiday atmosphere - all of which helped bring customers into stores.

And the sales gave the pair clues about what may be hot for the rest of the season. Among them: Hexbugs, robotic insects priced from $12 to $16.

“We just got them in a couple of days ago,” Benzinger said, “and we’re completely out of them. … I just ordered 400 more.”

Other big sellers were bigger items: Tables and chairs, toy boxes, dollhouses and large trucks. These are not “stocking stuffers.”

“We’re not a furniture store, but it is interesting that we sold a lot of furniture items,” Benzinger said.

The economy, as read by Benzinger and Plumley by their sales data, is picking up.
“We’re definitely seeing an uptick here,” Benzinger said.

The pair rely on instinct instead of any kind of technology-driven analytics.

“It usually serves us really well,” Benzinger said. “The things that we thought would be big were. And we don’t feel like we have any mistakes here.”

Paula Gardner is Business Director of AnnArbor.com. Contact her at (734) 623-2586 or by email, or follow her on Twitter.