Two hazards of small businesses are vacations and traffic, but usually not at the same time. Unfortunately, both keep your customers away from your business, potentially for an extended period of time.

This spring, schools around us were off on holiday and the weeks ended up extending over a several week long period from March to April. Then, the post-winter “pot hole repair” routine has been compounded by water main breaks, gas leaks and signal problems. Entire regions are crowded, delayed and avoided due to doubling, tripling and extending travel time beyond normal limits of patience. People even drive out of state over bridges and pay tools to avoid it!

When you lose your customers to the things that are out of your control, you begin to worry about things that would not normally affect your business. Even though you may like vacations and traffic is your time-sucking enemy – there is not much you can do about either if the customers stop coming in. What you can do, is find creative ways to entice new people to your shop in spite of the things out of your sphere of influence. You can inform your customers. Tell them what is happening, Create vacation like experiences for them. Find new ways to keep the business busy – or take a day off and enjoy it, too. Just watch out for the potholes and the construction zones!

~ Dawn aka Hat Girl