Learn all about the different types of cannabis sales and offers and how to implement them at your dispensary.
Dutchie
Learn all about the different types of cannabis sales and offers and how to implement them at your dispensary.
Dutchie Ecommerce gives retailers the control and flexibility to offer custom deals and promotions to their consumers. Our data shows that these offers tend to increase conversions, foster repeat business, and have a measurable revenue impact. For US retailers in particular, purchase incentives are incredibly popular—
and they’ll help your store stand out from the competition.
When tools don’t provide the flexibility to customize deals, retailers find themselves with limited ways to increase revenue. Dispensaries need more control and flexibility over the creation, use, and presentation of their customer promotions. They also need actionable insights into the revenue impact of promotions, which they can track with analytics tools like Dutchie Analytics.
This internal information can help dispensary managers understand product value and popularity, which leads to smarter business decisions in the future. Deals also tend to be a great way to hype up consumers, so why not get creative?
Sales are a type of discount that typically gives consumers a flat-rate dollar or percentage off deal based on purchasing from a specific brand, category, or set of individual items.
Since "days-of-the-week" Specials are popular in cannabis, an example of this might be: Flower Fridays: get 15% off all eighths. This kind of strategy has the potential to get the customer in the store more frequently, especially if each day is meant for a different deal.
Offers introduce another level of flexibility and customization to the types of Specials that dispensaries can tailor to their needs and customer preferences.
An example would be: Spend $100 on in-house products and get any [insert partner brand of your choosing] product for $20 each. This demonstrates how to incentivize shoppers buying from your priority brands first.
Flat-rate specials are great by themselves, but they can alsobe spiced up to lead to bulk purchases. Usually, flat-rate specials drive the day-of-the-week or limited deals that entice customers to come in at specific times. These standard deals can be customized to make consumers want to buy more during one shopping trip.
Flat-rate specials can be helpful to use around the holidays or when looking to refresh your inventory. These specials look might look like:
With these types of Specials, you can still control the duration of the sale on your Dutchie Ecommerce Admin page. These are great for short-lived sales, touching on cultural moments, or making room for bulk sales.
Bundling products and discounts together has been promising for retail businesses for some time now. The idea is: why buy one at full price when you could buy three and save? Using more flexible Specials can get customers to buy in bulk to get that discounted other brand item as we mentioned in the Offers example above.
Costco runs on a model that states bigger is better too—as do wine subscription companies that sell by the case. This trend also includes cannabis, because illicit market dealers used to give discounts to those buying in bulk. Customers are encouraged to buy an eighth over a teenth, a quarter over an eighth, a half-ounce over a quarter, and so on because the value is more appealing. Plus, most consumers will end up using what they purchase before it dries out.
The Costco example is a wholesale brand that sells in bulk as an advantage over the name-brand competition. This idea can also apply to cannabis businesses—particularly those that are vertically integrated, meaning they own a part of production in addition to retail—as they likely benefit more from selling their own branded products. This is something to consider if it fits your business model.
Either way, you may want to run promotions on products that are easy to group without creating any compliance issues or pushing any weight limits, such as half ounces of flower or infused sodas sold by the 6-pack.
Scaled deals or bundles mean moving cannabis inventory quicker, and keeping stock newer and above the curve for retailers. US cannabis brands are rapidly creating new and innovative products to live up to trends and consumer demand. Moving your inventory in bulk is beneficial to you for these reasons:
Remember that you can ensure that customers taking advantage of these incentives are generating a minimum level of revenue before discounts are applied to their purchases.
You can also apply discounts globally across an entire purchase. We’ve found that consumers who redeem Offers can have up to 30% higher basket sizes than those who don’t. Feature your own brand on your Ecommerce Specials page or promote high-margin brands to maximize your profit.
Reward big spenders by discounting their overall purchase. For example, if shoppers spend over $250, they can get 10% off their entire purchase.
Allow bulk buyers to earn discounts on other categories they love. An example would be: buy 4 or more edibles and get 50% off any 2 pre-rolls.
Allow your heavy flower consumers to purchase bulk weights and earn discounts on other categories they love. For example, if they buy 4 or more eighths, they could get 50% off any 2 edibles.
We’ve highlighted the idea of selling mass quantities, but bundles can also span across your different product categories. Check out some more inventive ways to cross-sell cannabis.
Create seasonal and specialty product bundles that allow consumers to purchase a set of products for a specific price.
Here are 5 ideas for how to use these types of deals:
You can create bundles by the terpene or effect, which is normally a good motive for a consumer to purchase a bundle of products. Think about times people would want motivation, like for spring cleaning, and bundle products accordingly. Energy-boosting strains and products are more popular in the summertime, and heavy relaxants are typically more popular in the winter.
For more information on terpenes, check out our guide on how to help consumers find their perfect terpene pairing.
Increase sales of your in-house and partner brands with cross-promotional specials that reward consumers with discounts on your partner brands after they have made a purchase of your in-house products. It doesn’t have to just be flower, either. You could incentivize your partners' most popular products with yours. Two examples:
For dispensaries that have the taxes included in the product price on the menu, the deal will show with a slightly higher price, including tax.
Here’s an example: buy 1 ounce and get any pre-rolls for $5 each, the $5 pre-rolls will be shown as a higher price to the end consumer, like $5 base + $1.70 tax = $6.70 menu price.
If you prefer to include taxes on menu prices, consider mentioning within the Specials Card that prices shown include MSRP plus tax.
This gives our dispensary partners the flexibility to make deals as easy to run as they are to apply to orders. Dutchie provides dispensaries even more flexibility to create unique Sales and Offers for their consumers. These new features will allow retailers to match in-store Specials with online Specials so that shoppers and staff have a seamless experience during the redemption process.
Nothing is worse than losing a customer who doesn’t want to wait for a manager to approve a deal. By integrating with Dutchie’s POS solutions, the seamless discount matching will make operations run even smoother on the sales floor.
