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Classes key to Cooks' recipe for retail success

By Jim McCartney

The mantra for small, independent merchants these days is this: If you can't beat them on price, beat them on service.

Like many small independent retailers, Cooks of Crocus Hill, a small kitchenware shop in St. Paul, Minn., finds that to survive, it has to offer something different, something more, or something better. The big national chains may match you on price and selection, but the little neighborhood stores can win the day with service that is both personable and knowledgeable.

Cooks of Crocus Hill has taken service a step further than most. Its fastest-growing source of revenues is not the cooking utensils sold on its ground floor, but the cooking classes it teaches on the second floor. And, not surprisingly, store officials say the classes on the second-floor improve service and sales on the ground floor.

While Cooks' approach is unusual, it is not unique. Other retailers are also adding services to boost traffic at their stores and pump up overall sales. For instance, sporting goods stores give classes in the various sports they serve, while musical instrument retailers offer lessons in guitar, flute and any of the other instruments they sell.

Aside from riding the wave of enthusiasm for gourmet cooking, the 25-year-old Cooks of Crocus Hill store is also tapping into two other trends with its cooking school: corporate team-building and open kitchens.

"We were looking for ways to broaden opportunities and diversify our focus,'' said Karl Benson, the general manager of Cooks of Crocus Hill, which is located on St. Paul's trendy Grand Avenue.

Although its first-floor store, stocked with pricey Calphalon pans and Wusthof Trident knives, still accounts for 70% of its estimated $1 million in annual sales, the cooking school is claiming an ever-increasing share, Benson said.

And if you can convince such major corporations in town as Medtronic, 3M, Cargill, St. Paul Cos., American Express Financial Advisors and General Mills that their employees can slice and dice their way to a better working relationships with each other, so much the better. If they don't stab each other in the back in the kitchen, they will be less likely to undercut one another at work.

"It's a great alternative to taking a client to eat dinner in a restaurant's kitchen,'' said Rick Wheeler, regional sales manager for Better Homes and Gardens magazine, who has brought clients both to the team-building class as well as the open kitchen.

"The Cooks class is much more interactive, and the setting is terrific. It was a great way to entertain -- and you get to roll your sleeves up and chop and dice.''

Onan Corp., a Fridley, Minn.-based manufacturer of electrical power generators, brought 15 managers and their spouses up for a team-building dinner at Cooks more to build social relationships than to achieve specific business goals.

"We are all assigned to different groups, and given tasks -- a lot of the men were assigned to make salads, and it was obvious it was the first time for many of them,'' said Lyn Langmade, Onan's director of human resources. Langmade said the three-hour event served its "social team building'' purpose nicely.

Cooks of Crocus Hill started cooking sessions as corporate team-building events about a year ago.

Some take it very seriously, trying to get their employees to work better together. Others are just looking for a more entertaining alternative to going to a restaurant for a holiday dinner.

"Holiday parties can be uncomfortable for spouses,'' Benson said.

Cooks is also latching onto another popular trend with its new "Ultimate Open Kitchen'' program. The open kitchen refers to the trendy pastime in which restaurant patrons eat in the kitchen while they watch a gourmet chef at work. For instance, Cooks offers "Babette's Feast'' -- first the dinner, prepared in front of you, then the movie of the same name, which you watch while you eat. Cost: $100 a person.

Cooks has been offering cooking classes for more than two decades, starting shortly after owner Martha Caemmer opened a kitchenware store called Thrice on Grand Avenue in St. Paul. In the meantime, the store has moved several times on Grand and its name was changed.

The cooking school offers a wide range of classes, from "How to Boil Water'' for beginners to "Techniques of Fine Cooking'' for those more advanced in the culinary arts. Although Cooks has two staff members who teach classes, most are taught by professionally trained chefs.

As a small entrepreneurial store, Cooks can try new ways of reaching its customers and growing revenues -- and it is careful to hire employees with a passion for cooking.

A critical part of the sales environment involves answering questions from customers and sharing cooking experiences with them.

"We want to be available to show you how to use a knife or how to make a crème brûlée," Benson said. Even calls from frantic cooks at home are accepted, he said, such as "My soufflé is burning in the oven, what can I do?"

If it can develop loyal customers, Cooks will gain a key competitive edge. While it has many competitors, few compete in all areas. It vies with Dayton's department stores and Williams-Sonoma to sell cooking utensils, and Barnes & Noble and other bookstores for cookbooks. As for its cooking classes, it competes with community education programs as well as occasional classes at food retailers such as Byerly's, an upscale grocery store chain, and Coastal Seafoods, a fresh seafood retailer.

As of press time, Cooks was expected to add a second location in April in Edina, a Minneapolis suburb. The 3,000-square-foot store will be smaller than its St. Paul facility, but will include both a store as well as an area for cooking classes.