Are you Buying the Best Products for Your Zoo Shop?
Zoo gift shops offer a completely unique retail experience. While conventional stores strive to trigger feelings of comfort, warmth and convenience, zoo shops immerse customers in an atmosphere of wilderness and excitement.
These dynamic shopping environments are not just extensions of the zoo; they are vibrant continuations of a day filled with exploration.
Your gift shop is an indispensable component of your visitors’ overall adventure. Positioned as the final stop after a day of animal encounters and educational exploration, it is your shop experience that ensures visitors leave the park with a lasting sense of happiness and satisfaction.
The Magic of Zoo Shops
Your gift shop is in an ideal position. A position that makes buyers for high street shops green with envy.
Firstly, we know that people spend more money when the are happy. By the time visitors reach your shop, they are grinning and laughing together. They have spent a brilliant day making memories with their friends and families. They are full of joy and excited for the last stop of their day out.
How many high street shops could say that about their customers?
What’s more, visitors know that by buying from your gift shop, they are supporting a wildlife conservation cause. And not just any old wildlife conservation cause - one that they have just learnt all about and emotionally connected with, right here at your park!
Many of your customers will even plan a gift shop purchase into their trip. You are presented with a unique opportunity that should not be wasted: your customers really want to buy something.
It is your job to ensure their expectations are met and they can leave the park with the perfect keepsake.
It is your responsibility - to your wildlife park, to your customers, and to the high street buyers banging their heads agains the walls trying to bring smiles to their tired customers’ faces - to make the absolute most of your retail space.
Why it's so Important to Get Right
Have you ever visited a gift shop that was part of a bigger experience and felt deflated as you walked through the store doors?
Perhaps you hoped to find something special to take away to remember a rare day out with your fast-approaching-teenage children, or maybe you thought it was going to be the perfect place to find a unique gift for a friend who had similar interests.
When you walk inside and find shelves bulging with brands you have seen a thousand times before, which aren’t linked to the experience you have just enjoyed, and which don’t even align with their values, the day ends with a note of disappointment.
Don’t let that happen to your visitors. Customers expect to be wowed by zoo gift shops and, with the right product selection, you can achieve that sense of awe and curate a vibrant retail environment that is guaranteed to wave visitors home on a high.
What are the Best Products for Zoo Gift Shops?
Products should be tailored to the experience. For your shop to wow, it must help visitors find the perfect souvenirs and mementos to remember their zoo visit by. That means showcasing the wonderful wildlife and unique animals that visitors have just interacted with, learnt about - and perhaps even been introduced to.
Of course that includes the beloved favourites - nobody can leave a giraffe or elephant enclosure without feeling an amazing sense of awe for nature and love for these gentle giants! Giraffes, elephants and lions leave an indelible impression on visitors and should absolutely feature on products if your zoo houses those animals.
But what about the animals that make your park unique? The species that visitors didn't even know existed until their visit, and which they will tell their friends about when they describe their day trip?
If your zoo is home to elusive aye ayes, charismatic capybaras and endearing red pandas, these animals should be given pride of place in your gift shop. Your shelves serve as a canvas of reminders and memories, allowing visitors to take home a piece of the zoo's distinctive charm and ensuring their daytrip remains vivid in their minds as a cherished memory for years to come.
Your shop can - and should - showcase a range of product options for both adults and kids. And at a range of price points, too. We’ve all watched people tighten their purse strings over the last year or two, so it’s more important than ever to have low-priced options that can still serve as souvenirs that will spark happy memories for your visitors.
The Educational Element
Do your products have an educational element, that adds a layer of depth to the overall zoo experience?
Consider how your shelves can be designed not only to delight, but also to enlighten, extending the value of a zoo visit far beyond the park's boundaries.
From children's books about wildlife conservation to nature explorer kits and games that unveil the wonders of the planet's extraordinary animals, these educational products could find a fitting home in your shop - a space uniquely positioned to inspire the next generation of conservationists.
At the heart of this educational initiative lies the exceptional collection of unusual and endangered animals that make your zoo distinct. Products featuring these animals have educational value in themselves.
Take art prints of endangered species, for example. More than decorative pieces, when displayed in a home these pieces serve as beautiful reminders of the marvels of the wild. They not only become cherished souvenirs, evoking warm memories of a day at your zoo, but they act as conversation starters, helping people to share the important plea of endangered species.
In this way, your zoo shop becomes a hub not just for retail, but for fostering awareness, advocacy, and a deeper connection to the delicate balance of our planet's diverse ecosystems.
The Remarkable Value of Cards
In the dynamic world of retail, where every inch of shelf space counts, the charm of a carefully curated collection of greetings cards can be a secret weapon for engaging customers.
Not only can a beautiful display of greetings cards be a work of art in itself, brightening up the space and enhancing the shop’s aesthetic, but they are handy revenue boosters, too. Here are a few reasons why greetings cards are a brilliant addition to a zoo shop’s offerings:
1. They bring joy
When searching for the perfect cards, a customer has their loved ones at the forefront of their mind. Customers will spend a frankly ridiculous amount of time browsing the shelves to find the perfect birthday card design for one particular person, or the ideal Christmas card pack for their nearest and dearest. Add greetings cards to your store, and you will spark smiles and bring a whole new level of joy and connection to the shop floor.
2. They offer an opportunity for uniqueness
There are thousands (millions, even?) of greetings card designs on the market. This offers a brilliant opportunity for you to amplify your shop’s unique style and values, and stand out from other shops with your beautifully chosen collection.
3. They are mini advertisements for your zoo
Because they are either gifted or displayed in the home, greeting cards are great advertisements for your park. When people receive thoughtful and unusual cards, they ask where the buyer got them from. In this case, they will be regaled with a tale of their day out at your lovely park - including a little sales pitch on how unique and wonderful the products were in your shop! Whether they are given away or put on a wall at the buyer’s house, greeting cards (particularly those featuring animals you house at your park) will act as conversation starters.
4. They have a big impact
Greeting cards don’t take up much space, either in the storeroom or on the shop floor, but are powerful little products. For zoo shops, they can be the perfect low-cost sentimental reminders of your visitors’ day out. I am constantly hearing from Wild Lines customers who have framed their birthday cards and put them on their walls instead of giving them away!
5. They bump up basket value
As low-cost items that many people buy multiple times every year, greetings cards are excellent for increasing your customers’ average order value. Your shop is a great place to find gifts, and spying a display of greetings cards can be a very useful reminder that the customer needs to buy a card too (or perhaps even top-up their birthday card box).
Sustainability in Zoo Shops
Through education, research, funding for conservation, and active involvement in species conservation (through breeding programmes, for example), zoos have important roles in wildlife conservation.
A trip to the zoo is an educational experience about the natural world, the wonderful biodiversity we share our planet with and, in particular, the threats facing much of the world's wildlife. With that in mind, all zoos should have a strong sustainability policy that carries through into the gift shop in an obvious, visible way.
Stocking sustainable products in the gift shop sends a clear and important message about the zoo's values. After all, how can a zoo claim to be a conservation force if the products they sell in their shop are produced, packaged and transported in ways that cause environmental damage and threaten the very species that the zoo is claiming to protect?
Not only is it the ethical thing to do, but an ingrained sustainability policy helps create a cohesive experience from the main zoo to the shop. In your carefully curated gift shop, visitors can still have a sense of a wild environment; they can feel connected with nature as they transition from the enclosures to the shop.
How Wild Lines Products are Tailored for Zoo Shops
Wild Lines' wildlife-themed greeting cards, art prints and gift collections are designed with zoo and wildlife park shops in mind.
There are so many incredible animals out there that don't get the attention they deserve in the retail world, and it is my mission to bring them into the spotlight. From wild dogs to dart frogs, Wild Lines products feature a great array of animals, including many endangered species, as well as commonly-featured species, like giraffes and zebras.
The products are all high quality and carefully designed by hand. The detailed, true-to-life wildlife artwork makes the designs perfect as zoo souvenirs, and the products span a range of price points.
We provide products that particularly resonate with animal-loving adults and are perfect for gifting, as well as keeping as reminders for themselves.
The brand is as eco-friendly as possible, fitting with even the strictest sustainability policies, and many of the products (including cards and art prints) feature the name of the species on the backs.
I don’t just draw a gorilla on a card: I draw a western lowland gorilla with its characteristic brow ridge! I work closely with our zoo stockists and am continually adding to our collections based on recommendations from the collections we supply.
We supply a number of zoo shops around the UK, including London and Whipsnade Zoos, Marwell Zoo and Longleat Safari Park. Our cards sell particularly well at wildlife park shops and we are proud to be Jersey Zoo’s best-selling card supplier.
Just click this button to send me an email (no need to write anything in the email - the pre-written subject line is fine!) and I'll send you the password to our wholesale shop, plus a copy of our wholesale catalogue right away
Key wholesale information
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To access the Wild Lines wholesale shop, please email jen@wildlines.art for the password
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Free UK shipping on paper-based orders of £150 or more (£300 or more for orders including mugs/t-shirts)
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Minimum order is £80 for the first order and £60 thereafter
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If you would like an animal that we don't currently feature on the product range you are looking for, please let me know and I will create a new design
View the Wild Lines wholesale catalogue to learn more about the eco-friendly wildlife art greeting cards, prints and gifts.