Excited to be Cloverkey's #1 Hospital Gift Shop Nationwide

Cloverkey Chief Revenue Officer Kim Schuler recently helped create a video for Cloverkey to send to potential new clients. Watch the video on the Cloverkey website or on Youtube. Read this Q&A for some insight into why Cloverkey chose the Friends of Strong Gift Shop as their premiere store in the video!

1. In what ways will Strong Memorial Hospital and Friends of Strong be highlighted during the video?

Friends of Strong will be highlighted, along with their history of service to SMH since their inception. As our primary point of contact, Sandy Arbasak was included in the video to share her leadership role, insight, and challenges with overseeing the management of the gift shop for many years and the benefits of moving from an in-house operation to outsourcing with Cloverkey, a national hospital gift shop management partner. Benefits include expanded gift shop operating hours to better serve the URMC community, a robust ecommerce solution to provide free same day delivery within the URMC campus, and an extensive inventory investment to include Strong, Golisano Children’s and Wilmot Cancer Center logo gear.

Another significant advantage with the Cloverkey partnership is the opportunity to reallocate FOS resources to focus on other URMC initiatives vs. gift shop management. Ultimately, outsourcing the gift shop has generated additional financial revenue for FOS and for URMC. An absolute win-win partnership for both parties!

 

2. How does Cloverkey plan to use this video to improve the reach and success of the business as a whole?

This video will be marketed to all prospective Hospital Clients that are currently operating the gift shop in-house. Our hope is that the incredibly successful transition to Cloverkey at URMC will serve as a testimonial to the strength of the partnership and encourage other prospective Clients to do the same. This video will showcase the relationships we strive for with all our hospital partners. As a company, we are especially focused on supporting the hospital’s mission and will use this video to help promote our commitment to that value. It will also give us an opportunity to showcase our gift shop layouts, which are crafted specifically for each gift shop we open. We pride ourselves on creating a personalized gift shop with no two gift shops the same!

 

3. As Chief Revenue Officer, what would you say is the best method to grow and maintain a successful Cloverkey Store?

Every new store begins by establishing a framework of trust with our new hospital partner and demonstrating that we share the same desire: to provide a gift shop that elevates the campus experience and supports the hospital’s mission.

We approach every prospective partner with this in mind and once the contract is signed and the shop transitions to my operations team, our plan is to continue down the same path of working hand-in-hand with the hospital to ensure the gift shop not only meets but exceed expectations. Specifically, we focus on keeping the gift shop appearance as inviting as it was the day it opened; listening and responding to customer comments and requests to make sure we are never taking our presence on campus for granted. My entire team embraces the significance of the partnership and are guided by a common principle; if a program or initiative is important to our Client, then its important to Cloverkey.

We are proud to partner with Friends of Strong on many campus-wide initiatives to better personalize the gift shop to URMC. Programs include establishing partnerships with local Rochester vendors like Stacy K Floral, Mojo Logowear, and Buffalove, a vendor that specializes in Bills and Rochester branded merchandise. We are proud to represent over 300 vendors within our product assortment, several of which are diversity vendors.

We have collaborated with URMC’s Marketing Department to produce UR Nurses Tee-shirts in support of Nurse’s Week, along with a year-round Pride 365 program.  In addition, we’ve partnered with Labor & Delivery in support of URMC’s Breast Feeding Initiative by providing specific Medela items in the gift shop. We are also pleased to support the sale of URMC Tickets to hospital-sponsored events, such as the Potato Bash, BBQ luncheon and Ice Cream Social, with 100% of proceeds directed back to Friends of Strong. 

 

4. What can you tell us about the overall mission of Cloverkey? Are there any end goals the business is aiming for?

We are a relatively new company, having only opened our first gift shop in 2021 (at Boston Children’s Hospital). But we have high aspirations. Our entire management team came from another hospital retail company that we grew together for over 20 years—from 85 stores to more than 400 locations—before it was purchased by a private equity company and changed completely in 2018.

Our business mission is to continue to expand, bringing our vision of partnership to as many hospitals as would welcome our services. Even as we focus on growth, we are keenly focused on maximizing our existing partnerships and continuing to provide the impeccable service they’ve enjoyed from us since the inception of our agreements.

Growth in this business is dependent on hospitals inviting us to partner with them. Our mission is to be ready when hospitals reach out and to do everything in our power to meet their needs throughout the sales, contracting, and ultimately operating process once the shop is open.

Thank you so much to Kim for taking part in this Q&A. We are proud to have been chosen to take part in this incredible project.

Interested in watching the video? Take a peek on the Cloverkey website or on Youtube!

Emily A. Teitsworth | 8/13/2024