An Appetite for Growth

While two-thirds of the company’s total business comes from gift orders, more than 85 percent of its customers also buy products for themselves. Like most catalogers with a large number of gift recipients, Cryer Creek does an annual gift-list mailing to customers each fall.

Cryer Creek brings in 20 percent of Collin Street’s total new-to-file names. Response rates to prospect mailings average 1.25 percent. Like most catalogers, Cryer Creek suffers from declining prospecting returns and increasing attrition in the second year of new customer acquisitions. Favoring long-term growth over short-term profits, it’s taking a slight step back and plans to mail only 2.2 million prospect names in 2005.