WinterSilks and Venus Swimwear have created a working solution to the challenge of running a seasonal business.

By Alicia Orr Suman

To attract catalog requests, the company runs ads for Venus Swimwear in Cosmo, Glamour and Shape magazines, and for WinterSilks in The New Yorker and the New York Times Sunday Magazine.

Customer relationship management (CRM) is something Scott says the company has always been involved in as part of its efforts to listen to customers and give them what they want. “We already target e-mail ads based on prior purchases, and this year, we’ll mail our new Fall book based on prior order history,” he notes. “All of this sounds simple, but shockingly few companies actually follow through [with CRM initiatives].”