Prepare Early, Sell More
A practical guide for winning the December Sales
Every year, the same story plays out. Early November, a flood of businesses suddenly discover that the holiday season is coming. They scramble to order stock, rush out promotions, and hire temporary staff in a panic. By the time they act, the best suppliers are fully booked, shipping costs have climbed, advertising is expensive, and customers have already made up their minds about where to shop.
Meanwhile, a smaller group of businesses looks calm. Their shelves are stocked, their teams are trained, their campaigns are live, and their cash position is healthy. They are not luckier or bigger. They simply started earlier, and they started with a system. In this article, I will explain how those business owners think, what they do, and when they do it. Whether you run a growing company or lead a corporate division, the same principles apply.
The Core Idea
Most entrepreneurs treat the holiday season as an event. Smart operators treat it as the result of a process. Sales in November and December are largely determined by decisions made in the preceding months: what you stocked, whom you reached out to, how much cash you had, and how ready your people were.
This means that the question you ask must change from: “How do we sell more this December?” to “What must be in place by early November for December to succeed?” That question forces planning, and planning is the real competitive advantage.
Step One: Start With the Numbers, Not the Expectation
Early preparation begins with an honest look at last year’s performance.
Pull your data and answer a few direct questions: Which products or services sold fastest, and which ones sat unsold? When did demand actually begin to rise, and when did it peak? Where did customers come from, and which channels delivered the best return?
What went wrong: running out of stock in peak season, late deliveries, long queues, website crashes, and unread messages? From this, build a realistic forecast with three scenarios: conservative, expected, and optimistic. Most businesses plan for a single number and are devastated when reality differs. Planning for a range lets you decide in advance what to do if demand surprises you in either direction.
If you are a new business with no history, borrow data. Study industry reports, talk to suppliers, and watch what established competitors do. Then keep careful records this year so that next year’s planning will be built on facts.
Step Two: Secure Your Supply Chain Early
Inventory is where early movers win most visibly. Suppliers, manufacturers, and logistics providers all get overwhelmed in the final quarter. Prices rise, lead times stretch, and the best terms disappear.
Smart businesses do three things differently:
- They order early and in stages. Rather than placing one enormous order, they place a core order well ahead of the rush, then they reserve capacity for top-up orders based on early sales signals. This protects against both running out of stock and overstocking.
- They diversify suppliers. Relying on a single source is a risk you cannot afford during peak season. Identify a backup supplier now, and test them with a small order before you need them.
- They plan logistics. Warehouse space, delivery partners, packaging materials, etc, all need to be arranged ahead of time. A product that cannot reach the customer on time is a lost sale and a damaged reputation. A useful discipline is to set a firm “last safe order date” for every key product; this is the point after which delivery before the holiday is no longer reliable. Put it on the calendar and treat it as a deadline.
Step Three: Protect Your Cash Flow
Here is a hard truth many young entrepreneurs learn too late: the holiday season can bankrupt a profitable business. You mostly spend heavily on stock, marketing, and staffing before the revenue arrives. If customers pay late, or if sales fall short of the forecast, you can run out of cash in the middle of your best season.
Prepare by building a cash flow forecast that runs through the season till February. Identify the exact weeks when money will leave your account fastest, then arrange your funding well in advance, whether through supplier credit terms, a working capital facility, or retained earnings set aside for this purpose.
Also set a spending ceiling. Excitement during peak season leads to impulsive decisions: one more advertising push, one more bulk order. Decide your limits in a calm moment, and let the plan, not the adrenaline, guide you.
Step Four: Build Your Marketing Calendar Backward
Customers mostly do not decide to buy on the day they purchase. They go through a journey: awareness, consideration, comparison, and finally action. Businesses that wait until the shopping peak to start marketing are competing for attention at its most expensive point.
Smart businesses work backward from the key sales dates and build a phased plan:
1: Warm-up (early). Build awareness and grow your audience. Collect email addresses and phone numbers. Share useful content, gift guides, and behind-the-scenes stories. Reward your loyal customers first with early access or exclusive offers.
2: Build momentum. Announce your offers. Use reminders and countdowns. Launch referral campaigns, since people trust recommendations from friends more than advertisements.
3: Peak conversion. Push your strongest offers, simplify the buying process, and communicate delivery deadlines clearly so customers know when to order.
4: Final sprint and beyond. Target last-minute buyers with fast-delivery or gift-card options, then immediately shift to thanking customers and inviting them back.
Notice that your own customer list is your most valuable asset in this plan; acquiring a new customer costs far more than reselling to an existing one. A well-timed message to people who already trust you will often outperform expensive paid advertising.
Step Five: Prepare Your People
Your team is the point where all your planning either succeeds or collapses. Hiring and training seasonal staff in the final week is a recipe for mistakes, rude service, and frustrated customers. Begin recruitment early, while the best candidates are available. Train people properly on your products, your systems, and your standards of service. Run rehearsals: simulate a busy day, practice handling complaints, and test the checkout process under pressure.
Burnout during peak season is common and costly; look after your core team. Plan schedules fairly, communicate clearly about expectations, and recognize extra effort. A motivated team treats customers well, and customers remember how they were treated long after they forget the discount.
Step Six: Stress-Test Your Customer Experience
During the holidays, customers are impatient, busy, and comparing you against everyone else. Small frictions become reasons to leave. Before the rush, walk through the entire customer journey as if you were a buyer.
If you sell online, test your website’s speed under heavy traffic, check that payment systems work reliably, and make sure your mobile experience is smooth. Confirm that your inventory counts update accurately so you never sell what you do not have. If you have a physical office or store, review the layout, signage, queue management, and security. Prepare for problems too. Draft your policies for returns, delays, and complaints now, and make them clear and generous. A business that resolves problems quickly turns an angry customer into a loyal one. Set up a simple escalation path so that any team member knows who can make a decision when something goes wrong.
Step Seven: Plan the After-Season
The smartest businesses think beyond December 25th. The holiday season is an opportunity to meet thousands of new customers. What you do next determines whether they become long-term relationships or one-time bargain hunters.
Plan your follow-up before the season starts. Have thank-you messages ready and send them on time, request reviews from customers, and offer a reason to return in the New Year. Prepare a clearance strategy for leftover stock so that unsold inventory does not tie up your cash. You can schedule a post-season review while the lessons are fresh: what worked, what failed, and what should you change. Write it down. This document becomes the foundation of next year’s plan and the reason you will be ahead of competitors again. Along with these, set aside appropriate reserves that will tide you through January and maybe February.
A Simple Timeline
To make this practical, here is a timeline you can adapt to your own calendar, counting back from your peak selling date:
Five to six months before: Review last year’s data, set targets, and begin supplier conversations.
Four months before: Finalize forecasts, secure financing, and place core orders.
Three months before: Plan marketing, begin recruitment, and start building your audience.
Two months before: Train staff, test systems, and launch warm-up campaigns.
One month before: Confirm stock arrivals, run rehearsals, and open early-access offers to loyal customers.
During the season: Monitor sales daily, adjust quickly, and communicate constantly with your team and customers.
After the season: Follow up, review, document, and begin the cycle again.
In conclusion, preparation is not glamorous. It lacks the excitement of a big promotion or a viral campaign. But it is what separates businesses that survive the holidays from those that thrive in them. The principle is simple: decisions made early are cheaper, calmer, and smarter than decisions made under pressure.
So ask yourself today: what is the one thing I can do this week that my competitors will only think of weeks later? Start from there and keep going, because the holiday season rewards those who were already in motion when everyone else began to rush.
Cheers!!
Fatherhood with Ibe
A MILE IN MY SON’S SHOES
As I lay in bed that night, my thoughts drifted to three experiences I had had with my children as they navigated the often-tricky terrain of adolescence. Each experience had left its mark on me, but one, in particular, kept returning to my mind. It was my experience with Emeka.
Emeka had always been something of a star. From his younger years, he showed remarkable promise in athletics, particularly sprinting. As he grew older, his interests expanded to show business, where he found an outlet for his talents as a dance performer. At Corona School, he was something of a celebrity. He was the popular boy others admired and wanted to emulate.
His mother and I took enormous pride in watching him shine. Whether at athletic competitions or social performances, we were always there, cheering him on and enjoying the admiration that seemed to follow him everywhere.
In many ways, Emeka reminded me of myself at that age. I was never an athletics star, although I captained my school basketball team. We did not win many laurels, but I found my own stage in music and drama, areas in which I excelled right through university. Those interests would eventually become useful in my professional life, particularly when I established Hints magazine and played a pioneering role in the birth of Nollywood.
However, my father, a disciplined and successful jurist, had always insisted that such interests must never come at the expense of academic excellence. He drummed one message into my ears repeatedly: music, drama and other extracurricular pursuits were fine for enjoyment, but they must not distract me from my studies. Looking back, I believe he was right for his time, and I found myself adopting much the same philosophy with Emeka.
One day, after receiving one of his rather average academic results in secondary school, I decided it was time for another father-son conversation.
“Emeka, it’s great to see you doing so well in sports and dancing, but you need to pay more attention to your grades,” I told him.
“Okay, Dad, but sports makes me a well-rounded student, and I’m happy doing it. Besides, everyone wants to be like me.”
I could see that he was pleased with his popularity and was not particularly enthusiastic about my intervention.
“I understand that, son. But if you don’t improve your grades, you may struggle to get into a good school for your A-levels or undergraduate studies in the UK or US. That could become a problem.”
He frowned.
“But does everybody have to be an academic, Dad?” He asked.
“Of course not,” I replied. “But those who don’t do well academically may find it more difficult to get onto their desired career paths. Even a talented musician stands a better chance of succeeding when he has the academic qualifications to gain admission into good institutions, where his talents can be further developed and recognised.”
The conversation ended, but the issue did not. It followed us into the next phase of his education.
When Emeka eventually went to the UK for his A-levels, his academic performance was still not what I expected. Worse, he appeared to be spending more time pursuing his musical interests, including regular sessions in London recording studios, than concentrating on his studies. Then came the call from his course advisor that had me rushing to their school.
I did not take the journey to London to exchange pleasantries. By the time I arrived, I was already sufficiently upset, and the conversation that followed was anything but pleasant.
“Emeka, I will be forced to take you back to Nigeria if you don’t get your priorities right,” I told him sternly. “You cannot continue to spend your time in music studios when you should be concentrating on your studies. Finish your degree first. After that, you can pursue whatever you want.”
I reminded him that educating him in London was no small financial commitment. The fees and other expenses took a considerable amount of money, and I needed him to appreciate the sacrifices involved.
“Please, focus on your academics,” I insisted.
He eventually did. He completed his first degree and, interestingly, went on to obtain a master’s degree entirely on his own volition. I was pleased that he had taken his education seriously, but that did not mean the struggle was over.
In fact, another battle was beginning.
Having satisfied the academic expectations that had been placed on him, Emeka still had to confront the question of what he really wanted to do with his life. He was torn between following a conventional career path and pursuing the artistic dreams he had nurtured for years. The latter had always held a special attraction for him, but translating that passion into a sustainable career proved more difficult than he had imagined.
As the years passed, the frustration became more apparent. Some of his former schoolmates, including popular Burna Boy, had gone on to achieve remarkable success in the music industry. For someone who had once been so enthusiastic about music and had believed in his own abilities, watching others blossom while struggling to find his own place could not have been easy.
And somewhere in that disappointment, I became something of a villain.
In his eyes, I believe, I was the father who had interrupted a promising journey, who had insisted on academic qualifications when he should have allowed a young talent to flourish. The very advice I had given out of love and concern might have become, in his recollection, one of the reasons his artistic ambitions never quite took off.
This is where fatherhood becomes complicated.
As I look at Emeka’s struggles, I sometimes wonder whether I could have handled things differently. Could I have found a better balance between insisting on academic excellence and giving him more room to explore his creative abilities? Could I have supported his artistic ambitions without making him feel that he had to choose between his education and his passion?
These are questions I cannot always answer with certainty.
But I have come to understand that acknowledging my possible contribution to his frustrations does not mean abandoning the conviction that guided my decisions. I did what I genuinely believed was best for my son at the time. I wanted him to have choices, opportunities and a solid educational foundation on which to build his future.
Today, however, my responsibility is not to defend every decision I made in the past. It is to understand where he is, acknowledge his disappointments and work with him to find a way forward. I want to help him rediscover his confidence, rebuild his aspirations and find a sense of purpose that will keep him from sinking into disillusionment or depression.
Every child responds differently to parental guidance. What one child receives as encouragement, another may experience as pressure. What appears to be a necessary correction to a parent may feel like a restriction to the child. And as children grow into adulthood, they must gradually assume responsibility for their choices, their disappointments and the direction of their lives. They must learn to take the lead, believe in their abilities and understand that a setback need not become a life sentence.
For Emeka, my greatest wish is that he will overcome his disappointments, rediscover the talents that once made him so excited about life and find a way to fulfill his potential, whether in music or in another field that gives him genuine satisfaction.
I understand his frustrations more than he may realise. After all, I was once a young man who struggled to understand his own father’s insistence on doing things a certain way.
My father was a man of strong convictions. He believed in discipline, hard work and academic achievement, and he was not easily persuaded to change his position. At the time, I did not always appreciate his approach. There were moments when I wished he would simply allow me to follow my interests without so much insistence on what he considered the more important things in life.
But as I grew older, took charge of my own decisions and began to understand the responsibilities of adulthood, my perspective changed.
Boy, was I grateful for the way my father had raised me!
I came to appreciate that much of what I had resisted was his way of preparing me for a world he knew would not always be kind or accommodating.
Now, as I look at my own son, I can only hope that time and experience will give him a similar perspective. Perhaps one day, when he looks back on his journey, he will understand why I made the choices I did.
And perhaps, just perhaps, he will say the same thing about my approach to fatherhood that I eventually said about my father’s.
Until then, I must keep learning, listening and walking with him… because being a father does not end when a child becomes an adult. Sometimes, that is when the real lessons in fatherhood begin.