Key financial strategies from "40 Tips for Music Professionals 40 and Under"—a NAMM U session presented at The NAMM Show 2013. The session was hosted by CJ Averwater (pictured), Cris Behrens and Ryan West of NAMM YP (Young Professionals). Use this as a checklist, and share it with your employees.

If you own a music retail business, you may well follow a do-it-now philosophy—which is, of course, necessary to keep things running. Still, you also need to think about tomorrow, which means you’ll want to take action on your own retirement and business succession plans. Jeff Ponte of Edward Jones looks at your options.

To attract customers, your store should be filled with cool products that customers want and need. But finding out what customers want can be daunting. Leslie Faltin of Instrumental Music Center explores three questions to ask yourself before committing to a purchase order.

One of the biggest problems most music retailers face is inventory. They have too many products that aren’t moving and not enough products that are. This can be fixed by avoiding a few key pitfalls and identifying the winners and losers in your store. Learn how from Donovan Bankhead of Springfield Music.

Do you know what’s profitable at your store and, more importantly, exactly what products and operations are not? Having a hunch doesn’t count. Only when you know where your profits really are can you make the best decisions to maximize your bottom line. Lori Supinie of Senseney Music shows you how to manage your profitability.

A recent news report estimated that the average American household spends about 4 percent of its annual income on gasoline. Plus, most freight shipments that get delivered to our doors arrive in vehicles running on diesel, which is even more expensive. For this reason and many more, we have to keep a close eye on our daily freight costs. Mike Guillot of Mississippi Music shows you how.

As a music store owner, you can’t escape budgeting. At The NAMM Show, Lori Supinie of Senseney Music urged retailers to view their companies’ budgets in a new light. She walked the audience through the essentials of the budgeting process and explained why you need a budget, how to prepare a budget and how you can use your budget throughout the year.

What are the warning signs that internal fraud or theft might be occurring at my store?  Every year, statistics are compiled about internal fraud and theft that happens in U.S. retail stores—and those statistics are startling:

How do I convince my bank to lend to me?  There’s an old saying, “The time to get a banker is when you don’t need one.”  That’s because most people wait until there’s a severe cash flow crisis before they contact a banker to obtain a much-needed loan. Unfortunately, a retailer's chances of getting a loan are greatly diminished if the store is unprofitable and losing money. But even the most pro

Watch this video for an easy lesson on creating a budget and steering your music store toward profitability and success.