For family businesses, long-term customer loyalty is a particular concern

“With 125 years of company existence, we are a classic family business. Long-term, trusting cooperation with our customers plays a central role in our business success. But the last 4 years have been a rollercoaster ride, and we are currently feeling strong headwinds, especially due to price pressure from competitors.”

This is how Jasper Holtrop describes the business situation in the Hotze Group. Holtrop has a dual role in the company, both as site manager of one of the 11 locations and as marketing manager for the entire group.

Hotze has its origins, and still has its strongest presence today, in Leese in Lower Saxony. The group of companies, which is a member of hagebau, is now not only geographically broadly positioned. Over the past few decades, the building supplies store locations in Lower Saxony and eastern Germany that are part of the core business have also included DIY/DIY markets (under the brands hagebaumarkt and Werkers Welt), Hotze Handel&Logistik, which trades in renewable fuels, the LKT commercial vehicle dealership operating throughout Germany, and the Weser-Energie mineral oil dealership. The company’s presence extends as far as Poland.

Current market situation means more competition

Hotze has faced several challenges since 2022.

On the one hand, competition in its core business, the building materials trade with construction and trade customers, has become significantly fiercer due to the economic weakness. Closer customer loyalty was therefore required.

A new location was also opened in Rhaden, North Rhine-Westphalia, which was outside the previous core area.

Most recently, a channel was basically sought with which corporate communication could be played out centrally and effectively.

Achieve customers with 80%+ open rates with Flinkit

Flinkit was able to help in all three areas.

Under the direction of Jasper Holtrop, WhatsApp newsletters were introduced in 2023. Flinkit supports campaign planning, which was a great relief, especially at the start.

“We took the first steps with around 500 customers, to whom we played out monthly promotions,” says Holtrop.

The successes were noticeable right from the start. “From the very first campaign, customers told me that this was their favorite channel,” explains the manager. This was also reflected in the numbers: open rates of 80% and more were not uncommon.

Instant 6-digit monthly sales with WhatsApp newsletter campaigns

“After this first aha moment, we quickly expanded the target group to over 15,000 participants. It hit like a bomb, I’ve never experienced anything like it before.” Consistently high opening rates translate directly into 6-digit sales per month.

Important for Hotze is the ability to address target groups in a personalized manner using segmentation. Another recipe for success is smart campaign planning. “We mix promotional offers with other customer loyalty messages, such as a European Championship prediction game, regular event invitations, etc. For us, Flinkit is now the central channel for customer dialogue.”

What is also special is that customers’ responses to invitations, etc. are always directed to the right contact person.

Conclusion

WhatsApp newsletters with Flinkit are by far the most effective channel for customer communication for family businesses in the wholesale trade in 2024/2025 and take dialogue with new and existing customers to a new level. With Flinkit, B2B retailers achieve 6- to 7-digit monthly sales