From aspiring artrepreneur to accomplished entrepreneur, David van Berckel has grown his art supply business from one shop and one employee (himself) to six stores and some 150 staff members.
As the owner and president of Opus Framing & Art Supplies, van Berckel started up Opus as a wholesale framing store on Granville Island in the mid-1970s. At the time, Granville Island was still an industrial park, and in the very early stages of development.
With his keen foresight and vision, van Berckel saw an opportunity in the then-undeveloped area of Granville Island – and he took it. In many ways, the move to Granville Island was not just a savvy business decision, it was kismet. Shortly after settling into his new location, the Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design moved in across the street. It was a fortunate coincidence for van Berckel’s Opus.
But, van Berckel didn’t just ride this wave – he deftly navigated it with his passion for art and commitment to outstanding customer service. Though, admittedly, it wasn’t the path he originally set out on. A self-styled hippie, van Berckel returned to Canada (well, Vancouver) after travelling the world in the early part of the ‘70s. Armed with a Civil Engineering degree, van Berckel realized he neither wanted to be an engineer nor work for someone else. He decided that his goal would be to somehow make a living in the arts.
Through the gallery that he had befriended, van Berckel recognized a business opportunity in picture framing – specifically in manufacturing and wholesaling frames. “I’ve always believed that framing is packaging for art. And an artist, from a business perspective, is like a small manufacturer,” explains van Berckel. “And since packaging is so important for artists, I didn’t think it made sense for them to pay retail prices for packaging.”
Testament to his innovation and ingenuity, van Berckel was the first person in British Columbia to successfully manufacture and wholesale metal picture frames and moulding. (There had been others before him, but no one else had any success with it.) "And in those days, metal picture frames were the height of elegance,” he notes. “So, I took advantage as the demand increased.” For the first five to 10 years, van Berckel notes that his business grew and evolved very naturally. “It wasn’t planned,” he says.
The first Opus store on Granville Island focussed primarily on picture frames. After Emily Carr moved in, however, he listened to his customers and recognized the need to provide high quality art materials and supplies.
“Obviously, we had lots of artists and students who were coming in to buy frames, and I had also already gotten into conservation materials, and so I was importing museum boards and with that came art paper,” says van Berckel. “So then it made sense – with Emily Carr across the street – that we get into art supplies. And that’s what I was hearing from our customers.” Thus, Opus Framing & Art Supplies (as we now know it) was officially born.
The act of listening to his customers has been an on-going commitment and theme of van Berckel’s business growth and success.
Since starting up his first store in the mid-‘70s, van Berckel and his team have – on average – opened up a new store every five or so years. In the early 1980s, approximately five years after opening his Granville Island store, van Berckel saw another opportunity. This time, it was in Victoria.
He chose that location for two reasons. The first was logic. He figured that as the second most densely populated area in British Columbia, that “it just made sense.” The second reason was his customer database, which had grown immensely through mail-order sales, and included the names and addresses of his customers, whether they were around the block or around the world.
He notes that the database is an important key to their successful growth and expansion. “Right from the beginning – right from day one – I got the names and addresses of all of my customers,” he says.
By creating this extensive customer database, Opus has been able to effectively and successfully market and connect with its core customers – and avoid any general and pricey advertising efforts. “Opus has always been a marketing-focused and driven company, and one of the ways we market to our customers is our newsletter,” van Berckel notes.
Opus’ innovative Visual Arts Newsletter was created in the early 1980s, long before company newsletters had become commonplace (or standard practice for big business). The newsletter is a creative marketing tool that keeps Opus top-of-mind with their customers, connecting with them and building dialogue through relevant and timely information.
Every issue offers customers invaluable information on important topics and issues relating to the arts – such as arts advocacy, studio tours, art shows, art events and festivals, artist demonstrations at Opus, as well as new products and special discounts in the stores. “The newsletter is a great way to keep in touch with our customers, and remind them that we’re here and that we’ve got great products,” van Berckel adds. The customer database has also been an essential tool in figuring where and how to expand the business. Van Berckel and his team routinely analyze the database to find out where their customers are coming from, how often they shop at Opus, and the kinds of products they’re purchasing – all of which help to determine where the next new store should be.
This led to the second store opening in Victoria in the early ’80s. From his extensive database, van Berckel and his team saw that a substantial number of artists and aspiring artists were living in Victoria and around the Gulf Islands. So, opening up a store in the second most populated area in British Columbia, which also happens to be home to a substantial artist population, seemed logical.
And more than 20 years later, the Victoria store is still there and thriving. Over the past two decades, Opus has opened four more locations throughout the province: Kelowna, Langley, North Vancouver and downtown Vancouver.
Why have they continued to open new stores? The answer is simple: demand. They know of the demand through their database, and make it a point to listen to and follow their customers.
“Over time, we realized that we’re a destination store, which means that in Kelowna, for example, people drive a long way to visit us,” van Berckel explains. “As a big shopping centre for the area, people come to Kelowna from the Kootenays, Kamloops, and from other parts of the Okanagan Valley. Which is why it made sense to open a store there. We found that people from across the interior were visiting our Kelowna store.” Plus, he notes, “we knew we had a lot of customers in the interior of BC from our mailing list.”
However, what van Berckel and his team have found is that it’s easier to “make a go” of a store in Greater Vancouver, than in other parts of BC because of the area’s high population density. Nonetheless, Opus knew how much business they would do in Kelowna before moving there because of their research.
“Having an updated mailing list helps enormously,” van Berckel explains. “Before we moved to the North Shore, we knew how much business we did in North and West Vancouver. And before we moved to Langley, we knew how much business there was south of the river.” As a destination store, Opus doesn’t need a location with heavy foot traffic – which means they have more flexibility when choosing where to open up new stores. But, what is a priority is cost and size. Van Berckel notes that he doesn’t exceed 10% of estimated sales when paying for rent and taxes at a new location.
For van Berckel, money and staff are the two most important considerations when opening up a new store. In terms of money, van Berckel says “it’s probably going to cost more than you anticipate – depending on the deal that you strike with the landlord regarding the lease, lease improvements, how long you’re there and that sort of thing.”
He also emphasizes the need to create a budget and set aside funds to purchase additional inventory for the new store, and to hire somebody to run it. After that, he says, “you fix it up, you fill it up and you have another store.”
With six stores already under his belt, van Berckel attributes his success and growth to his staff. Or, as he puts it: “Staff, staff, staff.” Along with being the largest advantage, staffing issues have also been the biggest challenge of growing his business. He says having good people are imperative. The success of any store greatly depends on the abilities and skills of the manager. “If a manager loses interest in the store, sales go down – and vice versa. We’ve seen it many times,” he says. “We spend a lot of money on staff, and we give a lot of service to our customers. So you can either put yourself in a fancy location and give no service, or pay less for rent and give better service – which is really what we’ve always done.”
He notes that it’s simple formula: If you have good staff, you’ll have a good business. “Give the service that people recognize – that you’ve got a fair price and provide outstanding service so that customers feel that they’re treated with respect and care,” he adds.
So, how does Opus find good people to run their stores and provide outstanding service? Their key is promoting from within, and they do this for two reasons: To ensure the Opus culture and values – including superior customer service – are carried and implemented to each new store. Secondly, to offer opportunities to their loyal staff members – cultivating them and providing different levels of responsibility to help them grow and succeed with the company.
Along with having good management, staff and systems in place, the key is to be financially stable and consider some of the logistics and potential earnings of your new store, says Scott Cronshaw, the Vice President of Retail at Opus, who has been with the company for nearly 25 years.
He adds that it’s also important to know the city by-laws, consider your new neighbours/tenants, and realize that it takes time – and many extra hours – to build a new store to be profitable and successful.
At the end of the day, Cronshaw notes, both your staff and your customers are critical to driving your business, and helping to determine its success. “That’s why you want to always build on your customers, and make sure that everyone has a good customer experience. It’s the experience that counts,” van Berckel emphasizes. “In every Opus store, customers should be happy, be recognized, feel good about being there, find the things that they want, and come back again later.”
Opus achieves this through staff training on their products and, more importantly, on providing excellent service that adds value to their customers’ experience. Van Berckel notes that unless you train staff on how to offer great customer service, “it doesn’t always happen.”
For the past 20 years, Opus has also offered sales incentive and profit sharing programs so all staff members can benefit from the company’s success and growth. Staff in the various stores take part in sales incentive programs that, nearly year after year, have netted them an extra $1,000+ annually. Store managers and management, meanwhile, also participate in profit-sharing programs that allow them to grow and prosper with the company.
From humble beginnings on Granville Island as a simple framing shop to a half-dozen stores (and growing), one thing is clear: van Berckel and his committed, loyal team are forces to be reckoned within the art supply business. And it all happened quite organically through van Berckel’s passion for art and artistic endeavours. “I just wanted to get into the art business, and I wanted to be self-employed.”
Indeed, and it seems van Berckel has done more than just gotten “into” the art business. As a businessman, innovator and a visionary, van Berckel continues to encourage artists everywhere by opening new stores and blazing artistic trails throughout British Columbia.
