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Market Research

What do Twitter, press releases, and advertising have in common? They’re all different ways you can use to market your business. But coming up with the right mix can be tough. And how do you make sure your promotional activities are reaching the right people?

Tacoma Business Services
To help you master the art of marketing, we offer a range of free strategic counseling and industry research tools and services. From tracking demographic data about a specific part of the city to providing you with targeted mailing lists we’re happy to share our information with you about our surrounding communities. For more specific information, visit our City of Tacoma services page.

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Business Profile_Childtrek

Biz Spotlight:

Miebeth Bustillo Booth

Childtrek

In Business Since 2007
Number of Employees 4

“I love Tacoma – it’s a metropolitan city with a small-town flavor,” says business owner Miebeth Bustillo-Booth. So it’s no wonder she chose Tacoma as a home base for Childtrek, her natural and sustainable toy store. The Tacoma resident opened a retail storefront back in 2007. In 2012, she decided to focus her energy on her growing online business.

Today she employs four people and partners with Amazon to sell her products around the world. “What helped our marketing efforts was winning the King 5 Evening Magazine’s “Best of Western Washington” award two years in a row,” says Miebeth.

Another part of her success she attributes to the City of Tacoma’s free business assistance programs. As a parent and former teacher, there’s no doubt Miebeth had the deep industry expertise and passion to run a successful business. What she needed was more information about the day-to-day aspects of being an entrepreneur. “Running a small business can be overwhelming at times,” she says.

One resource that helped her uncover new opportunities was the City’s free Secret Shopper service. After going through the program, she received a detailed report packed full of ideas. “The report was comprehensive and included a balance of what I was doing right in terms of my store appearance and customer service, while offering easy to implement ideas,” she says.

At the end of the day, Miebeth says it’s nice to have a coach for her small business. “No one is born a business owner. You can read a lot but the key is to utilize the free business assistance services available through the City and other organizations and walk through the mechanics of running a business. Using these services has helped make me better informed and a better business owner.”