These questions are being asked on behalf of a friend who is a
florist. She is a small scale floral shop owner & custom designer. The
business is 90% retail, 10% consulting (weddings, home & office
seasonal decorating, corporate events, trade shows and educational
classes). She would like to obtain business advice on how she could
make the transition to 80% weddings & consulting and 20% retail. The
shop is in a 50,000 person Canadian market- the smallest outlet among
many competitors. She would like several questions questions answered.
They are being posted sequentially to allow several researchers the
opportunity to present responses: 1) How can I make this transition
without loosing too many of my current retail patrons?

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You have a tricky situation here, but it's doable.

Your change is going to have to be gradual.  Instead of decreasing the
retail side, I would increase funding to the consulting side as much
as possible.  The goal here would be to only start diminishing support
of the retail side when the consulting end starts the thrive.  Don't
build up the consulting business at the expense of the retail
business.  Build the consulting side via word-of-mouth and selective
advertising, and pursue this side of the business as far as you can
without changing your current funding allocation to the retail side. 
When the consulting side is "calling" for more funds and effort above
and beyond what you can give to it while NOT at the expense of the
retail, then this is when you start to shrink the retail side.

Currently, because 90% of your total income is coming from the retail
side of the business, you don't want to lose that if the consulting
side isn't as profitable long term, or takes much longer to build than
you originally planned.  The trick to this will be in offsetting the
risk of expanding the consulting side of the business with the
already-established retail side.

As with any major change in underlying business approaches, there will
be some customers lost -- those who are most sensitive to this sort of
thing, and those who cling to familiarity.  But you can minimize this
by taking a gradual, balancing approach.  When you're making a change
in business, often it's wise to make nine 10% changes, rather than one
90% change.  Change your business to 80% retail, 20% consulting for a
while; then 70% retail, 30% consulting, then 60% retail, 40%
consulting, etc.

jbf777-ga
GA Researcher