How do retailers get shoppers to stop? Try goats. On a roof.

Dad says OK. He's going to prove to the kids that they're looking at very realistic statues. There are no goats on the roof.

"I've heard it like that a thousand times," said Zahradnik, co-owner and manager of the the aptly named Goats on the Roof store. "They are real."

And with word-of-mouth advertising and a couple billboards, business has been good. So good, in fact, that Zahradnik and his partners opened a second store in Helen last April.

Originally, Zahradnik said, Goats on the Roof was just going to be another country store. But the partners knew they had to do something to differentiate themselves from the competition.

"If we had just a petting zoo, I'm sure we would be busy," he said. "But crazy helps."

Out-of-the-ordinary methods to lure shoppers are hardlynew. There were the spotlights that arced through the sky, drawing curious onlookers. Inflatable animals on the roof or tree lawn. People in costumes on the corner, holding signs advertising a business in the nearest shopping center.

Such promotional methods are becoming less common as lifestyle centers and strip malls have proliferated, said Randy Stuart, assistant professor of marketing at the Coles College of Business at Kennesaw State University. They tend to work best for stand-alone stores, she said, and only for impulse goods. She expects to see fewer stores trying bizarre methods to get people in the doors, in part because a bad economy has left people less tolerant of such glibness.

But retailers who have taken a leap with something different are reporting success. For more than 20 years, Col. Poole's Bar-B-Q in Ellijay has been building a hill of pigs. More than 7,000 small plywood and plastic pigs are arranged in the shape of one giant pig on a hillside behind the store. Oscar Poole, founder of the restaurant that bears his name, said the shtick started when he made pig-shaped open and closed signs for his restaurant and painted names of family members on some pigs he made with leftover plywood.

Now, customers can add a pig with their own name to the hill if they have an honest face and $5.

"Visibility is one of the chief characteristics of good marketing," Poole said. "That's my billboard. That's bigger than 30 billboards."

Still, Poole said, having something that causes people to turn around to see the restaurant alone is not enough to keep him in business.

"No. 1 is the food," he said. "They [the pigs] might get the attention, but if you don't have a good quality product, they're not going to return."

Before retailers decide what their own gimmick might be, they have to make sure they have the merchandise and prices to appeal to the shoppers they'll bring in, said Ken Bernhardt, a professor of marketing at the Robinson College of Business at Georgia State University. If there is a disconnect between what people expect and what is offered at the store, he said, they are less likely to stop again or purchase items, defeating the purpose of the gimmick.

Bernhardt said the goal of such advertising is to break shoppers out of their routine. The same thing can happen with a sale banner, he said, but in a cluttered retail environment, it can be useful to try something new.

"That's why retailers constantly have to refresh what they do," he said. "Otherwise, people perceive it as a normal environment. If people see the same thing all the time, it's increasingly less effective."

One of the original examples of out-there advertising in Atlanta was the Big Chicken in Cobb County, Bernhardt said. But since it was first erected in the 1960s, it has become more of a landmark than a lure to the KFC business it houses, Stuart said.

Poole said he continues to see people respond to his efforts, including the creation of a traveling pig-mobile.

"The sillier I get, the more money I make," he said. Sales were up 35 percent through October 2010 from the previous October, he said.

At Goats on the Roof, Zahradnik said the store has sold thousands of "Goat Herder" or "Old Goat" T-shirts since the Tiger location opened in 2007. Seven goats live at both his locations and have free range of the roof and the gated grounds. In Helen, they can wander between two grassy roofs, crossing a wooden bridge where they also prefer to sleep. The goats can get to the ground via a wooden staircase and will come up or down at the sight of food.

The goats are unexpected entertainment for passers-by, said Shannon Dailey, who stopped with her family on a trip to Helen from Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Linda and Steve Plavchak, also from Florida, stopped for some ice cream after seeing the store in their online research.

"It's just so unique, I thought we'd check it out," Linda Plavchak said. "When there are things that catch your eye, it's nice to try something new."

Anthony Pernice hopes that will be the case for his Midtown home decor store, Flora Dora. He moved the 27-year-old store to a new location over two years ago, but later decided he needed to do something to draw attention to the space. So Pernice painted busts in bright colors, placed them atop four-foot pedestals and decorated them with feathers and flowers.

He brings them out to the sidewalk and said he has had a lot of people stop just to ask if they can take pictures with the busts. They often ask if they're for sale; they're not.

"A lot of people don't look at the sign as they're driving by," Pernice said. "Our sales are starting now to pick up. ... That's why we created it, to drum up business."

Unusual advertising has also benefited Classic Beverage and Gifts in Cleveland, Ga. The store used to be home to Williams Power Equipment and while that company still exists, owner Phillip Williams branched out into alcohol sales once they became legal in the city. A giant sign outside advertises the coldest beer in North Georgia and Williams backs up the claim with a walk-in freezer set to 23 degrees.

Without the addition of alcohol sales, his lawn equipment store would have gone out of business, he said.

In Cleveland, it is known as the chainsaw-beer store, said manager Carly Saxon, and she has sold nearly 200 T-shirts with a MasterCard commercial theme, listing the prices of a spark plug, chain sharpening and a 12-pack of beer.

"Getting it all under one roof?" the shirt asks. "Priceless."