Vertical merchandising. You may not know what it is, though you see it every day. You go to a grocery store, the local big box store, or even your chain pharmacy. It’s important for these types of businesses to use retail merchandising that arranges their sales space. They use a planogram so that everything is neat and orderly, with top sellers placed right at eye level. Vertical merchandising is one of the most highly effective types of planograms.
Don’t think so?
Go to the cereal aisle at your local supermarket. Where are the healthy grown-up cereals or cereals for the whole family? Eye level to the adult. Where’s the Captain Crunch, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Apple Jacks, and other sugary choices? Right at kid height.
Not Just for Supermarkets!
Lots of smaller retailers, popup stores, and even wholesale showrooms can benefit from using these same types of retail merchandising strategies. For smaller retailers, it can be even more vital to arrange merchandise to be organized and visually appealing at the same time. You really need much more bang for your small business buck, and make your displays visually appealing. Across small retailers with multiple locations, standardizing displays means that you know by the process of a retail store audit what you have from store to store, where it is, and how it’s selling.
Put the “Plan” in Planogram
They key to knowing how to plan your store the right way is to find out what you’re currently doing wrong. A complete retail store audit using FReD will give you a complete picture of your stores sales, inventory, and best movers. You’ll find that even with multiple locations, field merchandising becomes easier and more accurate from store to store, and even in locations with temporary presence such as farmers’ markets, popup locations, and local events like fairs. You’ll be able to enact retail execution with new merchandise and hot sellers in the best and most effective way by planning your planogram with rich data.
Smaller Has to Work Smarter
You and your staff know how hard you work, now it’s time to work smarter. It’s easy to forget that chain stores, department stores and big box retail is not the only player. Here are some quick facts about small retail businesses.
- Kiplinger, a trusted financial magazine reports strong retail sales growth in the first quarter of 2017, reflecting strong consumer confidence.
- Business News Daily forecasts that niche companies will find more success than more broadly based stores and that e-commerce will become more competitive.
- Retail is more than a job, it’s a job creator, according the National Retail Federation, supporting jobs in five different sectors of the economy.
Unlocking the potential of your small retail operation depends on building your brand and targeting your bricks-and-mortar customers as well as your online buyers. Use FreD app favored by 3,000 merchandising reps, merchandisers, and auditors to improve your operations and get the results you need.