VM TIP: displaying mugs
If you sell mugs, consider placing them like in this photo, with one mug sitting on an angle in another mug. This is a common approach in bigger businesses where they have research the best approach to pitching mugs to browsers.
Oh, and if you do not currently stock mugs, consider it as they are in the top ten gift items purchased.
If your business is a destination for birthday cards, it should be a destination for gifts.
Why you need more than one Valentine’s Day display
Look at the store of any major retailer during a season and you will see multiple pitches for the season, no matter how small the store is.
Even in a store of 100 sq metres you will see a key season pitched in at least three locations. I have seen this in gift shops, card shops and similar.
Each placement is visually connected to the other, but different, an advancement even.
This is on my mind today as I have been talking with a newsagent who says seasonal sales are declining in their business. They do one display per season. While it is is in a good location and looks good it is only one display, there is only one opportunity for people to connect.
By having at least three displays, you reinforce the message, hopefully getting through.
It starts with a bold, signature, statement at the entrance.
This is followed by a secondary display behind, usually at a key traffic destination.
This is followed by a third display placement, at or near the counter, where you can impulse pitch.
We should be growing seasonal sales, not only in cards but gifts too. To achieve this, we have to match and better our competitors. This is why I say for this Valentine’s Day, take a look at your pro motion points in-store. Make your you have at least three, they they connect and that they give you excellent opportunities to pitch to shoppers.
It is easy to look at the declining sales for a season or a promotion and blame the economy, suppliers or other factors. The reality is, it is on us as the retailer. We are responsible for the success or otherwise. It is on us.
Valentine’s Day 2018 is a good opportunity to start. Take a look at what you have done and see how it can be improved for greater success. Ensure all team members are on board. Then, make a similar, layered, pitch on social media.
Know last year’s numbers, so you know what you have to beat this year. Involve all team members in this, in the actual number you are out to beat. Everyone in the business should be invested in achieving this.
For me, multiple displays is a key factor for success and changing the displays as the season unfolds is also important. Multiple displays combat store blindness, which is common among newsagency shoppers.
Oh, and take note, people don’t often look up. In fact, there are plenty who do not even look straight ahead.
A single display does not cut it anymore.
For context, here is how my high street newsagency promoted the recent jigsaw offer fro outside the shop to behind the counter to the counter to inside the front door. It could not be missed, and it worked a treat.
Advice: retail visual merchandising for blokes
This advice could also be called VM merchandising for people who think they can’t do it. Everyone can do Visual Merchandising! Experience is not necessary.
Visual merchandising is about display products in a way that attracts people to them, to look, touch and feel. It is about displaying products so you sell more.
Sales determine success, and only sales. A pretty display that does not drive sales is a waste of time and space.
A display that wins a supplier prize that does not increase sales is a waste of time and space, despite the supplier award.
Here is my advice on VM for blokes.
- Start with a clean space, a flat surface, in a good location.
- The best display looks like a pyramid.
- Your hero product is at the top of the pyramid.
- A seasonal poster hangs above the display or is placed next to it to signpost the display.
- Flowing from the hero product down to the base of the display are other products. But not so many that you can’t see what you want people to see.
- The display is balanced, even.
- A display of gifts always includes cards.
- Use coloured paper to highlight certain products. But don’t go for a rainbow.
- From a colour perspective, a good display has no more than two core colours as the focus.
- Don’t put signs in the display itself unless absolutely necessary.
- A display can look untidy and that is okay in some circumstances. For example, a box of Beanie Boos exploding from a box .
- Mistakes are okay.
- Oh, and don’t treat this as an engineering challenge. Keep it simple and fun! :
Remember, the alternative is no display at all.
A note to others who may be around when someone is doing their first display – we all did our first display once … be gentle.
An excellent example of terrific visual merchandising
Here are four photos showing terrific attention to detail in a small Halloween themed display in a bookshop I visited earlier this week.
Not only is the display eye-catching, it makes excellent use of a small amount of space and it pit shed products from a range of different categories. In fact, I count six different product categories represented.
This is a smart display, especially for the space it takes. Rather than the old-school big and bold aisle end display newsagents bare still encourage to create, here is a small format display in a tight space. It is a display that represents ts a narrative and this is another reason I think it is smart.
I hope you find it as inspiring as I do.
Inspiring Mother’s Day display
Here is a Mother’s Day display that I saw when overseas last week. I love it for the terrific range of products and the fun of the display and that it does not look like a usual retail display. This is why I say it is inspiring.
Mother’s Day is a season that can be boring if the product mix and in store pitch is the same old. The starting point for a fresh pitch is a display that looks different, like the inspiring display ion this photo.
Visual merchandising inspiration: Pokemon
Pokemon product at the counter displayed professionally and competitively priced drives impulse purchases and drives return traffic to the business. Also, it pitches authentic Pokemon product. With some discount variety stores selling knock-off products, being proud about selling authentic products is important.
A terrific window display sure to attract shoppers
I love this Christmas window display from the team at newsXpress Bairnsdale for it pitches the business outside of what people might expect from this shop, it is fin and inspiring.
This is what the front window is all about, especially for retail businesses in high street situations country towns where attracting impulse visits depends on the window display.
This window display says come on in, this is a fun place to shop. Most important, the window appeals to kids and anyone who buys for kids and this time of the year that is most important.
The best place to start to redefine any retail business is from the front window. Start there, set your messaging and then work this into the business. Of course, any strategic change should start deep within the business, however, starting with the front window can unlock inspiration that demands to be addressed in the business itself.
This window display at newsXpress Bairnsdale is excellent, a proud representation of optimistic retail.
I hope it inspires plenty of newsagents to work on their window.
Inspiring Christmas displays
This Christmas display is what greets shoppers as they enter the bed bath and Table shop in Hobart. It is terrific, in your face, easy to shop and timely.
I mention this today because there are newsagents who are yet to put out Christmas.
Bed Bath and Table is a terrific retailer. When it comes to major seasons, they are the best of the best – out at the right time, in the right place in-store and with the right mix of products.
That they have these Christmas items out now is enough of a reason to say to newsagents: get Christmas out, now.
VM masterclass from a Red Cross op shop
The front window of the Red Cross op shop on Bridge Road in Richmond is always inspiring. The window always tells a story. It attracts people to the window and into the shop – like all good visual merchandising should.
Here is the current stunning display in this op shop window.
I love this display. It is a perfect window display as it is so good that people will tell others to go and have a look.
Everything about this display is excellent including colour choices, connecting with the season (Spring), having fun and pitching what they have inside.
Best of all, this display plays against what you might expect to see in an op shop window.
We need displays as appealing as this on in newsagency windows, displays that play against type, that challenge public perception of what they will see in side the business. This is key to attracting new people into the shop from those who pass by.
If you are ever on bridge Road Richmond, take a look at th window display for the op shop, it will inspire.
NOTE: Click on the image to get a larger version to see in detail what they have done.
Sunday newsagency marketing tip: kittens love to play with wool
Bringing a retail display alive, really alive, attracts shoppers and drives sales. This display created by one of the team at my newsagency is perfect, or should I say purrfect, as it shows the kittens getting up to mischief everyone who has had a kitten understands.
The display is fun, engaging and alive and this is key to successful retail theatre – a display looking alive, the products looking like more than a product with a barcode on the shelf.
I was talking with a shopper in the store on the weekend about the display and they had a story to tell about a kitten they had as a child. This 80 something gentleman is not your usual plush customer. The display and the memories it jogged led to him purchasing a kitten for a great grandchild. He came into the shop for a birthday card into which he was going to put $20 as the gift. Instead, he spent $29.99 with us.
This type of conversion, turning a browser into a purchaser, disrupting a shoppers plan to purchase something unexpected, is vital to all retail businesses today but more vital than ever in newsagencies.
Take a look at your shop and how you display products you could otherwise bring alive to have people see them differently. Next, get your best VM person in-house to create something engaging. Finally, engage with shoppers on the shop floor yourself to learn from what they see, their stories can be inspiring.
Sunday newsagency management tip: a crappy looking stand hurts sales
Every branded spinner or stand you have in your business is a representation n to only of the health and professionalism of your business it is also a representation on behalf of the brand of the stand.
A broken stand looks bad as does a half empty stand as does a branded stand with products other than for the brand. Such a stand can turn shoppers off. It gives off a message of a business that does not care and this can tell shoppers you do not care about them.
If a stand has a place on your shop floor it has to add to the business not detract from it.
It does not take much to ensure stands look good, strong, full of the right stock. Sure you could argue you don;t have the money for stock. The thing is – the stand is looking empty because you sold the stock, you have the money.
My advice is to set a policy for all who work in the business to follow:
- On a branded stand, only place products from that brand.
- Check sales for each stand weekly and be on top of reordering.
- Any stand that breaks is to be removed from the shop floor until fixed or replaced.
