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Is This the Perfect Formula for Visual Merchandising?
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Gifts & Decorative Accessories recently shared a visual merchandising webinar between the nonprofit group Heart on Main Street, which offers financial aid, mentorship, and education to retailers, and Suzanne Rafenstein and Lyn Falk from Retailworks Inc. The individuals gathered to “discuss visual merchandising techniques for independent retailers.”
During the webinar, the experts emphasized the importance of understanding consumer behavior and environmental psychology. This includes how individuals respond to factors such as music volume, ceiling height, and the strategic use of lighting to guide shoppers’ movement within a store. Furthermore, they explained how budget considerations are paramount when contemplating an investment to gauge if the resulting increase in sales can offset the renovation expenses.
Rafenstein discussed how the overall premise of creating displays revolves around the best practices of creating a story and guiding a customer’s purchase of multiple items. One of the most effective ways to promote this is by linking product categories, themes, and colors. When putting together a display, it’s important to carefully consider how the products will fit together. An empty display is obviously a mistake, but having an overcrowded display can be just as detrimental.
Product displays should also align with the overall image and identity of the retailer’s store. Each department should be clearly defined to create a cohesive and appealing shopping experience.
The design of aisles, in comparison, can vary depending on the store’s size and target market. Some stores benefit from meandering aisles, while others may use a racetrack layout. It’s also essential to consider the convenience of customers with strollers or bags. Retailers should periodically change their store layout to keep it fresh and exciting for customers. This practice can lead to increased exploration and sales.
To assess how well inventory is performing and whether specific sections are doing well, it’s important for retailers to complete regular sales analyses. Employees and customers who interact with the store regularly can provide valuable feedback on layout and product offerings and share suggestions for improvements.
For retailers looking to improve their visual merchandising tactics while cutting down on costs, Falk and Rafenstein recommended the following:
- Add an Accent Wall or Seasonal Display: Incorporating an accent wall in a store’s brand colors or setting up a display wall that can be changed seasonally can enhance the aesthetics of the store and keep it fresh and engaging for customers.
- Maintain Consistent Signage for Branding: Effective signage within the store, along with consistent branding for promotions, sales, and new products, helps customers recognize and understand the messages and offerings the retailer is conveying, leading to a more informed shopping experience.
- Ensure Optimal Lighting: Addressing lighting concerns is crucial, as many retailers (over 60%, according to Falk) lack adequate lighting. Proper lighting can significantly impact a store’s ambiance and customers’ overall shopping experience.
To conclude the webinar, Falk, Rafenstein, and Heart on Main Street’s executive director, Patrick Keiser, “discussed emerging merchandising and design trends.” Falk noted that “bringing nature indoors by incorporating plants into the store, artwork with nature, or even eco-friendly products, is an emerging trend.” Retailers can also capitalize on “telling a story about the building, the store, or the owner to engage and inform customers.” The last suggestion Rafenstein made was for retailers to have a “how-to or classes section of the store to educate your customers and get them to interact with the items they purchase.”
Discussion Questions
What are some emerging trends in visual merchandising that retailers could consider adopting to stay competitive and offer a unique shopping experience? How do you think visual merchandising will continue to evolve as e-commerce grows?
Poll
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Jeff Sward
Founding Partner, Merchandising Metrics
Visual merchandising is an essential element of good retailing. Unfortunately, it is also something too many large retailers mistakenly think they can skimp on. The purpose of visual merchandising is to help the consumer shop: in terms of curating items, inspiring them, and providing ideas. If done well, visual merchandising increases conversion and average transaction value. When neglected, it pushes the metrics in the wrong direction.
A while back we looked at the twenty apparel retailers consumers rated most highly for in store displays and experience, and at the bottom twenty. The top 20 collectively grew revenue by an average of 12.5% per store over a five year period. The bottom 20? They saw revenue shrink by 1.5% per store. There may be other reasons at play, but good visual merchandising makes a difference.
It’s not often I get to quote Shakespeare, and trust me, I had to look this up. “All the world’s a stage…” The play is different for every retailer, but the theme is the same, and that is entertainment. So, if you think of visual merchandising as set design, you’re half way there. The actors will show up during regular store hours and, yes, they’ll take lots of their cues from the store environment and everything they see “on the set.”
There’s no such thing as a standing ovation in retail, but solid sales numbers are close enough. But retailers should never forget that the most beautiful display of visual merchandising, something these shopper/actors are probably influenced by the most, is a smartly crafted price tag they can’t resist.
Based on many photos and visits into stores of late, particularly department stores, it appears that the primary skills and rules of visual merchandising are either not being taught and reinforced, or the labor force is so limited that basic housekeeping is not possible. It’s one thing to give a store team direction on how to set up a new delivery. It’s quite another thing to give them the skills to re-merchandise product as the “story” breaks down. That was once an essential boot camp.
Visual Merchandising is the real differentiator for Brick and Mortar. It stimulates interest and drive impulse buying. There is a reason why the featured items in catalogs sell out first and why merchandise on mannequins are top sellers. The conflict is over personalization vs a season/design point of view–what the customer wants to see based on prior behaviors and what the retailer thinks is important. There is a critical balance here. I can see more use of 3-d/hologram signs that change based on shopper profiles. I also see more integration with mobile devices and physical displays.
This ties perfectly into a CX (customer experience) strategy. We want to create the mood, feeling, etc. We can do it with lighting, art, props, and more. Visual merchandising appeals to and stimulates a customer’s senses. The next step beyond visual merchandising is experiential merchandising (think Bass Pro or Stu Leonards), allowing customers not just to sense but feel and interact with the products
Visual Merchandising is a combination of art and science. The science is in being able to fit the product into different size stores (quantity nd assortment) and display them in such a fashion that the customer can follow a theme and easily find the sought-after items. The art is to do so elegantly, appealing to the visual senses, in the right quantities and clusters and on the appropriate fixtures. There is plenty of leeway to do it right. There is no one formula.
Accent walls, signing and lighting are certainly important but these things are just the start of a perfect formula for visual merchandising. If there even is such a thing. But there are strategies that make displays better and sell more at the same time.
Good visual merchandising is a science as well as an art. It involves all of the senses, which is why we go into stores for one item but come out with more. Displays create the experiences we are always talking about. A pretty box is great, but it’s the individual displays that bring it to life.
Visual merchandising is all about managing emotions. People feel faster than they think. They will react emotionally to storytelling before they will react logically. Visual merchandising is storytelling at its core. Is VM solving a problem for a particular customer want or need? Or, even better, is it creating a moment of discovery? A moment that creates an unexpected “must have” response? That’s powerful VM!
It should be noted that VM is not a simple end of the process assembly task. Great storytelling starts at the planning, design and merchandising level. Planners have to plan the appropriate classification and SKU balance. Designers have to create the right style and color balance. Merchandisers have to curate into the physical constraints of store configuration and capacity. And that’s all just for one floor set. It then has to flow into the next floor set. Which styles live on and which styles head for the markdown rack to be replaced by fresh product? It’s a process that unfolds weekly, monthly, and seasonally. It has a lot of moving parts that have to mesh seamlessly. So VM absolutely has to have a seat at the table early in the process. Too many retailers don’t give VM that level of a role early enough in the process.
Visual merchandising is extremely important. When I was at Anthropologie, there was an artist in residence who would hand make many of the displays. They were beautiful. Moving forward, this should absolutely be a priority, and it’s also crucial that merchandise strategy highlights textures and the ability to experience products in the physical space. Strong merchandising in brick and mortar capitalizes on the fact that there’s physical product to engage with.
Good visual merchandising, good lighting, and organizing items for customers to quickly and easily imagine themselves wearing it, or tasting it is one of the most important things a retailer must do. This is being customer-centric. And it’s core to creating brand differentiation.
Years of performance data in food retailing shows where this has boosted sales, customer counts and profits, easily into double-digits and good ROI. It costs money and labor to buy the right fixtures, to set displays for color and sorting, make signage to explain not only features but benefits, and get the perfect lighting temps. Done right, it more than pays for itself.