Introduce theatre into your merchandising

Ian Handley, Harston Village Shop

“This is a relatively small store with space at a premium, so every category has to really work for us. At the moment, we have a split display of mints and gum with one shelf unit on each side of the till point. This means there is duplication between the two stands and I don’t think that is ideal. I’m open to new ideas and I’d really like to improve sales of mints and gum via new merchandising.”

Wrigley says

This is an exceptionally well–presented store with the gum fixture right in the cash zone, which is the perfect location. The range is almost spot on, but some of the bestsellers are in the second fixture, which is slightly less easy for customers to get to. My recommendation is to re-merchandise both fixtures and add some in-store theatre to one stand to promote a new range to customers and drive additional sales.”

Action plan

1) Wide on
Simon gets to work on the right- hand side fixture, replacing the existing shelves with new, wider ones that increase the number of boxes that fit on one shelf from three to four. “Changing the width of the fixture won’t affect the height so Ian doesn’t need to be concerned about obscuring the till point display, but it will allow him to stock extra lines.”

2) Eye-catching
Next he adds a top unit for Ian to stock the new Extra White 46 Pellet Bottles, along with shelf edge labels to make an eye-catching display.

3) Duplicate
After some discussion, Simon and Ian agree that leaving some duplicated products in both stands is a positive for the store. “Having bestselling products in both stands means customers can access them regardless of which queue they are in,” Simon says.