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In spring, many shoppers will not have been in your center since Christmas, fall or even last summer. This means that they need to find those essential items and easily understand what they need to quickly get their spring landscape up and running. You know the sort of regulars who come in every spring for a few flats of color for the front yard, two hanging baskets for the front door, a replacement rose and potting soil for those 4-inch annuals they got to freshen up their pots.
They expect strong, difficult-to-miss displays of the essentials for the next few weeks, with minimal education and maximum “what I need this week” information. April and May are a flurry of basic activity in the garden, even if it is only tidying up after winter.
They then relax and live with it for a few weeks -- spring successfully encountered! But as the weather warms and they spend more time outside they start to think it is time to “go see what they have at that nursery” when conversation comes up about decorating the deck for the party next month or finally tackling that dreary corner by the A/C unit.
They don’t know what they don’t know
Remember that at least 70 percent of sales in a retail garden store are not planned purchases in the consumer’s mind when they left home that day. Impulse buying is increasingly becoming the core of this business, not just the frosting on the cake (as in grocery stores, pardon the pun). Just as our signs have to be more like “POP For Dummies,” so must the presentation of our products and services.
Like me in a computer or auto-parts store, most of your customers don’t know their needs, so merchandising has to inform and educate, while maintaining the impulse and appeal.
Customers may be coming for ideas that suit their situation, such as big pots of summer herbs they just saw on a TV cooking program. In that case a hobbyist shopper would know to go to the herbs and veggies benches, then to the pottery section and pick up enough potting soil, fertilizer and maybe even look at drip irrigation products on the way through the store.
But increasingly we are serving customers who do not know this. To sell to the non-hobby homeowner, displays must be both relevant in message -- such as “A Taste of Italy” or “South of the Border Herbs” -- and visually attractive to hold their attention as they pass.
Today’s shopper has so many options and time demands. “Time to find stuff” is becoming increasingly important as a reason for consumers to stay loyal to a retailer. People feel life is complicated enough and are looking to retailers to help make it easier.
In our self-appointed time-poor society, retailers compete for customers’ discretionary minute, not just their discretionary dollar. So display merchandising has to attract shoppers, hold, inform, address questions, concerns and doubts and suggest the essential tie-ins within a few seconds and 8 square feet!
Hot spots, endcaps and prime retail areas must be drop-dead gorgeous and relevant to today’s shopper. No signs about “Spreader Sticker” or “Pollinators,” please!
Think link (British for tie-ins!)
Someone said to me last month, “When are you going to stop preaching about tie-ins?” And I replied “When are you going to do it?”
Today’s shopper doesn’t know what tie-ins they need. We, as full-service retailers, are supposed to be doing the thinking for them. But all too often I come across a list of reasons (mostly caused by team politics) why they are not in the display. Successful garden retailers have broken down those departmental barriers (mostly by top-down leadership, I have to add) and put the shopper’s needs over company tradition and departmental ego.
Ask “What is the purpose?”
Before anyone builds a summer display, this question is vital.
Whether the objective is to tempt someone to grow their own pesto sauce or hide that A/C unit, products must be accessible and shopable, unless the display is a simulation of the end result, as you see in IKEA.
If simulation is the goal, you will either have to have a well-organized system to turn consumer interest into self-service pickup (as at IKEA) or have constant attention by staff.
Given the cost of labor, most operators will settle for self service from the display, which means that not only should items be accessible (and look like they are for taking), but the display must have enough volume to last until it can realistically be restocked. Massing makes money.
Displays that are onesy-twosey might look cute in photographs and win awards, but people don’t do that at home. Magazines show swathes of color, designers always spec five or seven of the same plant in the landscape, so why do some merchandisers only put two or three in a set?
Often displays look great first thing in the morning, but if that large single-focal-point palm or large impulsive shrub sells within the first hour, the effect is lost until it can be refilled (which may take days).
Simulation displays are often thought of as more difficult, needing more artistic talent. That may be so in floral and gift worlds but in garden and outdoor living they can be as simple as suggesting a weekend project to pave a small area outside the kitchen window and to add a few planters, a bistro set and a fragrant vine. Such easy-to-relate vignettes are not meant to be landscape designer-level home improvements -- just weekend things they can do to brighten up their life.
Whatever the purpose, the impulse will be lost if customers have to wait for an employee to be free, or look around for more choice of that certain plant, search high and low for product names, prices, sizes and so on.
Record it
Successful retailers (and progressive suppliers) take photos of good and bad merchandising for future reference and training. Keeping a portfolio of winners and losers saves time and money in future years; surprisingly few companies do this as a matter of standard operating procedure.
Measure it
As you plan and build a display, someone has to set the expectations.
Will we be happy if it all sells in a week, two weeks, a month? What are we comparing success with, the display that just sat there all summer last year? What is the minimum dollar volume needed to pay the cost of the space? Is this display meant to be shopped and turned or merely to get people to look at it just so we can get them to enter this somewhat dark greenhouse? Is the display tied to an event or an ad that has a limited time appeal, or can we spend more time on it as it will be there all summer with the odd makeover? When do we admit failure? What exactly is the point at which to admit it hasn’t worked?
Move it!
For years the department stores have worked on the estimation that every time you move a display you will sell at least 15 percent more, and I have no reason to doubt that figure.
Just by moving it a display gets refreshed, people take notice (“Oh, I didn’t know you carried those”) and it seems new to browsers who may have been looking at the other side of the aisle last time they were there.
Fun or ho-hum in the sun
Summer in the garden center can be hot and grueling for employees and customers alike. The zeal of spring is over and both parties need to refresh attitudes and expectations. Whether it is a weekend project or decorating for a neighborhood party, let’s make it easy for customers with impulsive yet relevant merchandising. Differentiate your store by the success rate of your customers.
Ian’s display guidelines
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Do |
Don’t |
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Make sure there is enough product volume in the display (or adjacent to it) to last until re-stocking. |
Block traffic and hide vistas with high or solid displays. |
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Slope low to high, front to back, middle to side. Make a bowl of beauty. |
Sell small, high-value lines on the floor where they get lost or trashed. |
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Use demand items to lead shoppers to tables and down aisles. |
Put low-margin or browse products on endcaps. |
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Use big, bold signs/displays in vistas. Make a Wow! to draw people. |
Send too many messages at once. |
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Decide theme message contents and props before you start building. |
Try to educate at every display. It’s a grab-and-go world. |
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Use bold color combinations. |
Display onesie-twosie with small products. |
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Remember there is more than one side to most displays. Think 360 as you build. |
Overdo the tie-ins; just show the best one for success. |
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Use short, motivating, emotive words in signs. |
Spread single-piece statues or fountains around the store; mass for comparison and convenience. |
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Use mature specimen plants as living labels. |
Let everyone build a display or write a sign. |
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Make project displays easy, fun and relevant. |
Be too proud to admit it isn’t selling. |
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- Ian Baldwin
June 2008