Summary
• Some merchants have misconceptions about self-selection areas.
• Tradesmen like to “see” and touch products.
• Bigger and better shop areas can reduce staff involvement.

We started running merchandising and shop layout courses for merchants more than 20 years ago and came up with a definition for merchandising as: “putting products in danger of being sold” which is a deceptively simple expression.

But, in order for them to be so, customers need to know you stock ‘it’ and the easiest way is to let them see and touch ‘it’, without being able to nick ‘it’! The theft issue is often over-rated because if you locate the most vulnerable, (smaller/high-value) items close to and in view of the trade counter and use appropriate security gizmos for things like power tools and accessories, then the sales increase usually far outweighs any theft.

Another misconception about self-selection areas (SSAs) is that they are primarily for the retail customer. However, research shows that tradesmen also respond positively to the right sort of SSA. This misconception tends to lead merchants to have a small area dedicated to the small, pretty, retail/DIY products presented on shop-centre, low-level gondolas in small quantities with a bit of 2.2m high shop-shelving around the perimeter and a host of ‘free’ manufacturers’ point of sale (PoS) stands. This creates a corner DIY shop image that confirms to tradesman (70-80% of calling customers) that you have ‘gone DIY’ and it’s not particularly relevant to them. In addition, the sort of retail customer that comes to a merchant is often described as the ‘professional DIYer’ – ie, the 30% of DIYers who represent 66% of the DIY spend. They are not looking for a DIY shop, they want to buy where the trade buy, so it needs to have a trade feel. Think twice about putting in a suspended ceiling – they are not cheap, create a retail feel and reduce valuable cubic capacity display area.

Creating atmosphere

Trade feel? Well, remember you can merchandise anything that a merchant stocks, given a bit of ingenuity and the right kit. These not-so-pretty-but-trade-bread-and-butter products tend to be less nickable but create a more macho, trade, atmosphere. They often don’t fit easily onto traditional shop-shelving – the alternative is to use the integrated shelving systems, which have evolved using a combination of long-span or even pallet racking, and heavy-duty shop shelving components, plus specialist merchandising components. These enable the effective and professional merchandising of the full range of merchant products, in impressive volumes, and create that elusive trade atmosphere. The bonus is that the professional DIYer will love it too.

Space is often an issue when developing SSAs – the one thing you can be sure of is that, in the longer term, you will not have enough! You should be looking at expanding space as much as possible by getting rid of those back-up storage areas, combining them into a larger SSA, merchandising your whole range, and putting it “in danger of being sold”.

Cost reduction

The spin-off benefit to this braver approach to SSAs is a reduction in your cost to sell – ie, it will reduce unnecessary staff involvement in sales, allowing them to give a better service to those customers who really need it, plus your related item sales will increase. Doing this, you will have created a trade, assisted self-selection operation – the return on this type of investment is very high.

A simple recommendation for this type of development is to use the building height wherever possible and landscape your sales area, by going high around the perimeter (3m, 3.5m, 4m or even higher), using the area above 2.5m for bulk stocks, informative displays and signage. Then step down to 2.5m/3m for, say, half the shop centre, then drop down to a 1.5m gondola near the trade counter for visibility and higher-risk-merchandising, (you can even create counter-linked ‘corrals’ for these products). Make sure you design in some plinths for bulk displays near the door and counter and on gondola ends. Put your merchandise into logical, rather than manufacturer, groups and create ‘shop-in-shop’ areas by merchandising them either side of an aisle, using high demand lines to generate traffic flow past your lower demand lines. And encourage staff to get out amongst the products and customers.

A free CSD Shop Layout Checklist is available on request from ashley@csd-associates.co.uk