Opening a Retail Store...
Discussion
Morning,
We're looking to open a "Destination Store" in the Southwest and currently have a large open square space earmarked within existing property used for our online retail operation. Before I start traipsing the internet for generic advice I wanted to put something on here and see if anybody with retail experience can offer advice/help...
We are currently designing the basic layout of the space, however with no prior "Bricks and Mortar" retail experience its all relatively new.
FYI the store is approx 5000sqft and we'll be selling regular sized boxed goods, with various exciting display areas.
So:
- Planning/Design: Make it up as we feel fit, with the help of our suppliers and the POS they can offer? OR employ a professional to help create a design? Any recommendations of firms if the latter?
- Product Display/Storage: The space is very open, thus will require a lot of freestanding Gondolas etc. Any recommendation of suppliers or systems to avoid?
- Counter/POS Area. How have you optimised this space? Solid branded units or Display Cabinets for high value product? How many customers pay by cash? Have you tried cashless mobile POS devices such as Apple use?
- If you trade online do you operate a successful "Click and Collect"?
Struggling to think of many questions this morning and understand it varies hugely between industries etc, however appreciate anybody chipping in with advice or suggestions.
Cheers,
Russ
We're looking to open a "Destination Store" in the Southwest and currently have a large open square space earmarked within existing property used for our online retail operation. Before I start traipsing the internet for generic advice I wanted to put something on here and see if anybody with retail experience can offer advice/help...
We are currently designing the basic layout of the space, however with no prior "Bricks and Mortar" retail experience its all relatively new.
FYI the store is approx 5000sqft and we'll be selling regular sized boxed goods, with various exciting display areas.
So:
- Planning/Design: Make it up as we feel fit, with the help of our suppliers and the POS they can offer? OR employ a professional to help create a design? Any recommendations of firms if the latter?
- Product Display/Storage: The space is very open, thus will require a lot of freestanding Gondolas etc. Any recommendation of suppliers or systems to avoid?
- Counter/POS Area. How have you optimised this space? Solid branded units or Display Cabinets for high value product? How many customers pay by cash? Have you tried cashless mobile POS devices such as Apple use?
- If you trade online do you operate a successful "Click and Collect"?
Struggling to think of many questions this morning and understand it varies hugely between industries etc, however appreciate anybody chipping in with advice or suggestions.
Cheers,
Russ
JPJPJP said:
Get the suppliers of the products you intend to sell very heavily involved in the merchandising etc.
Yes all over that, started the ball rolling with my main suppliers in Jan. Sounds good so far with several looking to get quite heavily involved. However I do not want it to become a complete mix n match of fixtures/fittings - so am wanting to come up with our own cohesive design to give said suppliers some direction.
what are others in your sector (or comparable sectors) doing
- do they have experience areas (e.g. outdoors clothing type stores where you can try on walking boots etc.)
- is it rack them high and sell them cheap
- is it simply a display area you will fulfil from the warehouse - etc. etc.
There is quite a lot of psychology in retail, but if you are selling your online goods in a store that is different from running a retail store alone...
- there is an approach in retail where you analyse the profitability of each space in the store - supermarkets are good at this - and some areas are better sellers - so you charge suppliers a premium to be stocked there etc. is that applicable
- there is psychology in the buyer process - how you move them around the store etc.
also, think about how you sell items - e.g. the tricky question for those fulfilling from the same stock for online and store - if you have one coat left and I put it in my basket online and pay for it do I get it - or does bob who has walked into your store and taken it off the rack and is holding that same coat - does he get it... tricky when he walks to the counter and you tell him that you can't sell him what he is holding because the computer says it is no longer in stock (because it was bought online!) - simplest approach is usually that the online person doesn't get it until it is packed / dispatched - but you need to work out the best logic and how to present that to not upset people!
lots to consider
- do they have experience areas (e.g. outdoors clothing type stores where you can try on walking boots etc.)
- is it rack them high and sell them cheap
- is it simply a display area you will fulfil from the warehouse - etc. etc.
There is quite a lot of psychology in retail, but if you are selling your online goods in a store that is different from running a retail store alone...
- there is an approach in retail where you analyse the profitability of each space in the store - supermarkets are good at this - and some areas are better sellers - so you charge suppliers a premium to be stocked there etc. is that applicable
- there is psychology in the buyer process - how you move them around the store etc.
also, think about how you sell items - e.g. the tricky question for those fulfilling from the same stock for online and store - if you have one coat left and I put it in my basket online and pay for it do I get it - or does bob who has walked into your store and taken it off the rack and is holding that same coat - does he get it... tricky when he walks to the counter and you tell him that you can't sell him what he is holding because the computer says it is no longer in stock (because it was bought online!) - simplest approach is usually that the online person doesn't get it until it is packed / dispatched - but you need to work out the best logic and how to present that to not upset people!
lots to consider
Paul Dishman said:
I've started up two pharmacies, one from scratch and one a transfer from smaller premises. I used professional shopfitters who drew up plans incorporating my ideas. Letting suppliers merchandise a store sounds like a recipe for a dogs dinner to me.
For sure, hence why wanting to create an overall theme /design and giving this to suppliers to see how they can fit in. Had a meeting today with a local design company - went well.
designforlife said:
I used to work for a retail display/design/shopfitting company based in Highbridge, Somerset (I'm a retail display designer by trade)... If you like I can PM you some details.
I worked with a guy who left to become a shopfitter and run his own business. He told me he had a call from one of his customers six months after he fitted it out. They had closed down and wanted him to come and strip it out again and give him his money back.It seemed the concept had failed and the only person to blame but himself was the shop fitter. He was told him in no uncertain terms to Foxtrot Oscar.
DSLiverpool said:
Russ just a left field input, for a feature wall or attraction point look at exhibition stand builders.
This isn’t the shelves and stuff it’s maybe a scalextric mini coming out of the wall etc.
Expo chippys and designers are awesome.
Yes, thats a good shout - spent a lot of time at exhibitions recently and was blown away with the design of some of the stands - so can see where you are coming from. This isn’t the shelves and stuff it’s maybe a scalextric mini coming out of the wall etc.
Expo chippys and designers are awesome.
Cheers.
Think about staff numbers and how they're going to man the floor and for what percentage of time of their working day. A lot of small companies think "well I can afford x amount of staff over y amount of days that'll give me z amount of floor time".
Shops don't really work like that. Lego as you'll know have a good method, meet and greet at the door (good for security as little fingers like to take little things), roving "helpers" and till staff.
A mate's old clothes store had a similar method, with one person "out-back/downstairs" looking after stock. This person was key, as it meant they only needed one item on the shop floor for people to look at while he controlled the stock downstairs in an area that was dirt cheap for rates etc, next to office/staff room. If you already have a pro web portal, the staff upstairs can be logged onto this telling customers what stock they have left/different colours etc.
All of this creates a really streamlined process for buying and selling. The downside for small businesses is it means still having a full quota of staff in on a tuesday morning when you're quiet. Plus the ability to replace the downstairs guy should he phone in sick/be on holiday.
Shops don't really work like that. Lego as you'll know have a good method, meet and greet at the door (good for security as little fingers like to take little things), roving "helpers" and till staff.
A mate's old clothes store had a similar method, with one person "out-back/downstairs" looking after stock. This person was key, as it meant they only needed one item on the shop floor for people to look at while he controlled the stock downstairs in an area that was dirt cheap for rates etc, next to office/staff room. If you already have a pro web portal, the staff upstairs can be logged onto this telling customers what stock they have left/different colours etc.
All of this creates a really streamlined process for buying and selling. The downside for small businesses is it means still having a full quota of staff in on a tuesday morning when you're quiet. Plus the ability to replace the downstairs guy should he phone in sick/be on holiday.
LaurasOtherHalf said:
Think about staff numbers and how they're going to man the floor and for what percentage of time of their working day. A lot of small companies think "well I can afford x amount of staff over y amount of days that'll give me z amount of floor time".
Shops don't really work like that. Lego as you'll know have a good method, meet and greet at the door (good for security as little fingers like to take little things), roving "helpers" and till staff.
A mate's old clothes store had a similar method, with one person "out-back/downstairs" looking after stock. This person was key, as it meant they only needed one item on the shop floor for people to look at while he controlled the stock downstairs in an area that was dirt cheap for rates etc, next to office/staff room. If you already have a pro web portal, the staff upstairs can be logged onto this telling customers what stock they have left/different colours etc.
All of this creates a really streamlined process for buying and selling. The downside for small businesses is it means still having a full quota of staff in on a tuesday morning when you're quiet. Plus the ability to replace the downstairs guy should he phone in sick/be on holiday.
Yes, this is one of my next tasks. The problem we face is that a lot of our product is quite specialised and it'll be hard work for all staff members to have such specialisation in all areas - thus during peak times it would be important to almost have staff for specific areas of the store. Shops don't really work like that. Lego as you'll know have a good method, meet and greet at the door (good for security as little fingers like to take little things), roving "helpers" and till staff.
A mate's old clothes store had a similar method, with one person "out-back/downstairs" looking after stock. This person was key, as it meant they only needed one item on the shop floor for people to look at while he controlled the stock downstairs in an area that was dirt cheap for rates etc, next to office/staff room. If you already have a pro web portal, the staff upstairs can be logged onto this telling customers what stock they have left/different colours etc.
All of this creates a really streamlined process for buying and selling. The downside for small businesses is it means still having a full quota of staff in on a tuesday morning when you're quiet. Plus the ability to replace the downstairs guy should he phone in sick/be on holiday.
However our store will be built into one end of an existing building that houses our online retail business, thus with thoughtful design and positioning we could share resources between the two during really quiet times of the day. i.e the counter will be directly accessible via a door from the customer service office. So it's possible that during quiet times of the year (and day) that store staff numbers can be supported by also "quiet" online customer support agents if necessary.
Stock - as we have existing stock management systems in place for online selling, the store can be added as another sales channel and be handled by existing buyers and in a lot of cases stock can be replenished straight from large online stock reserves.
Clearly this creates other issues as per another poster pointed out earlier, i.e who gets priority on stock etc? But our system has functionality where you easily zone, allocate and buffer stock between various channels - which already works well with the channels we currently sell through - so hopefully we should be well equipped to deal with this when we have decided and created the different priority rules etc.
Cheers...
russy01 said:
Clearly this creates other issues as per another poster pointed out earlier, i.e who gets priority on stock etc? But our system has functionality where you easily zone, allocate and buffer stock between various channels - which already works well with the channels we currently sell through - so hopefully we should be well equipped to deal with this when we have decided and created the different priority rules etc.
the example I quoted is actually quite easy to sort out - e.g. the online is only sold once you go into dispatch - therefore the shop floor gets priority... it is more that it is important to think through these things - and it seems as though you are already being very thoughtful - good luck, sounds fun!russy01 said:
Yes, this is one of my next tasks. The problem we face is that a lot of our product is quite specialised and it'll be hard work for all staff members to have such specialisation in all areas - thus during peak times it would be important to almost have staff for specific areas of the store.
However our store will be built into one end of an existing building that houses our online retail business, thus with thoughtful design and positioning we could share resources between the two during really quiet times of the day. i.e the counter will be directly accessible via a door from the customer service office. So it's possible that during quiet times of the year (and day) that store staff numbers can be supported by also "quiet" online customer support agents if necessary.
Stock - as we have existing stock management systems in place for online selling, the store can be added as another sales channel and be handled by existing buyers and in a lot of cases stock can be replenished straight from large online stock reserves.
Clearly this creates other issues as per another poster pointed out earlier, i.e who gets priority on stock etc? But our system has functionality where you easily zone, allocate and buffer stock between various channels - which already works well with the channels we currently sell through - so hopefully we should be well equipped to deal with this when we have decided and created the different priority rules etc.
Cheers...
Maybe get a few retired modellers in part time, bit like B&Q do with retired trades guys.However our store will be built into one end of an existing building that houses our online retail business, thus with thoughtful design and positioning we could share resources between the two during really quiet times of the day. i.e the counter will be directly accessible via a door from the customer service office. So it's possible that during quiet times of the year (and day) that store staff numbers can be supported by also "quiet" online customer support agents if necessary.
Stock - as we have existing stock management systems in place for online selling, the store can be added as another sales channel and be handled by existing buyers and in a lot of cases stock can be replenished straight from large online stock reserves.
Clearly this creates other issues as per another poster pointed out earlier, i.e who gets priority on stock etc? But our system has functionality where you easily zone, allocate and buffer stock between various channels - which already works well with the channels we currently sell through - so hopefully we should be well equipped to deal with this when we have decided and created the different priority rules etc.
Cheers...
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