I was talking with a newsagent yesterday who had decided to bring in a visual merchandiser each fortnight to create stunning displays in their shop. Their plan is to spend $145.00 each fortnight on the visits. They chose the merchandiser because they have experience with David Jones.
While a visual merchandiser with David Jones experience sounds good, I doubt the relevance to a local independent shop, like a newsagency. I’d want to know their independent retail experience and what they think they could do in my shop, with what I have. They might create nice displays that get customer comments and make you feel good. The key would be whether the displays generate the revenue you need.
Department store experienced Visual Merchandisers tend to focus on brand-centred displays. Best practice today is not brand-centred displays. Rather, best practice displays today tell a story across multiple brands.
Rather than hiring a visual merchandiser for the newsagency, my advice is to do it yourself. Displays need to change regularly, more often than each fortnight. Changes daily are the key to an ever evolving business.
Most newsagents I talk with say they can’t do displays.
Everyone can do VM!
Here is my advice for someone who have never created a display before.
- Start with a clean space, a flat surface, in a good location.
- The best display looks like a pyramid.
- Your hero product is at the top of the pyramid.
- If the display is for a season or some other sign-post event, the poster should be placed with the display so shoppers can see it without having to look for it.
- Flowing from the hero product down to the base of the display are other products. But not so many that you can’t see what you want people to see.
- The display is balanced, even.
- A display of gifts always includes cards.
- If the display is promoting homewares the pyramid approach is not needed. Instead, go for something that looks more natural, like in the home.
- Use coloured paper to highlight certain products. But don’t go for a rainbow.
- From a colour perspective, a good display has no more than two core colours as the focus.
- A display can look untidy and that is okay in some circumstances. For example, a box of Beanie Boos exploding from a box .
- Mistakes are okay.
- Oh, and don’t treat this as an engineering challenge. Keep it simple and fun! :
Take your time, have fun.
Remember, the alternative is no display at all, or you spending $145.00 a fortnight for someone who does not know your shop or your customers coming in and creating something beautiful.
In my opinion, the best displays have a narrative relevant to the business, a story or purpose. This is code for saying I am not a fan of single product or single supplier displays. suppliers love these, of course, as they are a billboard for them. What suits them will likely not suit you.
A good display is a collection of items from multiple suppliers, categories and segments that make sense together, from which a shopper could choose several for a gift, or for themselves. Choosing the items for the display us you curating the display, making editorial choices to tell the story you want to sell.
Leave the display up for one week, two at the absolute maximum. Having a length of time for which a display will be live helps you allocate appropriate time for the creation of the display. if you are not sure how long to spend on it, set yourself and hour tops. Get it done within that time.
Once you’ve done a display, if you are new to this, ask for opinions. Learn. Each display will be an improvement on the last.