Tag Archives: Retail

Waiting

Kings Cross Station concourse, shortly to be ripped up to make way for another retail ‘destination’ crossed with a railway terminus.

The floor, which is grim indeed got me thinking about change in buildings. These ‘queue’ lanes have been here since the last time it was re-designed (80′s?). The idea is that everyone neatly lines up for their train in designated lane.

How very British. First come first serve, rather than the every man for himself dash of today. The lanes are now redundant. Too higher volume of passengers for them to work.

So now we await a new design. The question that intrigues me is how traveler’s will be serviced in 30 years time? What will we be doing differently at transport hubs that can’t be anticipated right now.

Will King Cross avoid the curse of the queue lane.

Retail – Part Two

GETTING REAL

So perhaps you’re a relatively small business. Perhaps your aim is to pinch a bit of market share. How do you go about taking your great idea to the high street, or any street.

I guess I could reel off a list of retail focuses or principles that you could follow in order to create your perfect store.

The obvious, but probably wrong idea is to try to emulate the big multinationals you most admire. You might scour the internet looking for great retail tips from industry insiders. Walk their stores to get ideas.

In the interests of research I did some hunting myself. Here’s some ‘tips’ I found. For some reason ideas in sets of four are popular.

-Location
-Location
-Location
-Location

-Shopfront/window
-Store Layout
-Ambience
-Category Management

-Top sellers first
-Navigation – Clear customer journey
-Secondary purchase or Up-selling
-Lighting

-‘Totality’
-Focal points
-Ease of shopping
-Flexibility

-Welcome/Invitation to enter
-Materials
-Layout and signage
-Visual Merchandising

-Supply chain value
-Experience
-Service
-People/Staff

-Brand expression
-Measurement and analysis
-Market relevance
-Graphic language

All great stuff here, but I reckon it probably wouldn’t help much. Too much jargon, Too generic. Too one size fits all. If you come to the market without a remarkable product or way of doing business at retail, then these lists are all you have to fall back on.

The point is, by being small, you can do things your bigger competitors can’t. The agile, change driven, cheap prototype mindset common to many small companies, is exactly the spirit to approach retail with.

Assuming you’ve developed a way to be disruptive in your market, the task of developing a unique trading space will be so much simpler.

Why not visit the tried and tested rulebook at the end instead. Use the industry standard as a benchmark for how far you’ve come when you look back. Focus on your ‘purpose idea’ and deliver the tricks of your bigger competitiors through the lens of your own talkable innovation. Forget about being big and concentrate on being truly outstanding. Big will come on its own later.

As a stand-out growing business, a better list of things to think about might relate to how you will deal with the growth your amazing idea will bring. What about thinking much longer term?

-How will you gear up to cope with volume?

-Do you have the supply chain systems in place and the inventory to keep you store full?

-Do you have an unrelenting focus on product design, quality and innovation that will drive the customer to keep coming back?

-If retail is partly about theatre, why would you put on the same show time after time. Can you design a space that will change over time?

-Could everyone in the company spend some time on the shop floor, communicating your idea and spreading the word? Shops should be about people and connection. How do you customers interact with your products? What can you learn?

-Don’t assume that the mass market has the same world view as your early adopters. They almost certainly won’t. How will your message and products need to change to address a new audience?

In my experience the transition from niche player to a more established proposition known by the masses often coincides with a need to ‘do’ retail. Perhaps its your first store or you are jumping from 1 or 2 shops to 10 or 20. It’s the hardest leap to make.

You will tread the fine line between losing the credibility of your devoted tribe, and gaining the appeal of a much broader audience. If you think longer term and look at your store as a research space, not just a distribution point, it can become and remain relevant as your company makes this transition.

Picture Above – Here’s as small business with a great idea, a solid online presence and shop that acts as a front for the main office and production facility. Nobrow might not need a further high street presence. Their space is simple. Its a gallery and that suits what they sell. They also turn it into an exhibition space for events to launch new products and ideas. The products are the prime focus.

If they grow however, they have to figure out how to keep the essence of what they have. A one on one with the owners, and the knowledge they hold about their business and their products is the most difficult thing to scale. Thats the magic of the existing shop. You need to avoid scripting the interaction between your people and your customers when you grow.

Retail – Part One

TELL YOUR STORY

On a memorable holiday a few years ago, I stumbled across a small town while camping in the foothills behind St Tropez. All week my partner and I had been sampling local food and travelling the twisty roads through cork plantations, the smell of Mediterranean pine drifting on the breeze.

Travellers I think are a bit like shoppers. Both aim to try to get a handle on something, be it a place or a product. They try to make sense of things and to understand. They want a story that will explain what they are seeing. A good story that will justify their purchase or their trip. A story they can tell their friends about.

We came to a small hilltop town, with a bustling market in full swing. Here, the whole region came together for us. The people, the local food stalls, shops tucked into basements that flanked a small square, artists painting portraits, and a happy mix of residents and outsiders. To all of this was a backdrop of the towns buildings old and new that tracked the journey of this place over time.

This was a normal weekend for the locals, but for us, with images of the sterilised corporate highstreets of home in our heads, it was a revelation. Trade and commerce did more than just make money. It brought a whole community of people together.

The village described how selling and shopping, trade in essence was part of a bigger picture for this place. The landscape, produce, products, people and district came together. It was an experience of ‘totality’ (1) that any corporate retailer would be desperate to bottle. A seamless story without any awkward gaps.

This is a fanciful example right? This was small scale economic activity. Not the sort of trade that supports a scalable retail business. That’s not important here yet though. I know it doesn’t paint the full picture of food retailing in France, or anywhere near it. I use this example because its a powerful piece of storytelling and it hooked me.

The village of Ramatuelle did an amazing job of ‘marketing’ the St Tropez peninsula and its way of life. So did its shops, restaurants and stall holders. Everything about it was a perfect ‘fit’.

‘Marketing’ then is what your store should be about. Your goods might not be locally made but their design, their manufacture, and the story of how you brought them to market can be just as compelling, provided you have a genuine tale, that isn’t fabricated.

Ramatuelle was remarkable, at least to me. It stood out as different. The experience resonated because it told a truth, at least one that I wanted to hear. That local food production was still alive and well in Southern France. Never mind evidence to the contrary. The story was right for me at that time. The challenge for your business is to be amazing enough that you too can tell a story.

What’s the genuine purpose that drives your company? What’s your big idea, your amazing product, your revolutionary service? It might not be radical, but its got to be a ‘talkable innovation’ (2). This should be driving your store design and everything you do in it. Ideally this point of difference ‘is’ your store design.

If your company has a real ‘purpose idea’ (3) the story you tell will be real and authentic. It will help your potential customer get a handle on what you do. It will help them make sense of you. If you haven’t got a ‘purpose idea’ you need one.

Picture Above – I bought this bottle of olive oil in Ramatuelle. The shop was entirely devoted to the sale of olive oil. The owner spent 5 minutes with you, one on one. You went through the different types, like you would at a wine tasting. Not only did you come out with a bottle of your favourite, but you learn’t something about Olive oil. What was the higher purpose of this business? For me it was a sense of being educated. That was the free prize.

References;

1 – International Retail Marketing – A Case Study Approach – 2004 Edited by Margaret Burce, Christopher Moore, Grete Birtwistle

2 – Jon Jantsch – The Referral Engine

3 – Welcome to the Creative Age – Banana’s, Business and the Death of Marketing – 2002 – Mark Earls

Featuring Recent Posts WordPress Widget development by YD