While trends are shifting dramatically to online shopping, high-traffic display locations at brick-and-mortar retailers are becoming key branding and sales drivers. Endcaps, sidecaps, and free-standing displays are prime real estate locations of any retail store. Like window displays of the past, brands are using these visible and high traffic spaces to gain brand recognition and a larger share of sales with a more focused and less engaged shopper.
Unsurprisingly, brands are applying marketing acumen and greater creativity to make their displays bigger and bolder, every year, much to the delight of customers and profits alike.
But as the value of these display locations increases, so does the cost to produce these show-stoppers.
Gone are the days where retailers purchased a second display location, stocked its shelves or pegs, and let it be. Now, walking past the displays is a full-blown customer experience similar to shopping department store dinosaurs.
Don’t get us wrong – we love the showmanship we see brands applying to their displays. But we also spend hundreds of hours in retailers every week and we also see the dark side of the displays – poor execution.
Poor Execution is Not an Option
Promotional displays don’t come cheap. A prime location in the retailer alone can cost tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars
When you pay that much for a location, not to mention the additional cost to create an engaging display, you don’t just expect an increase in sales and brand awareness – you need it.
Unfortunately, only 50% of inline POGs are set on time and executed correctly, this percentage takes a steep dive when the location is a secondary placement, like a promotional endcap display where industry average execution rates are 40% or less.
If your inventory doesn’t make it to that pricy display, you lose out on sales. If it’s priced incorrectly, your profit margins suffer. And if the display doesn’t match your perfectly planned planogram vision, you risk making a poor brand impression.
Fortunately, that’s where 3rd-party Merchandisers like RMS come in.
3rd Party Merchandisers – Your In-Store Support Team
Retail employees are busy looking after hundreds of brands as well as shoppers, online orders, and curbside pick-up options. They simply don’t have the time, nor is it their job, to make sure your promotional display is set perfectly, every minute of every day. Unfortunately, that means there will be gaps in display perfection, which leads to a loss in sales and brand impressions.
Retail merchandisers like yours truly can drive execution rates by paying personal attention to your displays in every store, making sure your store-level dollars are getting stretched as far as they can go.
Even with the rise in ecommerce, in-store shopping is still where 65% of shopping budgets are spent. At the same time, customers are looking for more out of their in-store shopping experiences and brands are finding success by embracing creative displays and large-scale marketing campaigns.
With this many retail dollars at stake, brands simply can’t afford not to go into stores and audit their displays. But it’s typically cost-prohibitive for brands to do this at every store.
By partnering with a 3rd-party retail merchandiser, you can get the cost per store down to affordable rates and keep the impact on your brand and your bottom line, high.
Maximize Your Store-Level Dollars with RMS
Like anyone, we love a good deal, which is why we developed our Snap! Audit service, exclusively for Target suppliers.
Start with an audit that makes sure your display is engaging, inventory is stocked exactly where it should be, and priced correctly. If anything is amiss, we can fix it on site. And the best part? Unlike other 3rd-party merchandisers, our pricing starts at less than $10 per store, ensuring that you can gain peace of mind and only pay for needed additional services.
Book a free 15-minute consultation to learn more about our tiered services.
