With the rise of e-commerce, many omni-channel retailers may be investing more time and effort into their online shopfronts at the expense of their physical ones. But that can prove to be a huge mistake: up to 70% of customers still prefer to make their final shopping decisions at a physical store! That being said, the design of your retail shop can significantly impact customer experience and the likelihood of conversion. How, then, do you go about designing your retail shop like a pro? Let us share some top tips in this article.
Floor Plan
As your floor plan will direct the flow of traffic around your store, this is the most crucial aspect of designing your retail shop. While coming up with a plan, you have to take into consideration existing structures such as display shelves and racks as well as the checkout counter. Most retail stores follow a basic loop pattern in an anticlockwise direction, accounting for the fact that most customers turn right immediately after entering a store.
Hence, it goes without saying that the “decompression zone” of your store – where your customer will first step into – is extremely important. You only get one chance to make a first impression, hence putting visually appealing displays here would be a good choice. To the right, where most customers will start their journey in your store, is considered a high-impact area where you may want to display your most popular merchandise.
Guiding your customers on a path doesn’t have to be direct and intrusive – this is often achieved by positioning racks and displays in the path you want your customers to follow. Another factor to consider is where you want your checkout counter to be: most stores place this directly opposite the entrance as the perfect midpoint between customers who decide to end their shopping journeys halfway and those who complete it.
Strategic Merchandise Displays
A time-old tactic for merchandise displays has always been to place items in strategic locations around the store, where customers are most likely to make impulse purchases. This can be as simple as placing related items together, such as cutlery sets next to the pans that are on sale this month.
Another popular strategy is to place several low-cost items next to the checkout counter, sometimes on shelves and racks that are positioned to guide the queue. The goal here is to increase the number of impulse purchases made by customers, or pop something into their minds they didn’t know they were looking for.
Besides the two top tips we have shared above, another important aspect of your retail shop design comes right down to the color and material of your indoor environment. If you already have a specific look in mind for your store or would like a recommendation, please do not hesitate to contact us at Materials Inc. We are a leading provider of a wide range of materials for wall surfaces, veneers and flooring and no project is too big or small for us. Having handled numerous corporate and residential interior design projects with great success, we strive to do the same for you!