Store Layout
Follow Ramesh Shingadia on his journey to refit his convenience store!
So…he finally got there!
Londis retailer Ramesh Shingadia of Southwater, West Sussex, one of Partners for Growth’s Retailer Advisory Panel, officially unveiled his new look store on Saturday 26 April 2014.
The ‘do’ attracted a huge crowd from the local community, including the local MP Francis Maude and the previous Postmaster, and featured door ‘buster deals’, face painting, food and drink tastings, champagne, goody bags and a lot of intrigued customers.
The journey from 1800 sq ft store to 2,400 sq ft village ‘hub’, incorporating the village Post Office, has taken 18-months to plan and carry out and has involved months of upheaval, including a four-week shutdown and lots of hard work from lots of people.
The Scale and Scope of it
The store has had a complete revamp, with the plan based around customers’ key shopper missions. Ramesh was always keen that his store layout reflected this and asked the Unilever Partners for Growth team to help with the layout and look and feel of his store, to ensure the best overall shopper experience for his customers.
Ramesh managed the whole refit process himself, and in addition to help from Unilever’s experts, Ramesh also worked closely with Musgrave stores, architects, structural engineers, builders, plumbers and countless other tradesmen, CCTV and fire alarm suppliers, bank managers and the local parish council, and not forgetting staff and customers.
He uncovered issues – including problems with the cellar and rotten floorboards – and gained various learning’s on the way. The importance of getting staff and customers on board, the need to keep them informed and the benefits of using the store’s existing assets are just a few of these.
‘Mission’ Accomplished!
But eventually, it all came together. The front of store is now more open and ‘shopper mission based’, making it much easier for customers to find what they are looking for – and often things they didn’t know they needed.
A new post office counter has launched, and Post office drop off is now available seven days a week.
And the really good news is that Ramesh can already report a 20% like-for-like increase in sales!
The Partners for Growth team are going back in to carry out some more shopper research, to see how shoppers are now shopping the store. We’ll also be talking with some of his customers to see how they think the shop has changed.
The Perfect Store
Convenience retailers know that making the most of their store means understanding what their customers want from it. The better you do this, the more profitable and successful your business will be.
Shopper Missions
Unilever research to find the “perfect store” layout for convenience stores shows that if you’re cramming your store with products and crowding your windows with promotional activity, you’re going wrong…
