When setting up your business or retail store you should always try to make sure
that the layout is structured in an attractive and high quality design. Image is absolutely everything when it comes to trying to persuade customers to buy something from your store, so you want to make it look the best it possibly can.
Visual merchandising and eye-catching displays are key to attracting customers, not only into your store but also to browse around it. Use creative and chic store fixtures as well as a perfect lighting system to really push your products out there, so that your really cant ignore them.
The main idea behind a store layout is to pull the customer around the store rather than pushing them. One of the biggest key performance indicators for any store layout is the average amount of time each customer spends in a store, as obviously the more time a customer spends looking around the more likely they are to buy something.
Finding the optimum shop layout is difficult and will take some trial and error to get it right, as a retailer no one can afford to scare off a customer and a well planned layout will really help maximise the sales for each part of your selling space within you business shop. There are other factors you also need to consider when deciding on an effective store layout, and these include things such as trying to minimise the risk of theft by reducing the number of enclosed or covered areas. Having a spacious and open plan space will make it much less likely that someone will attempt to steal your products.
You dont just want to create a place to display your products though; you also want to take your customers on a journey that will entice them to discover more products within your store. One way to do this is to create a buzz within the entrance of your store, this could be a brightly coloured counter offering tasters of a new food within your shop, as this could influence them to actually delve deeper into your store to buy that product.
Another important point to consider is to make your store as simple and easy to get around as possible. If you have odd angles or lots of corners within your store its going to put people off trying to look around and will make it hard for them to find what they are looking for.