Can the classic shelf be digital?

How shopfitting makes it from smart tools and digitization
to profit.

Bad Salzu­flen. (bre) Have you said good­bye yet? Have you alre­ady shel­ved your ideas for modern shop­fit­ting? No? Why not? Statio­nary retail is dying. And inves­t­ing in store fitting is a waste. At least, this is how it has been repea­ted over and over again in all media for some time now. Shop­pers now only shop online. Ever­y­thing is going digi­tal. Or?

How does that feel to you as a shop­fit­ter? They are sure to have crea­tive approa­ches and ideas for tomorrow’s store fixtures. The chall­enge facing the entire shop­fit­ting indus­try is to bring clas­sic shop­fit­ting into the digi­tal age.

The digi­tal world is omni­pre­sent. Just quickly order a new snea­ker — I can put toge­ther the design online and if I order today, the snea­ker will be with me tomor­row. I can also quickly add pizza and after-work beer to my shop­ping cart with a single click. Simply pay by PayPal or credit card and deli­very can perhaps even be set for a speci­fic time. What does this mean for statio­nary retail and thus for shop­fit­ting?

Touch and try…

One thing is certain: The market share of online retail­ing has grown rapidly in recent years. But does that mean the end for brick-and-mortar retail? Will shop­ping trans­form comple­tely? No! It is true that shop­ping beha­vior has chan­ged and will conti­nue to change. But accor­ding to a Statista survey, 86% of custo­mers rate the oppor­tu­nity to sample products in person by touch­ing or trying them out as the grea­test advan­tage of statio­nary retail. Perso­nal consul­ting is a close second. This is the oppor­tu­nity that brick-and-mortar retail­ers can and should seize. Espe­ci­ally you shop­fit­ting experts will agree.

The stage for products!

Haptics, visual stimuli and perso­nal advice are the driving argu­ments that draw custo­mers into stores. 84% of custo­mers aged 18–64 say they prefer to buy groce­ries in stores. For clot­hing and foot­wear, the figure is still 45%. The survey makes it clear that not every purchase is repla­ced by online offers. Food can be checked for fresh­ness and appearance. Taking the cold Coke from the shelf and perhaps spon­ta­neously deci­ding to also try another variety because it just feels so good can only be driven by anima­tion of the senses. Or feel the leather of the bag and check the seams for quality, works only directly on the object. For shop­fit­ting and retail, howe­ver, this also means: higher demands in store design. Products must be presen­ted in such a way that they can be found. If the
Product presen­ta­tion
appe­al­ing, custo­mers may reach for it two or three times. With the right presen­ta­tion solu­ti­ons, this turns any shelf into a real
Stage
for every product. In the best case, products sell so well that shel­ves need to be reple­nis­hed quickly. The Shelf in this case provi­des the presen­ta­tion area. But it is also possi­ble to turn the clas­sic into a modern infor­ma­tion tool with the help of digi­tal sensor tech­no­logy.

Pretty smart.…

This infor­ma­tion tool, the so-called
Smart Shelf
, is the link between the analog and the digi­tal world. Any clas­sic shelf can become a Smart Shelf. Prere­qui­site is the equip­ment with POS TUNING product feeders. In addi­tion, sensors, the so-called beacons, from
neoalto
. The feeds “piggy­back” on the sensors. With every move­ment of goods on the shelf, the perfor­mance of product place­ment can now be measu­red live. The data coll­ec­ted ends up in a cloud and can be queried from anywhere in real time. This makes it possi­ble to moni­tor and opti­mize merchan­dise avai­la­bi­lity for custo­mers or lost sales, plano­gram quality and also multi­ple place­ment in the market. How does my product perform? Where might some­thing need to be chan­ged in the place­ment? Which variety do custo­mers like best? The shelf can answer all these ques­ti­ons and offers you as a store buil­der exten­sive argu­ments for brin­ging the Smart Shelf to retail.

Linking tradi­tio­nal on-site shop­ping with the digi­tal world and turning it into an expe­ri­ence sounds like a chall­enge at first. But it only takes a few things to achieve these goals.

• Shelf auto­ma­tion: This not only saves time and labor. It also makes for happier custo­mers and more sales
• More space for opti­mal Product presen­ta­tion offer: Even small chan­ges to the appearance of the shelf can lead to more atten­tion
• Linking digi­tal and analog elements: This allows a myriad of infor­ma­tion to be drawn from the shelf space, provi­ding infor­ma­tion on elemen­tary buil­ding blocks for success. With this infor­ma­tion, brick-and-mortar retail can keep up with online retail.
• Take the chance to create a small expe­ri­ence land­scape out of every store design that turns custo­mers into fans.

No online retailer in the world can do that!

Shop­ping should be an expe­ri­ence. Many custo­mers combine their shop­ping with a varied excur­sion. The empha­sis here is on variety. The presen­ta­tion of products should be charac­te­ri­zed by inspi­ra­tion. It is no longer enough to simply put the shoes or the cans on the shelf and hope that custo­mers will alre­ady take the products. This is also no longer the opti­mum for retail­ers. Combi­ning digi­tal approa­ches with intel­li­gently used analog presen­ta­tion opens up new oppor­tu­ni­ties for custo­mers and retail­ers. This allows sales figu­res to be analy­zed and opti­mi­zed more precis­ely, custo­mer sales beha­vior to be moni­to­red, and purcha­sing proces­ses to be stee­red in the right direc­tion. And this works with the clas­sic shelf! Only the clas­sic shelf provi­des the stage for the products custo­mers need to touch and try. No online retailer in the world can do that. And this is where the hour strikes for you as a store fitting expert: Thin­king about shop­fit­ting is not yesterday’s news! Intel­li­gent presen­ta­tion solu­ti­ons, can turn any shelf or store furni­ture into a digi­tal treasure trove of know­ledge. Now the present can be linked with the future and this only works hand in hand with shop­fit­ting.