Unpopular bend zone: How do you make your products visible?

Bad Salzuflen, 19.03.2021. It’s quite strange: some products are real bestsellers — they have hardly arrived on the shelves and are already sold out again. Another product, on the other hand, remains almost unnoticed and is hardly seen by the customer. What is the reason for this? Is it the product — the brand — that is decisive for whether the impulse to buy takes place or is it the design of the packaging or something else entirely?

The market rese­arch company POS Pulse got to the bottom of the ques­tion of product percep­tion and found some asto­nis­hing and exci­ting results. A so-called product check was carried out via the Streets­potr app. The cate­go­ries exami­ned were soft drinks, sweets, body care, crisps and snacks.

All the results have one thing in common: across all the cate­go­ries surveyed, eye-catching pack­a­ging was the main reason for consciously noti­cing the brand or product. The eye-catching designs of the well-known labels achieve such visual strength that the custo­mer, almost without thin­king, simply reaches for it. For soft drinks, almost 50% of respond­ents said that the pack­a­ging is the most noti­ceable. The figu­res for the other cate­go­ries are simi­lar (confec­tion­ery 32.65%, drugs­tore 41.67% and snacks 40.82%).

Of course, brand aware­ness is also an important aspect. Espe­ci­ally in confec­tion­ery, custo­mers are brand loyal and connec­ted to the product. The market leaders from Mond­elēz, Ferrero and Lindt are the eye-catchers on the shelf. Supported, also by strikin­gly desi­gned adver­ti­sing displays, the market presence is under­li­ned again and again. More than 20% of respond­ents consciously notice these displays and cite them as the reason why they noti­ced the brand.

The analy­sis of the percep­tion in the diffe­rent shelf zones is really exci­ting. Inte­res­t­ing results can be read in the so-called bend, reach, stretch and view zones. In the cate­go­ries soft drinks and chips/snacks, 8.16% of the respond­ents say that the place­ment in the grip zone is a reason for brand percep­tion. For drugs­tore products, it is even almost 13 %.

So what does this mean for retailers?

One thing is certain: design and brand aware­ness are impulse gene­ra­tors in the purchase decis­ion. But: as before, this study under­lines that people can only buy what they see. If you look at the diffe­rent figu­res in the indi­vi­dual shelf zones, it beco­mes clear that the place­ment of the products on the shelf plays a decisive role in product percep­tion.

In order to better understand the figures, it is important to become familiar once again with the individual shelf zones:

The stret­ching zone is loca­ted in the upper area of a shelf and starts at 170cm. Here, it is some­ti­mes diffi­cult to reach products even for taller people. The view­ing zone is loca­ted at a height between 120cm and 170cm. Custo­mers of normal height can easily see the products presen­ted here because they are almost at eye level. The grip zone is loca­ted at a height of between 80 cm and 120 cm. Here, products can still be easily reco­g­nised and gras­ped. In the bending zone, things become more diffi­cult. At a height of partly less than 80 cm, the custo­mer may even have to kneel or crouch down to reach the product.

If we now look at the values in the indi­vi­dual cate­go­ries, we see that products loca­ted in the stoop zone are hardly noti­ced or not noti­ced at all. The values are below 5% in all the cate­go­ries asked about. The same applies to the so-called stret­ching zone. There, too, the percep­tion is below 5%. If a product is placed in the grip zone, the percep­tion increa­ses again (12.50% in the body care cate­gory, over 8% for soft drinks, crisps and snacks).

What does this mean for the placement of products on the shelf?

Reck and stoop zones cannot remain empty. The solu­tion is simple. Visi­bi­lity can be impro­ved, espe­ci­ally in these shelf zones, with push feed systems. If products that are alre­ady diffi­cult to reach in the stret­ching and bending zones are always presen­ted at the front of the shelf through the use of feed systems, the visi­bi­lity and thus also the percep­tion of the brand is increased. The use of shelf auto­ma­tion not only increa­ses brand percep­tion, but also sales. Custo­mers can visually grasp a brand or product in a few seconds and decide whether to buy it or not. But they must be able to see the product and, in the best case, reach it effort­lessly. If the products are at the back of the shelf zones, the custo­mer cannot reach them. Thus, the purchase decis­ion is abor­ted at this point at the latest. The retailer can present every product in every shelf zone at the front of the shelf by using push feed systems. This way, even the custo­mer-unfri­endly shelf levels become a stage for all products.

Press cont­act

Maren Brett­meier

+49 5222/36965–646

+49 1721338139

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info@postuning.com