Canadian Retailer - Store 2014 - 57

2014 ERA AWARDS IN-STORE MERCHANDISING (MID-SIZE RETAILER)

AWARD WINNER

MISSION HILL ENTERS A
DIFFERENT WORLD

Communicating the message and connecting with customers,
with the emphasis on merchandise
MISSION HILL Family Estate Winery, just out-

side Kelowna, B.C., overlooks Lake Okanagan.
From the pictures, the winery looks like the
kind of old world winery usually found in the
movies, with sweeping panorama views of blue
waters and lush green fields, a bell tower and
a 1,200 seat Greek-style outdoor amphitheatre.
Inside the winery, guests can find an art collection that includes works by Chagall, Leger and
2,000 year-old antiquities. They will also find
some of the best wine in the country-in 2013,
the winery received global awards for Best Pinot Noir and for Winery of the Year.
The winery sought to surprise and delight
each of its guests, including with its retail offerings. The challenge became: how to retail merchandise in a way that doesn't interfere with the
architectural integrity of the structure?
The winery found a solution in the retail
strategy they called Enter a Different World.

Merchandise Speaks for Itself

The retail strategy limited the amount of signage in the store.
What signage they did have included handwritten tags for one
of a kind vintage items, handwritten chalk boards for a French
bistro feel, and books that acted as mini billboards when the
store needed to communicate more information about products. The winery also removed supplier fixtures from the store
and used a collection of vintage European and Canadian tables
to display many of the goods for sale in the shop.

Surpassing Goals

Enter a Different World established clear
metrics for the winery. They wanted the shop
to increase revenue by seven per cent over the
previous year, increase visitors to the winery
by two per cent and devise a new marketing
plan to attract visitors with higher incomes.
The results of the program were impressive.
The winery ended the season with a 12 per cent
year-over-year increase and an increase in the
average ticket by 15 per cent (the average basket contained 5.2 units compared to 4.1 units
the previous year).
From a retail standpoint, the results were
doubly impressive, considering the fact that
most visitors to the winery would rather spend
their money on wine. But after Enter a Different World, 45 per cent of all units sold were not
wine and 25 per cent of all transactions did not
include wine at all. On top of all these good
numbers, Tripadvisor comments were overwhelmingly positive with a 4.5/5 rating for the
retailer on the site.

A focus on merchandise tells the winery's story.

David Amos, Director of Retail and Merchandising at Mark
Anthony Group, says that the biggest learning for him was to
focus on the merchandise and not so much the props or signage.
"The merchandising can tell the story with much more clarity
and impact [than signage can]. Customers react most positively
with colour and good organization, balance and structure of the
merchandise. Sound in-store merchandising can make the simple quite extraordinary," he says.
The success of the retail operations has helped to raise revenue and give customers more selection and more reasons to
open their wallets. The store also helped to reinforce the winery's key message-they sell some of the best wine in Canada.
"We were privileged to be awarded several medals on the
global stage for our wines. The in-store merchandising for the
award winning wines allowed us to communicate the recognition
in a very impactful manner. Creatively, the in-store merchandising was much more powerful than just signage," says Amos.

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