design:retail - May 2019 - TR4

Fixture Management Considerations
WHEN IT COMES TO MERCHANDISING and displays, selecting
the right fixture for the job cannot be understated, especially as the
footprints of retail stores are getting smaller and retailers are required
to do more with less. Eric Chiang of Perfect Fit Meals says retailers
who take a flexible approach to fixtures and displays will help brands
that are seeking to develop an effective merchandising plan within
the store environment. "If built in-if they've already designed these
stores to be very modular in nature-it's that much easier for brands
to come in and plug in because it's like a common frame that we're all
working from. And it's cost effective for the retailer because they're not
over-investing in sets of fixtures that may change out every six months
or a year," he explains.
Chiang adds that modular fixtures can help streamline merchandising
programs in terms of restocking, making the process much more easily
managed. Perfect Fit Meals utilizes vertical fixtures with horizontal
push trays, which aren't new, per se, but maximize floor space and
allow for ease of inventory changeout without adding significant costs.
The industry is following suit with the modular fixture trend, according
to the Industry Size & Composition study. Sought-after features across
many channels include flexible products, as well as those that are easy
and inexpensive to update. Mobility allows retailers to avoid sparsely
stocked fixtures during inventory fluctuations and gives them the flexibility to focus on and adjust the store layout as they see fit.
To help retailers select the right fixture for the job, Brad W. Cox, director of sales and marketing, and Rich Wildrick, director of engineering
for Trion Industries, Inc. offer the following considerations for several
fixture-type categories:
STRAIGHT ENTRY HOOKS-These fixtures are used for a few
reasons: one is to be able to easily place display hooks tightly under
shelves without needing to remove the shelves to do so. Standard
display hooks need to be
steeply angled up to place
them in a peg board, whereas
straight entry hooks (either
one- or two-piece) can be
placed straight into the board,
hence the name. Straight entry
also allows the tightest display
and maximum product density
throughout the display, not just under shelves.The other reason retailers use straight entry hooks is because it gives them an easier way to
change a planogram as they can move a fully stocked hook instead of
having to remove the product, as with a standard peg hook that needs
to be angled up to remove and replace in the board.
SHELF MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS-Shelf management
systems are used to assist in organization by keeping items in their
own lane as they are shopped. Spring feed pushers can be added
to keep the merchandise pushed forward to the shelf edge for best
visibility. Some items cannot stand on their own due to packaging constraints, but by using shelf management a retailer can stand the item
up to billboard the marketing information printed on the packaging

(bagged frozen vegetables,
for example). Shelf management can also be used to limit
shelf stock. By using a pusher
system shorter than the shelf, a
retailer can keep the appearance of the shelves looking
full until the last item is sold,
which leads to another benefit of shelf management: when a product
is sold out it can be easily identified by the retailer to be restocked. Bar
merchandisers come in many forms, from thin crossbar to square and
rectangular tubing, and often
allow tighter vertical spacing
with less wasted space than
shelves. Simple systems use
hooks to merchandise items,
while more intricate merchandising trays can be used to offer
better product management.
SCAN HOOKS-Scan hooks are the primary fixture used to
merchandise most hanging or carded items in retail. They consist of a
lower merchandising arm and an upper arm that holds the scanning
tag (price label) in front of the product for easy identification. The
most sophisticated scan hook approaches include flatback backplates
to avoid marring the display
surface, flip front label holders
that swing up for better product
access, forward staging areas
to billboard visual presentation,
and simple, anti-theft profiles
to prevent "sweeping" or mass
theft of multiple items.
These types of fixtures, among others,
can result in a number of benefits for retailers,
including: increased sales, maximum visibility, enhanced
package billboarding, proper product rotation, and increased facings.
Additionally, Cox suggests retailers look for several characteristics
when making fixture management considerations. "Retailers should
be looking to partner with an experienced fixture provider who is well
versed in all aspects of merchandising. Fixtures should be consistent in
quality, so planograms will look uniform when implemented from store
to store," he explains.
It is important to find a manufacturer who has multiple solutions to
meet all a retailer's needs from display hooks, bin systems, dividers,
pushers, shelf management systems, and more. Of course, cost is
another driving factor, so retailers need to be sure that corners are not
being cut to reduce fixture prices that will end up costing them more
money down the road. "We have seen reduced diameter wire display
hooks not hold up and label holders yellow under UV lighting that
was caused by inferior materials being used to reduce costs, when if
they would have spent a little more upfront they would have gotten
extended use, lower life cycle cost, and better consistency in these
types of items," Wildrick notes.

2017 Shop!
Standards:Solutions
Store Redesign
2018 ROI
Merchandising
: Space Management & Fixture Considerations to Maximize ROI

design:retail - May 2019

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