Published • 8 Aug 2024
Product merchandising is a crucial aspect of unattended retail, involving the selection, display, and promotion of products to maximize sales. With a VMS (Vending Management System) like the one from 365 Retail Markets, you can optimize your product merchandising to boost sales in your micro markets, smart stores, and vending machines up to 10%-15%. Here’s how it works.
Identifying and Responding to Product Performance
Monitoring product performance is essential for effective merchandising. When a product isn’t meeting expectations, understanding the reasons and making necessary adjustments is crucial. This ongoing evaluation helps retailers stay responsive to market demands and optimize their offerings. With a VMS, you can get critical information on product performance with ease.
Using Data to Make Decisions
Data-driven decisions are key to successful merchandising. A VMS records sales information at your point of sale and informs you of product performance. By analyzing daily consumption rates, par levels, and other metrics, the VMS shows product performance as red (poor), yellow (average), or green (excellent). This approach ensures that decisions are based on actual sales data rather than guesswork. Informed adjustments to the product mix, grounded in data, allow retailers to optimize their inventory and enhance sales performance.
Adjusting Product Mix
Adjusting the product mix based on performance is vital. While one beverage may work in a white-collar location, it may not work well in a blue-collar account. Consistently failing products should be replaced with items that have higher demand. This strategy ensures that shelf space is optimized for maximum sales potential, keeping the product mix dynamic and relevant. The VMS from 365 Retail Markets recommends alternatives to poor performing products based on location type, helping you try items that are more likely to sell well. By stocking in-demand items, you can also reduce spoilage due to expiration. Proper product merchandising can decrease product spoilage by up to 30%. For a three-route operation with a 5% spoilage rate, this equates to over $75,000 in savings per year.
Continuous Improvement
Merchandising is an ongoing process. Regularly revisiting and refining strategies ensures that the product mix remains appealing to customers. A commitment to continuous improvement, with plans to review and adjust merchandising tactics based on feedback and performance data, is essential. While this may sound monotonous and time consuming, a proper VMS will help you easily view and act on product performance metrics. Want to boost sales at your locations? See how utilizing the 365 VMS will help you sell more products.
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