INFORMATION
BDS Small Business Support The British Display Society is committed to supporting the High Street. We offer a retail consulting service in Visual Merchandising. We utilise professional VM experts and knowledge to support today’s new-retail challenges. We offer an online basic display and styling course that is perfect for those new to retail or for small businesses. You can supplement the training course with our online or face to face service where you can personally chat with our retail professional about how you can quickly make positive changes. How stores look and the customer experience are even more important now than ever. Physical stores still and will continue to play a vital role for retail and customer experience. Visual Merchandising also helps with styling and other activities such as market stalls, pop ups and digital marketing that show product display or the physical environment as the backdrop for e-commerce. We talk about why first impressions are crucial for any business, not just retailers, and how eye-catching window and interior displays can raise profiles and increase sales. Basic rules of display along with merchandising tips to ensure businesses works logically and customers can find what they are looking for. Simple, inexpensive changes can make all the difference to a business. The same VM basics and tips can be applied to digital photoshoot styling for online and social media content too; Six Steps of Display 1. Your Message 2. Location 3. Know your customer 4. Inspiration 5. Basic display rules 6. Housekeeping The course consists of videos, photographs, illustrations, narratives, and demonstrations. Complemented by a downloadable workbook, there are questions to answer throughout which encourages students to focus on their own business or project - it’s also useful for future reference. Students will finish the course not only full of inspiration, but with the knowledge of how to do their displays too, and a plan to carry their business forward. Our BDS advice is structured to make it easy for retailers to benefit from a simplified and scalable service. VM consulting targets 3 key areas of customer experience and physical retail 1. Shopfront and windows 2. Merchandising and layout 3. Store display and design Divided into 3 phased offerings that build upon each other 1. Quick response support 2. Short term client consultation 3. One season consulting contract
