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PERGO RETAIL
KEEPING THE RETAILER – CUSTOMER CONVERSATION GOING
Inspiration and quotes for this whitepaper provided by: - John Ryan, stores editor, www.retail-week.com - Fiona Briggs, editor and retail business journalist, www.retailtimes.co.uk Pergo references - Ligne Roset by Bluegroup Retail P10-11 - Avance shoestore by Euro Shoe Group P16-17
This paper was made in collaboration with retail specialist John Ryan. With a background in retail, John Ryan worked as a buyer in London and Dusseldorf for more than 15 years, before picking up his pen and becoming a journalist, writing about the business of retail and retail design. Today he is a writer for numerous publications including Retail Week in the UK, Stores + Shops in Germany and VMSD in the US. He is also a frequent conference speaker on the topic of retail trends and what’s happening in retail interiors. Pergo: “In your experience how and to what extent can flooring manufacturers contribute to retail store design?” John: “The best flooring manufacturers are always looking at the effect their products can offer within a new retail interior and how this will work for consumers and retailers alike. They are really in a position to be a major element of the equation that leads to a store that’s worth visiting.” Pergo: “What advice would you give to retail chains/owners who are planning to restyle or refurbish?” John: “On the matter of restyling or refurbishing stores, while there are no hard and fast rules as far as when is the right moment to do something, as a retailer you’ll know when a store is looking tired and as a shopper, you just won’t bother visiting. The best retailers are the ones who can identify this tipping point before if happens and do something about it before things begin to go wrong. Brand loyalty is notoriously fickle and no interior lasts forever in retail.”
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PERGO RETAIL 01
KEEPING THE RETAILER – CUSTOMER CONVERSATION GOING
In-store experience as a vital part of the relation between retailers and their customers The conversation between a retailer and a customer starts by trying to get the customer to the store. However it doesn’t stop there. Unlike what we may assume, the product will not speak for itself. In-store we need to keep the conversation going. The store lay-out and signage, the pace and mood and the path to purchase are all equally important to ensure an on-going conversation and lasting relation with your customer. This paper highlights some of the important aspects to consider when creating your retail environment.
Care for the environment read more page 6-7
On renewing a store interior read more page 18-19
What price experience read more page 8-9
Case Ligne Roset read more page 10-11
A matter of influence read more page 12-13
Case Avance read more page 16-17
Finding the right path read more page 14-15
CARE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT
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How can you get shoppers to come into your shop and not go somewhere else? ‘Walk on by’ might be seen by some retailers as the funeral march that accompanies the steady flow of shoppers wandering past their stores without pausing, much less entering, the store. It’s a familiar complaint and is perhaps a response to the single demand that every shopper makes of every retailer: ‘Give me a reason to come into your shop’.
the thinking tended to be; put stock in the window accompanied by a winning price and all would be well. The advent of the discounter more or less put paid to this and today windows may, or may not have stock in them, they may have digital elements and, on occasions, they may even have people sitting or taking part in an activity in them, there are many options. Whatever is done,
one of the best approaches is to look at the shop as a sensitive environment where, just as in nature, if anything is out of balance almost every other part of the eco-system suffers This poses the question, why do some shops attract shoppers where others do not? For an answer, one of the best approaches is to look at the shop as a sensitive environment where, just as in nature, if anything is out of balance almost every other part of the eco-system suffers. Looked at in this way, the starting point is the shop window. With the exception of supermarkets, and even some of these have them, windows are the part of a shop that asks for the shopper to take a store seriously. In days gone by,
failure cannot be countenanced as this is the first line of attack for a retailer. Indeed, even the store can act as a window. Many retailers now choose to dispense with window displays altogether and to allow shoppers a view deep into the interior. If the store’s visual merchandising is up to scratch, this can be every bit as effective as a piece of static VM in a boxed-in window. It is also important for a store to be part of its surroundings. Google opened its first store anywhere in March 2015 on London’s Tottenham Court Road.
Much play was made of the fact that while it may be a global player, this was a shop for London – which meant underground station signs in the window and references to the UK capital, as well as a lot of technology. In the store, shoppers were presented with an environment that invited them to play with the technology – it was, in effect, an online proposition given physical substance, an attempt to replicate the digital experience in the real world. This is what store environments and all of the components used to create them, should be about, creating something that shoppers will want to visit and them return to as occasion requires. Stores environments are sensitive, as are shopper responses to them, and as much time and planning should be spent on creating an appropriate interior as is given to sourcing the stock that will fill it. Think along these lines and the chances are good that success may follow.
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Experience is the bold new frontier in retail, but how many stores can claim to offer it?
Retailers are fond of saying that they have to ‘differentiate’ in order to guarantee the requisite level of footfall through their doors and to generate the profits needed to remain in the game. And for many, if not all, the current buzzword in order to ensure that a retail environment is differentiated is ‘experience’. The problem is that experience needs definition as far as retailers and shoppers are concerned and the two do not always find common ground. How therefore to put experience at the heart of the store and what needs to be done in order for this to be effected For one answer, a trip to London department store Selfridges is instructive. Recently it has been running a storewide promotion called “Work It”, which takes different forms as a journey is made around this multi-level space. For shoppers this can mean anything from free beauty makeovers – Selfridges has got all of its concessions and brands on-board, to more esoteric offerings such as a 3d scanner and printer that turns customers into lollipops. For anybody walking into the store, a range of experiences is on offer and there is probably something for almost anybody. That said, this is just one version of what ‘experience’ might mean. The other side of the coin is the store environment itself. This is where experience at a macro level can be created by retailers and there are a number of elements that should be given careful consideration. At its most basic,
a store designer will look at lighting, flooring and then the fit-out that sits between these two. Changes of pace and mood can be injected by altering both lighting and flooring as a progress is made through a retail space and this in itself can be sufficient to constitute an experience. Done properly it really can create difference and something that shoppers may not have encountered.
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Changes of pace and mood can be injected by altering both lighting and flooring and this can be sufficient to constitute an experience
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Every town everywhere has shops and usually there will be many offering more or less the same thing, at different price points. At any given point it is also probable that there will be fewer shoppers than there are shops vying for their business, which is where differentiation comes in.
Take either of these approaches and the chances are good that an experience will be the outcome, although both eventbased and store-design focused experiences will rely upon change, at intervals for this to be maintained. Does this need to be expensive? Not necessarily. Store environments can be changed by creating focal points that are altered sporadically - a change of flooring or mid-shop equipment needn’t mean a total overhaul in order for shoppers to perceive difference. The real point about experience is that it should stay with shoppers after they have left the store with a purchase in hand – this is what will generate continued turnover and ensure retail survival at times when others may be heading for the offices of the receiver.
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WHAT PRICE EXPERIENCE
CASE LIGNE ROSET
CASE LIGNE ROSET PERGO RETAIL | 01 | P10
CASE LIGNE ROSET
As part of the internal relocation of the Ligne Roset furniture brand from first to second-floor, London based shopfitting specialists Bluegroup Retail worked in conjunction with Ligne Roset on the specification. Between the two parties, it was decided that Pergo’s Living Expression Drift Oak planks should be used throughout the
second-floor to help create a more welcoming and open feel to the whole department. With a large and open layout, Living Expression Drift Oak’s two-metre long, extra-wide plank and defined 4V bevel help to enhance the feeling of space, with the floor’s pale oak tone providing the ideal backdrop to key furniture pieces from Ligne Roset’s incredible collection of designers.
Country UK City London Year 2014 CASE LIGNE ROSET
CASE LIGNE ROSET
Laminate flooring from Pergo is now providing style and performance within the iconic Heal’s department store, the capital’s destination for contemporary interior design.
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A MATTER OF INFLUENCE So you’ve got the shopper into your store, but how are you going to influence what happens next? It’s the morning and everything is bright and shiny. You’re in a good mood and ready for new things. This is the time when a store should mirror your frame of mind, presenting its most positive face to the world. By lunchtime, things may have slowed down a little and you’ll be ready for something a little more relaxed and by the time the evening comes along you’ll be positively relaxed. This simple statement of the changing attitudes that many of us feel during the course of a day can and probably should be reflected by retailers if they want to maximise the chances of making a sale. Homewares retailer The White Company has tried to do this at its Norwich flagship with lighting that can be changed during the course of a day, pre-programmed, to capture both the shopper mood and external weather. More than this can be done, however, by shifting the pace and mood in a store through the use of varied lighting and
flooring. In the case of The White Company’s Norwich store, the retailer has tried to apply domestic thinking to the interior, following a template created by UK design company Dalziel + Pow. This means that the entrance to the shop has a “lobby” which is brightly lit and where the flooring is also light – providing a welcome similar to that which might be encountered when entering a house. The lobby leads into the lounge/sitting room space, the main body of the shop, and here there is greater latitude for contrasts between light and shade and between lighter and darker palettes for the flooring and mid-shop displays. There is also a children’s area, where the lighting is softer still and a gentle cream colour is used to create another change of mood. This is all simple stuff, but it does provide reassurance for the browsing shopper and stands as a good example of what can be done with a little thought to create moods that will encourage reticent shoppers to reach for their wallets.
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Thought is always given to how a shop feels and the influence that it will have on those who cross the threshold. Yet it is remarkable how frequently retailers still provide a single level of ambient lighting and a palette that is the same across the whole of an interior. Elegant variation is something that can be realised with relative ease and should be part of the brief given to any design company when seeking to open new stores or refurbish existing ones.
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The pace and mood in a store can be shifted through the use of varied lighting and flooring
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FINDING THE RIGHT PATH
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How can shoppers be guided around a store? There are a variety of ways to effect this. For shoppers, finding you way around a store can be difficult and confusing, but what can be done to overcome this? Take a look at what discount fashion retailer Primark has been doing in its stores in Germany and Belgium and one answer is digital signage. It is a broadly acknowledged fact that moving images on screens and illuminated light-boxes tend to attract greater amounts of attention than good old-fashioned cardboard signage, although clearly the latter is cheaper and can be changed quickly when required. In Primark’s stores in Brussels, Düsselfdorf and Berlin, high profile digital signage that takes the form of anything from screens that wrap around
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Flooring helps to tell the story and curate the space that speaks about the brand. Retailers can use flooring to stage key categories.
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Joe Bona, president of the retail division at design agency CBX
mid-shop pillars, to static but eyebrow-raising light-boxes next to the escalator on each floor, have been the order of the day. In some parts of the stores, signage of this kind involves words, in others it can just be an image, used to demarcate a particular merchandise area. This points to the other factor that can be taken into account when creating in-store wayfinding systems – interior guidance can be more than just words that appear on a screen or are printed on a piece of cardboard.
Tapi, a newly-launched carpet and flooring retailer in the UK, has a branch in Tooting, south London, that uses flooring as a means of ensuring that shoppers get to the right part of the shop and that once there, the flooring helps them make sense of where they are. Practically, this means a store where wooden flooring is used in the area where wooden floor coverings are on offer, carpet in the carpet area and vinyl tiles in the vinyl area. This probably sounds like common sense, but it is amazing how many flooring retailers see fit to use a single type of flooring across the whole of an interior. Flooring used in the Tapi manner is a retailer’s chance to show what is possible and to offer shoppers a little more inspiration than a massive roll of carpet or a display of wooden planks. The same is true of lighting. Vary the lighting ‘heat’ levels, colour and create areas of light and dark and shoppers can be subconsciously taken on a journey around the store. And the real positive in all of this is that it need cost no more than a standard store as all shops need to be lit and floored. The fact that lighting and flooring are, in effect, layered on, after a store design has been completed is evidence of how many retailers think signage means signs with words or pictures. There is much more to the art of guiding shoppers through a space than a store directory.
CASE AVANCE
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Pergo endless plank laminate makes customers feel at home at Avance shoes
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Create a homely yet modern feel for the entire family. With this vision in mind, Avance opted for Pergo laminate flooring for the upgrade of the company’s retail store in Bree (Belgium). Having successfully completed the pilot project, Pergo has now been asked to add its warm, contemporary touch to all Avance footwear stores. They opted for EndlessPlank oak design flooring: long planks with no visible seams. They create a feeling of space and add a contemporary look. This, combined with the realistic oak design, creates a truly homely feel.
Country Belgium Year 2015
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CASE AVANCE
CASE AVANCE CASE AVANCE
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All retail interiors are time limited and when they reach the end of their natural life it’s time to renew. But what should be done to ensure future longevity? Store interiors look fresh, contemporary and inviting when first unveiled, but over what can seem a relatively short period they begin to look tired and may even look dated. Before this point is reached, it’s probably time for a makeover, but how much should be done and what is the likely return on investment for this unwanted capital expenditure?
Briefs tend to evolve, rather than being handed down from on high, so be prepared to work with your design team and be flexible, rather than just telling them what needs to be done. This part of the process can take a while and one of the primary considerations is how much you are prepared to spend on the exercise as a whole.
ON RENEWING A STORE INTERIOR The first point to be determined is whether you are happy with your customers. Are they buying at the price levels you hope for and is their number growing? Which demographic do you cater for and is this changing? Answer these questions and you have a target market and this will help to shape the form that your refurbished store will take. The next task that has to be confronted is creating a design brief. There are many things to be considered here, but probably foremost among them is choosing a design consultancy, if this is being undertaken externally, or communicating what you want to achieve to your internal team, if that is the route that is being taken.
A ‘cosmetic’ store makeover need be little more than a coat of paint and some new graphics, but this will only suffice for a while. A more general refurbishment should look at the store from the ground up. Start with the floorcovering(s) and what they will contribute to the overall effect. Look at the shop’s internal perimeter and the colour scheme that you are going to use. Will it work for your shoppers and for the graphics package that will form part of the overall change? At the same time, think about how the space will be lit. This part of the refurbishment will probably mean considering whether to go down the LED lighting route, or not, and what effect this is likely to have on the flooring and mid-shop equipment that you have selected.
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There are many variables and nothing is fixed, but it is worth bearing in mind that everything that you do will have an effect on the bottom line, both in terms of the return on capital employed and the immediate effect on a company’s bank balance. It is also worth bearing in mind that there comes a point when a retailer should know that an interior will do the job for which it has been designed and that further embellishment and consequent expenditure will not generate greater revenues. Refurbishment will generally be cheaper than new build when the final reckoning occurs, but it is still an expense and should be done when needed, rather than just because it is felt that it is time to do so.
COMMERCIAL FLOORING SOLUTIONS A commercial floor is a stage for real life. In any retail environment, flooring is the hardest working element. From helping provide the wow factor for new flagship stores and major refurbishments, to coping with the daily functional demands and extreme high sale season footfall. So for the beautiful to stay flawless, design has to meet durability. Our many years of expertise and over 500 granted and pending patent applications make it possible to offer you commercial flooring solutions with extraordinary wear resistance. We offer a single source retail flooring solution with technologically advanced laminate, vinyl and natural wood systems. Dedicated consultants will work with you from initial design including bespoke customisation options, through fast-track installation to guaranteed life-long performance.
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