Dive Brief:
- One Door yesterday debuted its Planogram Connector feature which is to be used with its Merchandising Cloud application to improve in-store merchandising efforts, according to a press release.
- The new feature allows retail space planners and visual merchandisers to incorporate data from legacy planogramming applications into interactive plans that are optimized for mobile and can be communicated to stores using the Merchandising Cloud.
- By using the new feature, One Door claims retailers will see higher engagement around standards for visual merchandising, increased store compliance levels and higher sales.
Dive Insight:
There's a missing link in the planning process for brick-and-mortar stores that One Door says its updated cloud merchandising solution fills. Planogram Connector fills a digital void between retail personnel working on legacy software on visual display diagrams and executing the placement of products on store shelves in a way that maximizes sales.
In another new approach to merchandising, Walgreens, working together with Coca-Cola, tested the use of virtual reality to help visualize and evaluate shelf sets, reported CPGmatters. The companies used a technology from InContext Solutions for the reset testing. "Working with InContext, we made sure that the changes we made were what the customers wanted," Emily Miller, Walgreens' senior category manager, told the publication.
A survey conducted by One Door found that 82% of stores still receive planograms as static documents, either in PDF format or image files. As a result, store-level personnel handle an average 41,600 printed planogram pages each year. With the implementation of new technology, store associates can benefit from an interactive merchandising experience, and see information that is applicable to the layout and marketing attributes of their individual stores.
One Door's survey found that store associates at large retailers can spend a combined 86,000 hours per week on merchandising of store shelves, according to an infograph. Additionally, 91% of stores print out planograms for employees' use at a significant cost and time. For 1,000 stores, the annual price of printing planograms is $1 million. Forty percent of stores devote over 20 hours a week to merchandising, yet 50% of planogram execution is still inaccurate.
"As retailers look to make changes to their displays more often, visual merchandisers, space planners and promotions teams must communicate and collaborate more effectively with their store teams," Tom Erskine, One Door's Chief Marketing Officer and senior vice president of product said in the press release. "Many major retailers tightly align their assortment and space planning processes at headquarters, but struggle with getting the right products and promotions displayed in stores." The new feature improves store communication and execution, but it makes no changes to the process of planogramming, he said.
By upgrading the efficiency of the merchandising process, retailers can see a significant effect on financial performance. Because retailers and their supplier partners spend millions of dollars on product placements and promotion, the accurate and efficient execution of merchandising is a high retail priority.
