Patrick Patel
- Location: Crofton Park, South London
- Shop size: 3,000 sq ft, supermarket style
- Been in the business: 30 years
- Customers: “high-end” mums, families, office workers
Patrick Patel’s store started out as a newsagent and expanded into a convenience store. Two years ago, Patrick and his family joined Budgens and around 60% of its original customers were replaced by mums, families, “yuppies and high-end people”, as Patrick puts it. The store’s best sellers are alcohol, pop and fresh and chilled produce. It also sells organic and gluten-free products, and offers a number of free services to encourage footfall. Patrick got involved in the project because he admitted that having a supermarket format has meant “newsagent lines”, such as drinks and chocolates, have suffered from a lack of attention.
Before
Confectionery
- Confectionery displayed on 3 metre main layout mid-store, described by Patrick as “haphazard”.
- Kids’ products low on shelves.
- Block chocolates high on shelf.
Crisps & Snacks
- Crisps and snacks merchandised together in tight space mid-store.
- No planograms followed.
- Promotions such as Walkers’ two for £1 deal working effectively.
Soft Drinks
- Displayed on main fixture on aisle next to entrance.
- Wide range to incorporate main brands and niche to suit customer base.
- All products chilled, including larger packs.
Category Advice
Mars: Confectionery
- Rationalise range by 10%.
- Do a full relay, multifacing best sellers, grouping products by category and allocating space according to sales.
- Create a themed area with relevant point-of-sale material.
- Build display of the best selling bitesize confectionery lines near the beers, wines and spirits area.
PepsiCo: Crisps & Snacks
- Relay the fixture to focus on best sellers and optimise range.
- Place chiller baskets containing core products by sandwiches.
- Create a secondary display in the beers, wines and spirits section with a range of sharing bags.
- Maximise market-leading promotions such as Walkers Flavour Cup by using secondary sites and PoS material.
GSK: Soft Drinks
- Group like products together and implement a needstates flow to make it easy to find products.
- Smarten up vertical blocking.
- Reduce facings on slow selling lines.
- Give more facings to top selling products.
Results
Confectionery
- Increased volumes ordered from wholesalers.
- Customers often buying two bars of chocolate instead of one.
- Vastly improved layout with blocked categories naturally leading on to each other.
- 41% more bagged confectionery and 8% more countlines sold.
- 11% increase in units of confectionery sold.
Crisps & Snacks
- Sales of single bags up 50% in-store between May and July, compared to February to April, before the changes were made.
- Large increase in sharing bags sales – up 101% during the project – due to secondary site placement.
- 58% overall rise in crisps and snacks sales.
- High sales generated from secondary sites, such as baskets in chillers and placements near alcohol.
- Better understanding of different sales patterns on different days and the need to adapt displays accordingly.
Soft Drinks
- Drinks sales increased through better placement in the chiller, especially water and energy drinks.
- 17% growth versus the market.
- Improved shopping experience for customers due to clear blocking of products.
- Improved marketing of key brands and products, advertising store’s core range to customers.
