SpecialREPORT
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How to Improve Impulse Purchases The Front-End Focus—a 2009 research study conducted by Mars Chocolate North America, Wrigley, Time-
Warner Retail Sales & Marketing and The Coca-Cola Company in partnership with Dechert-Hampe Consulting (DHC)—examined shoppers' buying habits in an effort to improve front-end merchandising strategies. According to Jennifer Jackson-Luth, senior manager of corporate affairs at Wrigley, key recommendations from this study include:
Manage the front-end as a department with a dedicated manager
Focus on "power" categories on each lane. Merchandise all self-checkout installations to drive incremental purchases.
Employ different merchandising solutions by lane type to optimize
Encourage consumers to purchase multiple front-end items through "tie-in" or combination deals.
Merchandise beverages on self-checkout and express lanes with endcap coolers.
"These recommendations still hold true today," Jackson-Luth concludes.
using 3-D computer renderings and virtual reality technology to facilitate various types of retail testing. "Th e V-Store helps drive forward
simulates the shopping experience by
controller to enter the store, walk down an aisle, bend down or look up and even select
shopping malls nationwide to match the participating retailer's demographics. "Th ey're invited to visit our virtual reality store that simulates the shopping experience by using 3-D computer renderings," Quinn says. "Th e shopper uses a controller similar to a video game
thinking in areas including aisle location, space allocation and adjacencies, shelf confi guration, assortment and merchandising opportunities," Quinn explains. Consumers are recruited in
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a product from the shelf. Th e consumer can even read a package label before adding items to his/her shopping cart." Th e idea, says Quinn, is to gain
shopper insights for a fraction of the cost, in a fraction of the time, without disrupting the actual retail store. "It truly advances consumer and shopper research to a whole new level," he says. As retailers continue to vie
for market share of the candy, gum and mint categories, understanding the nuances of impulse buying is a must. Knowing how and why customers select confections, then merchandising those products appropriately, will help sweeten sales of products shoppers buy based on spur-of-the- moment decisions. PCB
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