If your brand offers its products in supermarkets, you know how important it is to make them more visible to maximize your sales.
To achieve this, you need to master the fundamentals of facing, which is the number of identical products placed side by side on a shelf, playing a crucial role in their visibility and accessibility to consumers.
In this article, we'll explain how retailers use various facings methods to increase their profits, and how you, the brands present in supermarkets, can negotiate the best facings!
To organize the layout of products on their shelves, supermarkets create a planigram, a visual representation of a department, also known as a shelf or gondola.
Subsequently, department managers make product layout choices in line with the strategy promoted by the merchandising team. As a brand, you want to optimize the number of facings - i.e. items facing consumers - and influence the layout of these products.
To do this, you need to understand what your retailers are up against when it comes to organizing their shelves.
By playing with the layout of products and modulating the visibility of what's on offer on the shelves, supermarkets make it easier for consumers to compare prices, or simply to spot their favorite brands quickly. A well laid-out supermarket encourages the customer to make a purchase. It also creates a sense of order and clarity, and customers benefit from improved visibility of products and brands during their shopping journey.
In other words, the implementation makes it easier for customers to search and buy. Furthermore, by displaying seemingly always-full shelves, stores reassure customers that they are well-stocked, and that they will find all the products they need. That's why, as a brand, you need to constantly strive for as many facings as possible, and with the best possible layout.
In terms of stock management for supermarkets, always bringing products to the front also helps to better manage in-store replenishment, and to ensure that foodstuffs comply with best-before dates. It's a bit like the Tetris of products: by cleverly positioning each item, you ensure smooth replenishment and make sure that fresh food stays... fresh!
Last but not least, varying the organization of front displays and merchandising allows your distributors to give sales a real boost! New products are showcased, promotions take center stage and, guess what? Customers love it: it often results in an increase in their average shopping basket, as they become more sensitive to the store's marketing efforts.
In this way, well-organized facings enable your distributors to achieve their sales objectives by guiding the customer's buying act.
Depending on the volume of products, the number of departments, the surface area available to supermarkets and, of course, their sales targets, supermarket operators can follow three main facing or product positioning methods.
Imagine a column of your product stacked from floor to ceiling. This is the principle of vertical presentation.
Vertical presentation consists of placing all a brand's products, or the different product ranges, on an area of restricted width but occupying all levels. In short, all the products of a brand, or identical products, from the bottom to the top.
Brands located in the center of the aisle benefit most from this layout. It's an effective technique, but one that requires space! This configuration makes it easier for consumers to compare brands, provided, of course, that they can stand back far enough to see them in their field of vision.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is horizontal facing. Here, your brand's products are displayed side by side, like books in a library.
Horizontal facing refers to a shelf in which the same products or brand are placed horizontally on a limited number of levels. This technique facilitates price comparison between competing brands. And of course, high-margin products or private labels are placed in the center.
Consumers looking specifically for the most expensive or least expensive products will need to pay attention to the highest or lowest shelves.
The best of both worlds? Block facing is a variant that combines these two methods. The same product can be displayed on several levels, and in several rows per level. Versatile and visually captivating!
To boost sales and turnover, supermarkets use other techniques such as cross-merchandising. This consists of placing products (sometimes duplicates) near items of interest to the same buyers. A good example is the barbecue corner in supermarkets: have you ever noticed that bag of charcoal right next to the barbecue grills?
Placing products at the top of the shelves can then encourage more compulsive purchases.
In any case, the optimal facing for your products, whatever the technique used, remains the center of the shelf and on the shelves opposite or at a distance of 30 cm from eye level. This is where the eye is naturally drawn.
Distributors may charge you positioning fees to give you the best shelf space. Fortunately, you have the arguments to convince them that a good facing of your product is a win-win strategy, and thus reduce these costs.
After all, increasing sales of your products is also in their interest!
Start by reminding your distributor of the advantages that have enabled you to get your brand listed. For example, if your product is innovative and original, it contributes to a modern image.
Prove the commercial value of your product to the buyer. For example, you can show them figures for sales made through other distribution channels.
Demonstrate the effectiveness of your communication plan, the advertising efforts you deploy with your target clientele, who frequent your point of sale. This, in turn, will help to increase overall sales.
Offer turnkey merchandising solutions.
You have actions and content that can stimulate sales and thus increase turnover, such as POS (point-of-sale) promotion or the provision of specific promotional tools that enhance the visibility of your products on the shelves (advertising trays, customizable pallet covers, stands, etc.).
You can also suggest cross-merchandising operations with other products in store.
Highlighting your products also increases the distributor's profitability. When negotiating, therefore, take into account your investments and their benefits in terms of sales achieved, in order to establish a reasonable price that preserves your margin.
Of course, in this negotiation, data relating to your product (distribution networks, sales volume, communication plan) is a major advantage. The use of Sidely CRM is therefore an undeniable asset for optimizing shelf surveys and compiling data from your various points of sale.
What's more, the scoring system and optimized tour planning via our mobile application enable you to prioritize the stores to visit, targeting the best opportunities and working the most strategic locations to boost your sales.
Having convincing data on the proven popularity or high potential of your products is a decisive factor in negotiating a good shelf position, and therefore a better facing.
The stakes are high: good facing boosts sales of your product, and makes it easier for future buyers to discover it. It is these buyers, through their purchasing choices, who will guarantee its long-term visibility.
Don't lose sight of the fact that, from the outset, negotiating a good facing is a win-win strategy. It's on the basis of this reasoning, and by making field data speak for itself, that you'll be able to convince your distributors to put your products forward.
