Ideas to inspire you
Retailers and industry experts up and down the country have been sharing their ideas with us to help us celebrate Cadbury’s 200th year.
We want to continue the spirit of giving that Cadbury is known for by asking retailers to share their Great Retail Ideas with the industry and their peers.
To help provide you with some inspiration of what we’re looking for, here are some of the ideas we have been supplied with. Remember, we’re looking for specific ideas that you have done in your store – or that you have seen or want to implement – that have helped engage customers, drive footfall and sales, or helped position your store at the heart of your local community.
RETAILERS
Bobby Singh, BB Nevison Superstore, Pontefract
We have a suggestion box. We’re always looking for feedback. Have some cards and pen, make it easy for the customer. If someone says something, we just say “Write it down!”.
Trudy Davis, Woosnam & Davis, Llanidloes
If you put the most expensive stuff on the right-hand side of the display, shoppers will pick that up first. So, on TV mags, for example, put Radio Times (premium pricing) on the right – and TV Quick (value pricing), for example, on the left. Most people are right-handed and that’s what they will naturally reach for. I believe if you can get 80% of people to pick something up, they won’t put it down.
Momoe Lowry, M&M Retail, Barnstaple, Devon
Instead of a contract with a coffee machine, I bought my own machine. I can make the deal at whatever price I want now. It means I’m not tied, I can get them to work well for me and not have to pay lots for a contract.
Avtar Sidhu, St Johns Budgens, Kenilworth, Warwickshire
Strategically merchandise your store to spread the hotspots around – milk, bread, our COOK concession, alcohol. People dwell at these places, so spread them out and get shoppers to walk the store, make the journey work. Understand that journey and how you can maximise that.
Nishi Patel, Londis Bexley Park
Delist products a lot. Every 2/3 months, do a review of certain areas to make the space you have work better. If something doesn’t sell, get rid and put something that will sell in its place.
Shital Patel, Jimmy’s Store, Northampton
Hampers! Gather things, and make a Cadbury hamper, or a wine hamper, or a Christmas hamper. For things like Mother’s Day or Easter, or big occasions like that. Sell them at different price-points - £5, £10, £20 – we’ve done hampers for people who are proposing to their girlfriends, for example. They are perfect!
Suki Athwal, Shop Around The Clock, Tenterden, Kent
Make sure you’re posting something on social media (we use Facebook primarily) every day. You might not have time to do it every day, or they forget. We’re busy. When you do get five minutes peace, get your social content all scheduled for the week. It means your stuff is going out even when you’re not doing it at that moment.
Julie Kaur, Premier Jules Convenience, Telford
Make yourself available for a couple of hours at key times, to stand there sampling whatever the new product is. At those key moments, sample the right products at the right time. Sampling, especially backed up by talking and at the counter, gets more sales. It really works. Push it on social media as well, to further drive those new products and create excitement.
Sue Nithyanandan, Costcutter Epsom
We get a report periodically from Google, which tells us what people are looking for in relation to our store. This is invaluable – it allows us to make changes and work out what people are actually searching for, without them telling us.
Serge Notay, Notay’s Premier, Batley
What works well for us is ensuring we are first to act on trends, and then driving those new trends and products immediately through social media. So we always keep our eyes open, every day, to look at TikTok or social media trends, and then absolutely jump on those to get a product in that’s trending and not available as widely as others.
Nalin Kotecha, Samways, Great Missenden
When you get new stock in, check the pricing at that point to ensure that you’re selling it at the price that works best for you and your margin, and for your customer. Make pricing a part of every single day, and every single product. Without clarity for yourself and your shopper, everything becomes more difficult.
Shisan Patel, JASP (DPS), Birmingham
Follow stores abroad and in the UK on TikTok to find weird and wonderful ideas. I follow stores over here that aren’t doing the same things as us for inspiration. I can take a little bit of that idea, bring it into our store and freshen it up.
Sid Ali, Morrisons Daily, Mintlaw, Aberdeenshire
Do a goodie box with everything you need for a big night in that’s made to look better value.
Alan Mannings, Shop on the Green, Chartham, Kent
We stock more than 20 different ready meals from a local curry house at an affordable price for our customers. The ingredients are all fresh and the meals use locally sourced meat and vegetables. Some people challenge the price, but it’s cheaper than a takeaway, and healthier. It can be cooked in the oven in 45 minutes, which is the time most will wait for a takeaway to be delivered.
Raaj Chandarana, Tara’s News, High Wycombe
Habits create motivation. They keep things going. It’s about not following the shining light like a moth – if you do follow a light, make sure you come back to your consistent habits and standards. Don’t get burned by too many ideas, remember the basics to keep you humble and slow.
INDUSTRY EXPERTS
Megan Humphrey, editor, Retail Express
A community idea that stood out for me is a retailer who recently helped support a fellow retailer’s Christmas tombola because they’d never laid on an event before. Although it doesn’t have an immediate impact on her bottom line, I’d say that’s going above and beyond when she didn’t have to. It shows her dedication and value to the retail community.
Aidan Fortune, editor, ConvenienceStore.co.uk
Walk the store like a customer would and make sure there's a natural progression for complementary categories that make it easier for them to fill their baskets. Ask a regular if you can walk with them to see how they shop and how the shopper journey can be improved in your store.
Chris Noice, Communications Director, Association of Convenience Stores
I love the idea I recently saw in the new Fresh & Proper store. They have kids trolleys up front in the shop, so that when families enter the youngest members can get truly involved in the shop. This is a great, fun way to increase basket spend.
Antony Begley, Managing Director, Scottish Local Retailer
Use your Epos to figure out the profit you are making from each fixture and each category to build a league table of categories. Then use that table to allocate time and resource to each category accordingly to their importance in terms of cash profit. Then, within each of the most profitable categories, use your Epos to analyse the cash profit that each SKU delivers for you in a week and create another league table of SKUs. Promote winners (by giving them more facings and siting them in more visible positions) and relegate losers (by deprioritising or delisting them).
Louise Banham, Editor in Chief, Newtrade Publishing
I think Asiyah and Jawad Javed of Day-Today Alloa Road’s idea is inspired. They paid for a billboard on a busy road near their store to advertise their cheesecakes. They had 1,400 pre-orders that were collected on Christmas Eve. The cheesecakes have an average RRP of £3.75 and it’s their own business within the business, rather than a franchise, so their margins are fantastic.
