Precise Planograms, Perfected: Unlock Next-Level Visual Merchandising with Smart Containers
In the One Door platform, Smart Containers are dynamic planning tools that allow for the customization of store-specific planograms and merchandising layouts according to specific store characteristics.
These Containers enable the rapid generation of product variations and assortments tailored to individual store demographics, consumer buying behaviors, and other local factors.
Smart Containers facilitate a more personalized approach to visual merchandising, ensuring that each store’s layout and product display are optimized for its unique market conditions.
This feature supports retailers in creating more effective and targeted in-store experiences that resonate with local customers, enhancing engagement and sales performance.
Here’s how:
Feature Overview: Smart Containers
Smart Containers help retailers quickly create localized planograms using pre-set business rules. This smart feature enables large retailers to:
- Tailor displays based on regional attributes, language preferences, and other demographic factors
- Improve the efficiency and accuracy of visual merchandising execution in stores
- Ensure a seamless in-store shopping experience across multiple locations due to precise display and product management
Two types of Smart Containers exist:
Assortment Groups represent product SKUs. Variation Groups include Content like signage and posters.
Take a closer look at Smart Containers in real-world scenarios.
Feature Overview: Variation Groups
Variation Groups consist of content items (POP) that are variations of a single item, such as a poster or sign.
These variations could be in language, graphics, marketing initiatives, or all of the above.
The platform uses business rules to display the correct version to each store by matching content and store attributes.
Smart Containers enable visual merchandisers to update individual pieces of content in multiple stores within one planogram.
No need to manage dozens of different planograms.
Here’s an example:
A visual merchandising team for a national clothing retailer wants to set up the same display for stores in Miami, FL; Quebec, Canada; and Nashville, TN.
However, previous marketing campaigns indicate that native language is important to the in-store customer experience.
Using Variations in Smart Containers, the merchandising team can update the display’s poster in a single planogram:
- The poster in Miami will be in Spanish.
- The poster in Quebec will be in French.
- The poster in Nashville will be in English.
Feature Overview: Assortment Groups
Assortment Groups are a curated collection of product SKUs with defined placement priorities within a planogram.
The One Door platform leverages business rules to display the correct collection of products for each fixture in a particular store.
This is based on the alignment of product assortment with store-specific properties, such as geographical location or market segmentation.
This enables tailored product presentations that cater to localized market demands.
Assortment Groups ensure that product placements are optimized for each location’s:
- Shopper demographics and customer preferences
- Spatial requirements
- Store layouts
- Product needs
By creating and managing Assortment Groups, space planners and visual merchandisers can tailor product selections to fit the unique characteristics of each store, improving efficiency and shopper satisfaction.
This smart feature reduces overstock/understock situations and enhances the overall shopping experience by aligning products with local demand.
For example:
As a national bookseller, you have displays for the top trending books on social media.
However, certain genres perform better in certain regions.
The original planogram has an Assortment of Books 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 – in that order.
Using Smart Containers, you can reorder those books in an unlimited number of ways without updating individual planograms:
- Books 2, 3, 4, 5, 1 for the West Coast
- Books 3, 4, 2, 1, 5 for the East Coast
- Books 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 for the South
Key Benefits of Smart Containers: Precision & Localization
Here’s what One Door users can expect with Smart Containers:
An Intuitive User Experience: Get precise visual merchandising materials for multiple stores, from signage to products, with a simplified user interface.
Design Consistency: Smart Containers ensure that designs are consistent and accurate for every campaign and every store. For example, Smart Containers can lock to prevent unintended edits when designing localized planograms.
Agility and Adaptability: Smart Containers help retailers more agilely and precisely adapt to fast-changing market trends and customer preferences without sacrificing brand consistency across stores.
Fast Customer Service Assistance: With Smart Containers, users can access help links directly within the platform for quick guidance.
Retailers need a localization strategy to ensure shoppers feel that retailers understand their needs, and Smart Containers make that as easy as possible.
(Check out what happens when consumer needs, like in-store personalization, aren’t met in this report from One Door and GlobalData: The Cost of Poor Visual Merchandising: The $125 Billion Challenge.)
With Smart Containers, large retailers have an easy-to-use tool to meet the precise personalization expectations of today’s shoppers.
Smart Containers Case Study: A Leading U.S. Broadband Communications & Entertainment Company
A U.S. telecommunications company achieved significant efficiency gains by leveraging One Door’s Smart Containers to streamline localized campaign management.
Previously, the retailer managed 180 individual planograms to account for regional variations.
By implementing Smart Containers, they were able to consolidate these into just eight assortment groups, drastically reducing the complexity and time required for execution.
The client, who prefers to remain anonymous, highlighted an additional impact of this approach, saying: “Smart Containers has reduced management of accessory promotions via variation groups.”
By simplifying planogram management, this telecom retailer saved time and ensured greater accuracy and consistency in their promotional execution across locations.
One Door: Store Planning Software
Smart Containers builds on One Door’s commitment to deliver smarter, faster visual merchandising solutions for retailers.
Click here to learn more about store planning with the One Door platform.
If you’re interested in seeing Smart Containers in action, request a demo with our team.