Increasing Sales Through Cross Merchandising

Simple ways for cross merchandising can appear anywhere in a store. Here are a few simple ideas:

Mannequins: Pick a popular selling top and add shoes, jewelry, or a bag it. Make sure that the apparel is on a fixture nearby. Consider adding t-stands to displays of mannequins in the isle.

Table Tops: Add bust or bottom forms to the top of the table. Accessorize with belts, shoes, scarves, etc…

White Hangers: Add the hangers to the walls or to four-ways and display the garment with a piece of jewelry, a scarf, etc…

Furniture: Add pillows or throws to couches. Put items on a coffee table. Behind the display make sure to display the items on racks or another fixtures.

Future of Retail

The news is looking good going into 2010. Retail Forward is reporting the same-store sales for December (excluding Wal-Mart) increased 3.0%. This number comes from a sales-weighted composite of 32 retailers. Department stores stores sales did lag, but they did have higher sales over last year while apparel and accessory stores did better than average.

Who is the big winner in all of this? Well, Amazon.com. They did cut into some of the sales from stores. Numbers show that more than half of all households shopped at Amazon.com during the holidays.

“The trend through the holidays is now pretty clear that shoppers are moving toward stronger spending into 2010. But it’s also clear that some cautiousness will persist and that s pending will remain uneven across categories and retailers,” said senior economist at Retail Forward, Frank Badillo

Maybe it’s time for more retailers to pull out their business models and take a cue from Amazon.com’s playbook.