Merchandisers Mind Set

In this post I will be sharing with you the things that the members of a merchandising team consider to be the most important assets they need to do a good job or to get the job done.

This is the result of a small survey I conducted among some of the members of the merchandising team that I manage as par of my responsibilities working for a manufacturer in the foods industry.

I believe this is a good way to make us thing about how to help our associates to do a better job for us. Looking at it from a different perspective, how to help them help us in a more effective manner. I will display them in the order of the most mentioned to the less mentioned and will ad some personal ideas about each one. 


Which five things should always be present in the mind of a Merchandiser?

•  The Expiration date of the products.

This is in the top of the mind of our team members. It is of great importance to keep the products fresh and this is a very logical answer given that we are a foods manufacturer.

Nevertheless it is a major responsibility of the supermarket or store, we as the manufacturer, need to protect our costumers, our product, and our brand…our name.

This idea has been very stressed out into the minds of our team and is always been monitored by the supervisors of merchandising.

I have to say that here in my country there are some stores that aren’t very concern about this topic, in fact, some times our team have pulled out some items because they have reached the expiration date and the store personnel has placed them back in to the shelves. Many times they claim this was done by mistake but some other times we are sure it is just a lack of respect for the customers.

There has been, any ways, some advance with the work of the government institution that regulates this.

• Organization and cleaning of the products.

This one also has to do with the product it self. Now in this case, an error will not be as fatal as in the first topic – expiration date- because it has to do more with esthetic side of the products display and the way this display helps the sales of the store.

Now, it takes to be working in a dirty store for a merchandiser to have in mind that he needs to keep the products clean. This is the case of the majority of our merchandisers because in the big supermarket stores here, in my country, we use other type of personnel, they are female promoters that spend the whole day at the same store. They do the merchandising work and also they sell to the customers, nice.

Now a merchandiser needs to keep products clean and organized no matter what type of supermarket it is. We always provide our merchandising team members with all they need to do this because, again, the shelf is the silent sales person you have in the store but if the products are dusty or unorganized it will have less selling power. Imagine yourself trying to sell a dirty pair of shoes…or trying to sell a dirty box of cereal, how many people will you need to offer this item to in order to get a sale? If ever get a sale.

Now organization refers to various factors.

Filling up the shelf.

Giving product a good alignment in type row and column.

Placing the fresher to the back, in terms of expiration date.

Placing the label nicely to the front of the customer.

Placing correctly the POP materials.

Using the verticalization concept.

Using space the most effective way.

• Competition.

Our team has always competition in mind. We are always measuring our team member’s ability to gain space, to get “out of shelves” exhibitions among other things. Competition lowers their chance of doing a better job in terms of this. So they “sleep with one eye open”, always have to check their shelf space, always have to make sure the shelf is very well filled up with our merchandise to avoid competitor taking our space, that is our sales space, money space. Also, competition lowers our sales when do a special promotion or offer. So our merchandisers keep us informed and aware of competitor’s actions in the market.

• Been on time.

As I said before, our merchandisers, the ones we call that way, don’t stay in one only store, they move to different stores. Some times four to five in one day, so been on time is very important to them as they will meet better the objectives of their job. Our merchandising supervisors are always taking control over the timing of our team. This is for many reasons including labor reasons and marketing reasons. We have reached the momentum in which our personnel don’t have to come to the office before going to visit supermarkets, they are aware of the importance of been on time to their job. Jumping from home to their route gives them more time to work and reach the day’s objectives.

• Keep in contact, and have communication means (cellphone)

For various reasons this is important for a merchandiser to have the means to communicate with their supervisor and with the company.

Works out of the office.

Has a Supervisor to keep informed about any thing occurring in their route.

Needs to communicate with the company sales person who attends the store.

Has to inform of any change needed to be done in their day route.

Competition. As we explained before.

Client’s solicitations.

Needing of some materials.

There are other important thing for a merchandiser, such as, good communication with the store personnel, the store inventory and others but I just mentioned and commented the five most important.

These same things are the ones they think of for the next day.

They check their next day route. They take notes of any thing relevant that needs to be communicated. They prepare to go out on time to their route, verifying things like their means of transportation, their uniform, the materials needed for the day and so on.

I hope this information can be of help if you are a merchandiser, if you manage a merchandising team or own a store. Feel free to contact and make any questions about this topic.

That is it for now.