Background

• IKEA is the biggest furniture brand in the world.

• It has a turn over of €22.71 billion in (2009)

• It has 313 stores in 37 countries

• Its website has an annual average of 470 million  visitors per year.

1. Examine the role of visual merchandising and its contribution to corporate image2. Investigate the principles of store design in relation to visual merchandising

Exterior

•Big Box structure means there are no Windows for display

•The Big Box structure is painted an iconic colour scheme of

yellow and blue, it has the name IKEA which is also the logo and

trademark. These draw customers to IKEA.

•Without the logo, these colours immediately tell customers that

they are at an IKEA store, the home of low priced “flat pack”, self

assembly furniture.

Signage

IKEA uses signage:

•for directional purposes to direct customers into the store

•To define departments and show customers where products are

•For product labeling and information

•For pricing

•Specials

Visual merchandising display techniques used to influence customers

To create a retail ambience, IKEA has divided the store Into floors:

- ground floor: checkout + warehouse - 1st floor: market place - 2nd floor: Showroom

-The Show Room is designed into Room Settings that offer particular living situations or

concepts to customers for:

-Living rooms, Dining rooms, Kitchens, Home office, Bedrooms, Toilets etc..

-Each Room Setting is designed to balances colours, fabrics, shapes and textures to

give the "room" a restful and uncluttered look.

-customers are encouraged to draw inspiration from these room settings to re-create

them in their own homes.

-In between display units, IKEA uses subtle push marketing to promote products for

impulse buying.

In store / Virtual Visual Merchandising

Lights

•An entire IKEA store is always lit very well

•In particular the Room Settings and product

displays are set off by more intense lights.

•Light makes products shine and bring colors to life.

•Once a product has captured a customer’s

attention, the odds are increased that a purchase is at hand.

•The visual merchandising technique of using light impacts positively on IKEA’s

customers’ impression of their shopping experience and the store’s profits.

IKEA is consistent with its corporate image and

brand anywhere it is located.

It does this through:

•its iconic name and logo, iconic trademark that is

identifiable as IKEA

•Distinctive colour scheme of blue and yellow which is the colour scheme for every IKEA

store regardless of size or location. In the absence of the name, they are identifiable as

IKEA

Brand identity - “typically Swedish”

- Due to its origin the brand is reflected as wholly Swedish. The colour scheme is made up of

the colours of the Swedish flag.

- When a customer sees these colours they immediately think of

the name IKEA the Swedish store of low priced, flat pack,

self assembly furniture.

Product Names

Regardless of location of store, all IKEA products carry a Swedish name, this is consistent

With the founder’s philosophy of “typically Swedish”.

Corporate image

Store layout

MAZE layout

•IKEA uses a maze-like layout for all its stores.

•This is designed to induce impulse purchases as

customers are forced to see all products displayed

in a manner which is attractive .

In store customer traffic

IKEA developed a unique in store Customer traffic

system which forces customers to move in a

single direction only all around the store.

•Arrows on the floor and signs at critical junctures indicate that you are moving

through the store in a planned, straight forward manner.

•The purpose of this design is to expose the customers to all products that IKEA

sells and encourage them to make impulse purchases.

•There are short cuts to allow customers not interested in long walks to quickly get

to their destination. They are not obvious.

IKEA’s online visual merchandising strategy is the

same as the mortar strategy which is:

•to sell more effectively on the web,

•to encourage people to buy more and return

•to improve the customer buying experience

Objectives of IKEA’s online visual merchandising

•make it easy for customers to find products,

•give them an appealing, realistic view of the product.

•To provide enough information for customers to make a buy

IKEA Main Page

It is the main entrance into the IKEA virtual store. The main page on www.IKEA.com is the

gateway to the various IKEAs’ across the world. Clicking on a country of your choice will take

the customer to that country’s website.

Making online shopping easier

Customers visiting an IKEA site will look to locate products by category or search.

Just like in a mortar store, IKEA puts the most popular products at the top of the category list

page. In mortar terms, this is the platinum area dedicated to high profit products.

Virtual Merchandising

Making it easier for the shopper to select and identify alternative or associated products.

IKEA designs its online pages using the same visual merchandising techniques they

do in store.

•they use room settings for particular living situations to inspire ideas.

•the pages are presented with grouped products giving options and making it easy for

customers to browse by clicking the next room button.

•a strong use of light to highlight products and create an ambience

Showing popular alternatives or grouped products on a product page, customers are

more likely to get ideas and find the product they want before they drop out.

IKEA virtual shoppers cannot physically interact with the product itself like they

can do in store.

•IKEA therefore provide extensive information about the product.

•provides quality clear pictures online

•enable zooming in and out and other options to view the same product.

Returning visitors are more likely to buy

An average 470 million visitors visited the IKEA website.

Its no doubt that all of them were returning visitors.

Unlike Amazon which has a facility to show customers the products they

viewed last time they visited the site, IKEA does not have that facility.

They have tools to assess online traffic, however that does not benefit

customers who face the task of starting over again in their browsing

experience.

Provide sufficient information on the product.

Books

•Tony Morgan, Visual Merchandising: Window and In-Store Displays for Retail,

Laurence King Publishing, 2008

White Papers

•Paul Edmunds, Online Merchandising Techniques, ClickTorch, 2008

•The Retail Doctor® Group Pty Ltd, VISUAL MERCHANDISING, How to

build powerful visual merchandising that lead to greater sales, customer visits

and profits, 2009.

Websites

•Available at: www.IKEA.com [Accessed: 15/07/10]

•Available at: www.allbusiness.com [Accessed: 15/07/10]

•Available at: www.vmsd.com [Accessed: 15/06/10]

•Available at:: www.charlotte.bizjournals.com, [Accessed: 14/07/10]

•Available at:www.discoverdbr.com/visualmerchandisingtips.htm, [Accessed :

15/07/10]

Bibliography