WHEN the Scottish Grocer Awards judges visited Shaun’s Premier Store in Cardonald in the south west of Glasgow in the early part of this year – as part of the Best Soft Drinks Outlet of the Year award run in association with Coca-Cola Enterprises – they couldn’t help but be impressed by a state-of-the art convenience store, larger than many and designed to a very high standard indeed.
It’s the third shop in the growing chain owned by the Marwaha family. Shaun is in the business with his mum Rita and dad Jack. He got the retail bug working in one of the family stores while he studied at Strathclyde Business School. His grandparents were retailers too so he represents the third generation in the industry.
For the judges, several aspects of Shaun’s Premier Cardonald stood out. It has a very large number of modern, energy-efficient chillers, impressive ranges of chilled and fresh foods, an open airy atmosphere, a notable beers, wines and spirits offer … and a soft drinks range that’s ranged, merchandised and promoted excellently.
At first glance it looked as if the family had found a promising site and quickly carried out a top-to-toe transformation.
But, in fact, things hadn’t moved quite so quickly. The Marwahas actually took on the shop, which had been trading as a KeyStore, in May 2011. But, though keen to get moving on the project, things were held up by the fact that it had previously had an unusual set up on drinks. The alcohol business had been run separately from the main store, from an area towards the rear of the site. It had to change. But these days such a variation takes licensing board approval.
So the full refurb was put on hold while the application proceeded. But if the delay was frustrating it also proved useful.
“I suppose you could say it was a forced hand but it meant we learned a lot,” Shaun explained.
“In this store we sell a powerful amount of soft drinks and we had found that out that before we started the refit, so we were able to allocate a proportionate amount of space.”
When the refurb did eventually take place, in summer 2012, it was indeed a transformation. Just about everything changed. New flooring, ceiling, shelving, and lighting were installed. The former store’s three old chillers were replaced by banks of modern refrigeration units, air conditioning was introduced, the windows were changed, and the entire building was repainted before the 2500 square feet Premier unit opened for business.
The front of the shop has been opened out, there’s a queue management system in place plus room for promotional stacks and impulse confectionery displays, and clear sight lines to just about every part of the shop.
The banks of chillers present a full range of chilled foods, dairy and milk, fruit and veg, soft drinks and beers, wines and spirits.
The effect was quick and the returns were significant. Within a relatively short time turnover had doubled from the level at the store’s acquisition and growth has continued, to the point that it’s now around 125% up on initial sales.
Go big on deals … have them all over the store … capture people on different shopping missions
Many people use the shop for major top-ups and more, typical basket spend at around £8 is considerably above average c-store rates. And the shop’s catchment area has widened considerably.
Our Best Soft Drinks Outlet of the Year operator makes the best of all styles, types and sizes of soft drinks – using a dedicated chiller as well as stacks, baskets and other displays throughout the store.
The 3.75m chiller, which largely holds single-serve soft drinks intended for instant consumption, is split into three sections.
The first carries drinks in the fast-growing functional and energy drinks sub-category. The second holds the mainstream carbonates, Coca-Cola Irn-Bru and the like. The final section displays water and still drinks, kids drinks and products in cartons.
The chiller was originally merchandised to a Booker-inspired planogram but, very quickly, analysis of the store’s EPOS system statistics supplied info on sales rates that allowed Shaun and his team to range and display to suit local preferences and the store’s own merchandising policy. And that, in short, is to provide good, better and best options in categories across all the sections of the store, to put popular, profitable lines in “eye level is buy level” positions, but to ensure adequate facings of other lines, including own-label products, where customer demand requires it – providing the profit on return justifies it.
So, for example, Red Bull sells well – several cases a week. But there’s no escaping the fact that the energy drinks in Booker’s Euroshopper value range (at 35p for original and 39p for flavours) fly out of the door.
Euroshopper provides a minimum 30% profit on return and Shaun said the mix of a decent margin and large volume sales makes it worthwhile from the retailer’s point of view.
With carbonates, the best sellers like Coke and Irn-Bru are positioned at eye-level.
In the third section Shaun’s has found that a decision to move flavoured milk drinks into the cabinet has paid off.
“We took the view that as the drinks are often for instant consumption they should be next to instant consumption soft drinks and it has worked, sales increased,” he said.
The well-merchandised chiller impressed the award judges but it isn’t the only aspect of the store’s detailed soft drinks strategy.
Promotions play a very significant role. And, once again providing there’s a reasonable return, the shop is keen on PMPs, which are often very popular with store customers.
The business isn’t shy about buying into good soft drinks deals. It ran a two for £2 offer on the new 1.75-litre size of Coke through the format’s launch period and for months afterwards after investing heavily in the stock.
Single-serve Lucozade at 2 for £1.20 was also very popular.
The store features stacks of eight-packs of Irn-Bru through most of the year.
Soft drinks promos form part of what’s become the big-night-in area that sits across from the chilled soft drinks section.
POS is used very effectively too, both on branded products and own-label lines.
While soft drinks do take a considerable amount of space, ranging is carefully controlled, just as it is in other categories.
“We really utilise the EPOS system, everything is done as per sales,” Shaun said.
“An average store of this size would probably have about 3500 skus. I think we have just under 2500.
“We have a good range but not an inefficient range. If something goes below a certain rate of sale we’ll delist it. It allows us to give maximum facings to products that do sell.
“It makes things easier from a logistical point of view in terms of filling up and also the cabinets tend to look better with fewer products.”
So, just more than a year on from the refit and after an excellent summer of soft drinks sales, what would he give as his soft drinks top tips?
“Have a good mix of products,” he said.
“Availability is key, go big on deals that do well, have them in a lot of places, all over the store, capture people on different shopping missions.
“Buy as many promos as you can, but buy sensibly.
“We wouldn’t buy at a cheap price and sit on it and let it sell at full price – it’s more about getting it shifted, get it sold and move on, go for volume.
It’s good to get that through,” he said.
