Planning and preparing for a new store opening is never an easy task or quick endeavour. You only need to ask anyone who has gone through the process. Like Makro. Following a year of in-depth planning, which included various feasibility studies, the FMCG wholesaler which is a part of the Walmart group, announced the opening of its new store in Riversands.
Located north of Fourways, which is one of the fastest-developing commercial and residential hubs in northern Sandton, north of Johannesburg, Riversands has also been named as the wholesalers’ new flagship store. The store officially opened on 29 November 2017.
And just like DotActiv helped Food Lover’s Market with their flagship store opening in Somerset West in November, we helped Makro too.
Reasons for opening a new store
While Food Lover’s Market opened a new store because they were running out of space and needed to better cater to their customers, for Makro, it was slightly different reasons.
Firstly, while they are already a household name, they are still looking to expand their footprint in South Africa as well as beyond. Alongside this, is the goal of becoming the biggest and most popular cash and carry store in the country.
Both of these are ambitious goals. And especially considering the retail industry where competition is strong. But for this wholesaler, it’s achievable considering how they are looking to present themselves with this new store.
When walking into any of their stores anywhere else in the country, you’re usually greeted with a typical wholesaler layout. But with this flagship store, you won’t see that. They were intent on breaking from that mould from the beginning.
That means that while their Riversands store looks similar on the outside - the same branding and look and feel - once you enter, you’ll quickly see that it’s different. That’s because the store is modelled after a department store rather than the more accustomed warehouse.
How DotActiv helps its customers
DotActiv has had Makro as a client for the past nine years. During that time, we have provided them with the full category management bouquet, offering both services and software.
For this store opening specifically, DotActiv was tasked with coordinating the signing off of the final floor plan between store development, Makro’s General Merchandise department, and the merchandising managers.
We also created planograms for the whole General Merchandise department of the new store and provided merchandising formats for their Outdoor and Office mezzanines.
Before we go any further, it’s important to note that this store opening and everything around it was very much a collaborative approach between us and the FMCG wholesaler. That’s how we work with all of our clients.
So how did this whole process work? In short, it was a step-by-step process.
The first step was to get all the stakeholders involved to agree on the space allocation which had been agreed on in the floor plan.
Once the floor plan was signed off by all the buyers for their respective sections, we then set about compiling a fixture audit report for the type of fixtures required by the department. Just to note, when it comes to our floor planning tool, everything is data-driven. And it works hand-in-hand with planograms (also data-driven) to give you a macro view of your store’s performance.
Following that, it was a case of finalising the product ranges with the respective buyers and then building preliminary planograms for all categories within the general merchandise department. When doing this, we had to keep in mind the number of drops that were signed off on the floor plans.
The buyers and merchandising managers would also view any planograms we built and if changes were needed, we made them. Once everyone was happy with them, they were sent to the store to be implemented.
Of course, there were challenges in pulling this project off.
One challenge, for example, came down to communication between store development and the operations team. For example, while changes were made at one level, they didn’t filter down to the space planners who were responsible for creating the shelf plans.
Another challenge was the result of fixtures not arriving in-store, which meant planograms needed to be altered. Yet another was the actual challenge of executing the planograms in store.
To ensure the data-driven planograms that were built using our software were implemented correctly in-store, we worked hand-in-hand with the FMCG wholesaler at the store. In fact, at least once a week, we would visit the store and walk the floor in search of any flaws or misalignment in the actual implementation. This we did up until two days before the official store opening.
What to expect when you walk into their store
As mentioned previously, when you walk into Makro Riversands, what you’ll find is more than just a wholesaler with all of the products you need.
At 23 263m², the store is that much more spacious, allowing customers to navigate the store more easily. You can also treat it more like a department store than an actual warehouse, as seen in the images below. This was to ensure easy-to-navigate stores with readily accessible stock.
More than that, it has gone ‘green’ with the increased use of environmentally-friendly technology. That includes solar-powered parking bays and roof. Click here to view more pictures of what it looks like inside the store.
Makro Riversands touts itself as the future of shopping. DotActiv’s category management software and services have played a part in helping them get there.
Conclusion
At DotActiv we are working with retailers both big and small to achieve data-driven product layouts that drive inventory efficiency and increase category performance. If you're looking to take your next store opening to new heights, book a custom exploratory consultation here or visit our online store here.
