Convenience store is a kind of small retail store with optional shopping mode, which is located near residential areas,maily sells instant goods to meet convenience needs as the first purpose.
The three giants of global convenience stores: Lawson, 7 Eleven and the FamilyMart, how do they make “convenience” the best?
The coup has the following points:

1.“Back” line layout, which make you “MUST” pass these shelves
A standard convenience store generally has an area of about 100 ~ 120 square meters. Convenience stores will adjust their shelves according to its size. For example, 7-Eleven with a small area will display special shelves with extra height.
Unlike grocery stores, convenience stores rarely turn customers back. From the entrance to the checkout counter, the customer walked to the innermost daily merchandise shelf, and then went out, just around the circle. Unless there is a clear shopping goal, consumers generally follow this route.
1) On this “active line”, you will pass the end shelves for promotional products and self-produced product shelves promoted by convenience store owners, which account for 40% of the revenue of convenience stores … and other products and grocery shelves are placed in the center of the circle, magazines are placed by the window.
2) The checkout counter is usually on the side of the store door, and the store door is generally not opened in the center of the store, so that customers can go out in the shortest distance after checkout.
3) The counters for bulk (or instant) food are close to the cashier’s counters. These counters are usually next to a walk-in cool room for drinks, which guides consumers to buy drinks with food.
4) Daily goods are also called fresh food products. Most of them need to be sold in a refrigerated state, and refrigerated reach-in display cabinets need to be placed against the wall. Therefore, daily goods are generally on one side of the store; the other side of the store is Cash register and counter.

2. Light products put on top , heavy-duty products put at down. “strong purpose” products are placed lower.
1) from small to large, from light to heavy is one of the rules of convenience store display merchandise. For example, bottled water and large-volume pumped napkins are mostly placed on the bottom of the shelf.
Visually speaking, top-heavy is really bad. On the other hand, if it is a small object, it is more difficult to see it at the bottom.
(For small items, the convenience store staff normally set up hooks in the shelves according to the packaging characteristics of the items, and they even set “in-rack” in the shelves.)
2) “Strong purpose goods”, such as lighters, stockings and other goods will also be placed on the humble bottom shelf.
Integrated shelves are the trend of future display, allowing small objects of different categories to be neatly placed together. The first criterion for convenience store display is to make customers see as many products as possible.
Emergency products such as band-aids, paper towels, and lighters are located on the ground floor.

The same display logic applies to beverage cabinets. In winter, convenience stores will place popular “light-flavored water” such as green tea and lemonade on the best position to guide consumers’ purchase.
A strong brand effect product like Coca-Cola is placed in a slightly inconspicuous position because the person who wants to drink Coca-Cola will find it everywhere you put it.
In the summer, (the drinks are selling very well), the best cola sold is placed in the most prominent position.
In addition, drinks, sandwiches, rice balls, etc. in the reach-in glass door display cabinet are also “strong purpose” consumer goods. Consumers will buy these things in the morning, so they do not need to be placed in a prominent position at the door

3. Every convenience store has a most frequently updated shelf.
After entering the door, the first shelf facing the checkout counter is considered to be the “golden section” of the convenience store, called “promotional end shelf” or “special shelf”-this is the place for customers to pass through when they queue up .Consumers are unavoidable to stay here.

No item on this shelf will appear for nothing. Take the FamilyMart convenience store as an example. At present, the first floor is event goods specially launched for the Spring Festival, and the second floor is topical goods. A promotional label is affixed to each item.
Ad-hoc shelves are 7-Eleven’s most frequently updated shelves, and items are updated every 2-3 weeks on average. 7Eleven’s promotional items are generally new and best. Only by letting customers know about these best products will it be possible to cultivate their continued buying habits.

4. Why are convenience stores filled with small packages with poor cost performance?
Generally speaking, bulk food is more cost-effective. For example, in hypermarkets, we often see promotional packages such as “family value sharing packages” and “buy three, get two free.” But they are rarely seen in convenience stores.
The trend in convenience stores is to sell small packages of food. Miao Fu, sell one by one. Sandwich biscuits, sold two by two.

Pastry Biscuit Small Package, Brand Small Package, Candy Small Package
On the one hand, limited by the display space, the shelf position is too valuable for convenience stores.
On the other hand, the consumer groups of convenience stores are not price sensitive and do not care about the price difference of a few dollars. For some people, eating a whole biscuit package can be more stressful.
Take the FamilyMart K11 store in the commercial building as an example. White collar workers and other business people are the main consumers of convenience stores. Two biscuits with a cup of coffee just happens to be an afternoon tea.
In line with the life concept of “eat less but more meals”, FamilyMart launched a sushi bulk service last fall and winter. Consumers can choose one by one, match with different flavors of sushi, and buy four pcs, one free box offered to pack.

5. Did you discover it? The inclination of the packaging of the bread matches the inclination of the shelf
Convenience store products are divided into: daily products (that is, fresh food delivered daily, such as rice balls, sandwiches, box lunches, etc.); non-daily products (such as instant noodles and potato chips with a long life) and inedible groceries;
Daily products come from factories exclusively provided for convenience stores. These products have unique food formulas, and even their packaging is carefully designed and exclusive.
FamilyMart stores provide fresh food delivery twice a day, and other goods once a day. After the noon rush, sandwiches, sushi, and homemade bread in the convenience store will be out of stock.
Taking bread shelves as an example, the clerk will compactly fill bread on two rows of shelves according to the priority principle from high to low to make the shelves look as good as possible.
If there is only one individual bread variety left, it is also placed at the forefront of the shelf, flush with the other rows. Strangely, this lonely bread naturally stood on the shelf without any support behind it. After careful inspection, the original box’s inclination angle matches the shelf inclination. Without the help of external forces, the bread will “stand” on the shelf in an upright position, showing the customer the complete package.

6. Why is the commercial refrigeration cabinets always on the side?
A row of commerical refrigeration upright reach in display cabinets placed next to a wall in a convenience store. The open refrigerator is called open-case, and the glass door type is a walk-in cooler or a self-contained glass door merchandiser. Both refrigerators set a temperature of 4 degrees Celsius (plus or minus 2 degrees).
The former stores drinks and foods with shorter shelf life, which means that convenience stores need to sell them in a shorter period of time. Using open front multideck cabinet is more friendly and easier to access and take, but consumes more energy and electricity. Recent years, more and more retailers notice the importance of refrigeration running cost cutting , starts to retrofit glass doors onto their open front display cases , this is an easy way to get 75% reduction in refrigeration load.(for more details, please visit https://www.artrefrigeration.com/retrofit-glass-door-for-open-multideck-chiller-freezer.html )

7. Convenience store locations vary, so do the items on the shelves
Even in same brand convenience stores, the items sold in different locations are not the same. For example, the FamilyMart convenience stores near the hospital will add congee food, while the K11 store adjacent to the commercial building will mainly promote high-quality “black label series” box lunches.

The 7-Eleven refrigerated cabinets look very good, with a whole row of coffee of various colors; in ordinary community shops, there are only three rows of coffee.
Product display is part of the training course for new entrants in Japanese-style convenience stores. Formal employees need to receive a six-day training, and part-time staff also need two days of training.
The manager of each store has the authority to adjust the category and quantity of the purchase, but the real decision is still the preference and purchasing power of the target consumer.