How can I keep the costs of my visual merchandising displays to a minimum and how regularly do I need to change them?

When times are tough, it might seem that one of the things you can cut back on is visual merchandising. After all, providing the ranges are good enough, presumably the merchandise will sell itself – as long as the price is right.

This may be the case if your business is food – and even here it would be contentious – but in almost every other type of retailing good visual merchandising is a must. And visual merchandising will only be any good if people notice it, which means that change is the order of the day.

The question is how often should this be done? Debenhams creative director Mark Woods is absolutely clear about what’s required: “We would suggest you change your windows and displays at least every three to four weeks. That’s what we do.

“In the windows, it might be just a product change, but you do need to keep on top of things as far as newness and freshness are concerned.”

Debenhams creates its window schemes in head office and then sends instructions out to the in-store visual merchandising teams. And this is the other point: by its very nature visual merchandising has a tendency to be expensive, both in terms of time used and the materials required. For multiple retailers, therefore, standardisation is a must. It also means that the

danger of over-elaborate displays, when branches go out on a limb, can be avoided.