Merchandising Your Cash Wrap Area

If you are a retailer with a free standing store, listen up! From my personal shopping and professional retail experience, I have found that 99% of retailers do not use their cash wrap retail space to their advantage. In other words, they are losing the possibility of sales because they don’t merchandise product by where their customers “check out”.

Think of your local grocery store as an example here. When you are waiting in line, what do you generally do (beside trying to keep your kids in the cart, unload your groceries  or look for coupons)? For the most part, you look at the magazines, candy, and other little goodies that can be so tempting for an impulse purchase. Now maybe you hate that you grab an US Weekly every now and then (at least I hate that I do this), but the point is that you grabbed it and guess what? US Weekly, the company, is happy! They just made yet another sale. And so can you if you merchandise accordingly near your point of purchase area.

The idea when merchandising near your cash wrap is to encourage customers to buy something they weren’t planning to. This means that the retail value of this product should be low, ideally under a couple dollars and no more than ten dollars for most stores. Of course, there are exceptions here. If your product assortment is of higher retail value, than your point of purchase products can be higher than ten dollars, but they should be among the lowest price points in your entire store. Another thought – make sure that the products are small so that they don’t take up too much space in your cash wrap area. Finally, don’t clutter this space with so much stuff that your customers have no room to put their purse down, sign a receipt, and most importantly, lay their items for purchase down for you to ring up!

In review, consider these three points when merchandising your display area:

1. Merchandise a variety of products that will be tempting for your customers to buy last minute and on impulse. Examples include jewelry, lip balm, greeting cards, accessories and candy. Of course, this all depends on your overall store assortment!

2. Make sure price points of products merchandised on or near your cash wrap display are inexpensive. This will give your customer the quick thought of “yes I’ll get this” versus “too expensive – I don’t need it”. We all like a little extra something, so suggesting these products to your customer as they are standing in front of you about to check out is always a good idea. Just don’t be too pushy! No one likes that.

3. Don’t clutter your space so much that customers aren’t comfortable when they are preparing for check out. It’s no fun to have to sign a receipt with the paper half off the counter because there is no room. Give your customers space.

Finally, be creative. Each store has their own space, their own product, and their own approach towards display. Embrace all of this when deciding on how to merchandise your cash wrap the best way possible for your store.