It is a fact; that big retailers are in the middle of a big change in their history. Best Buy announced this year the intention of closing 50 stores. This news fed the rumors of a possible ending of big stores, while proximity stores grow every day.
Nothing far from reality: big store formats are still working and very well, nonetheless, the trend now is proximity stores.
This isn’t new. Actually, Carrefour stopped a project called Carrefour Planet when they detected this tendency and moved towards small and proximity formats Like Carrefour Express, City and Market, etc. In the same way, other retailers did the same.
Last year, hypermarkets have grown only 2%, Meanwhile, proximity stores have reached 5% of growth.
Sporting goods or home decor retailers like IKEA or Decathlon have already started opening small-format stores and have adapted them to big cities downtown.
“Worldwide, the combination of sales channels is being fragmented while consumers move towards small format retailers.”
Patrick Dodd, Market growth director of Nielsen.
This tendency is due to the change in consumer behavior owed to traffic, the difficulty of moving around big cities, lack of time, and a lot of other issues of modern life.
This store has to adapt not only its store size but also its product offers and store equipment. Important equipment as baskets and carts should be adapted to this proximity format. Narrow aisles, more visit frequency at the store, and reduced numbers of items in each visit are factors that follow this new way of consuming.
Shopping Basket Solutions
All Shopping Basket range of products is made for this kind of store. The form factor of baskets and carts is significant, considering the new size of stores and aisles. However, reducing the basket and cart sizes shouldn’t mean losing capacity or reducing the average ticket size. For this case, Shopping Basket has created an exclusive vertical basket line called BOND and SUPERBOND.
We have created a hybrid cart called SNUPY which is a combination of two 28-liter baskets and a bottle holder for up to 2 bottles. SNUPY is the ideal solution for stores that don’t want to have two different models of baskets. This way, they can use the GREAT baskets, attached to the wheeled cart SNUPY.
Another powerful feature of small proximity stores is the concentration of clients in peak times which increases the general noise in the store. All our products are made of polyurethane. Our wheels are extremely silent, capable of generating 20% less noise than our competitors. They are also designed with a double bearing system which guarantees perfect maneuverability, and 360º movement event even if it’s fully loaded.