Consumer Demand for Service and Information

Published: 05 Mar, 2010

In the industry it's often said consultants are divorced from the day to day reality of running a retail business. John Russell decided to work on the shop floor of a garden center attached to a big box retailer earlier this year. He found a lot hadn't changed but two aspects surprised him.....

It was the first time I had spent any length of time working at the coal face, so to speak, for over ten years; and in spite of thirty plus years of experience, I was surprised by some of what I encountered.

In particular, the first was the high consumer expectation of top level service. The second was the consumer thirst for information.

Because the store is a big box retailer based on high volume sales at everyday low prices, the expectation might be that it is essentially a self service operation.

To a degree staff levels reflected this. But in reality, the opposite is true. And not just in the garden centre, but across all departments in the store.

On any occasion I walked the store I was accosted by customers wanting help and assistance in all departments – I helped with plumbing enquiries, I showed a lady how to lay vinyl, I sorted out gas bottles, camping equipment, sealers, and house wares.

In the garden centre it was just the same – a constant flow of “excuse me’, “Can you show me “, “where is “, “Have you got any”. 

What also struck me was how these customers had changed over the last ten or so years – now more demanding, more impatient, less polite, less willing to compromise.

All that aside, when they got the service they expected and deserved, they were invariably appreciative. On several occasions customers shook my hand, saying how good it was to get some decent service. They also went away with full trolleys!

The second thing that struck me, and which upon reflection isn’t all that surprising, was the amount of information people were seeking.

This was especially so in the garden center, but also across all other departments. When I thought about it, it was obvious what had brought this about, especially in the garden centre.

This recession we have worked our way through, has brought about a huge increase in numbers in one consumer group – the beginner gardener.

This group crosses all age groups, but they have one thing in common – the need for advice and information. And on looking around I could see that apart from price and product location there was very little written information available. Yet these customers were crying out for it – “How do I plant this?”. “How tall will it grow?”. “What do I feed it with?”

If this cross section of customers is representative of the broader consumer groups then this clearly gives us some strong signals as to where some opportunities lie for us to grow our business.

So how do we do this, and more importantly, without incurring huge costs? (Rules out putting on more staff)

Let’s start by training and up skilling the staff we already have – in customer service and selling techniques, and in basic product knowledge, so that they can answer with confidence the most frequently asked questions.

This training can be done easily in-house, at staff meetings and start of day sessions. Train in bite size pieces that can be easily absorbed and learned. Often it is a good idea to use a professional trainer for a one or two day session to start the ball rolling, and then build on this using the approach described above.

Information can be disseminated in several ways:

• Monthly “What to do in the Garden” pamphlets,
• “How To’ brochures on a range of most common topics, especially edible crops, seed sowing, feeding, pruning, pest and disease management.
• Importantly, have a strong, integrated, in-house signage system. Start by telling your customers where to find things (Category Signs e.g. Fruit Trees), then break this down into the various types (Sub-category Signs e.g. Citrus), then give information on individual varieties (Point of Sale benefit signs e.g. Lemon ‘Yen Ben’). Keep the information brief, relevant, easily digested, and accentuate the positives and benefits. Short, sharp bullet points work better than long wordy sentences.

For example:
- Lemon Yen Ben
- Quick growing
- Seedless fruit
- Excellent flavour
- Price

A good signage system with lots of information supported by a well trained and well informed staff will give you the edge over your competitors in meeting the needs of your customers.

As an aside, a third thing my recent work experience reinforced in me was the importance of good stock management – buying right, pricing right, reducing destroyals and markdowns. But that’s another story!

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