Type: Chain
Region: Midwest
Location: Second upper floor of a large suburban mall
Appearance:
Inventory:
Staff:

External appearance: The large name in bright letters made it easy to locate the store, even from far across the mall.

Willow Tree figurines, with a complete crèche set at the top, and a variety of other gift items on clean glass shelves were clearly visible through full-length front windows.

But, before I even stepped into the store, I saw two things that made me wonder if the store only featured backlist product. A sale table with neatly stacked DVDs and CDs was covered with a red tablecloth. The color contrasted dramatically with the yellows and pinks in the other mall stores that bloomed in the spring palette. The second item was a rounder with calendars—how unusual to see this at the front of the store, well into the year.

Entrance: The entrance was wide, and to the left there was a small stand with current store catalogs and a stack of blue shopping baskets.

Layout and inventory: My first impression was wrong: inventory was frontlist-driven in the entire first part of the store. Dumps with the newest VeggieTales release were followed by rows of face-front best-sellers and books by high-profile authors in all categories.

Neutral slatwall formed the backdrop for two large alcoves fully stocked with framed art, crosses and plaques. To the left was music and to the right were card racks. Along the right wall, nonfiction was shelved high on the wall above alphabetically shelved fiction. That was an interesting way to expose fiction readers to nonfiction and vice versa, but I was originally puzzled by the organization.

Although category signs were above each unit, product did not always match the label: communion trays and wafers were under youth resources. Two small displays with yellow signs indicated, “Up to 80% off” on tables near the back of the store. A single, wood chair tucked in the far back corner looked like it might have been positioned for a child who was to be punished.

Staff: A young male was the only staff person I saw. Although he didn’t greet me or several other customers upon arrival, he emerged from the register twice to ask a few customers if they were finding what they needed.

At checkout, I asked about the names written on lamb pictures below the register. The frontliner explained that the papers represented people who had donated $5 toward the purchase of toys for needy children.

He told me: “At Christmas we did the same promotion with bears. My manager got to go and see the kids get the toys, and it was pretty neat.”

As I looked past some of the bent-edge pictures, I noticed a basket on the floor with two rather droopy plush lambs that strongly resembled the photos on the papers.

Verdict: Use seasonal product to attract shoppers. A busy parent isn’t going to walk all the way to the back of the store to find a children’s Easter book on the shelf labeled “seasonal product.”

Replace badly stained carpet. Clean up the area behind the register—open product boxes, labeled with black magic marker notes, look tacky.

If this were your regular store? Adequate for basic needs, but I’d drive farther for a store with more personality.

Would a non-Christian feel comfortable here? Yes.

What will you remember of your visit a week from now? A desire for this store to present a crisp, “with it” welcome to the many shoppers who walk past. It’s a ho-hum store in a highly visible location.

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