What’s up? Look at all the space above your shelves that could be working for you. Photo by Becky McCray.
Empty space is an enemy of small town retail stores. Empty shelves and empty space make customers think you don’t have much to sell. They already think you don’t have much because that’s the stereotype of small town stores.
You can combat this perception easily: fill all empty space, floor to ceiling.
Secret: You can fill with anything relevant to your business.
- Use gift bags with tissue paper to fill the top shelf
- Fill lower shelves with empty merchandise boxes
- Hang themed items from the ceiling
- Use “shop small” decorations like banners and pendants to fill in
Use whatever works in your business. One paint store used empty paint cans to fill the top shelf. They didn’t even have labels, but they filled the space!
The kitchen store in the picture used all kinds of vintage kitchen items to fill empty ceiling space. Almost any business can find some vintage-themed items to display.
It’s better for your rural store to feel a bit crowded than to feel sparse. You’d rather have customers thinking, “They have a lot of stuff” than “There wasn’t much in that store.”
New to SmallBizSurvival.com? Take the Guided Tour. Like what you see? Get our updates.
- How small town businesses can market to remote workers and turn them into new customers - May 15, 2023
- Survey of Rural Challenges 2023 results - May 8, 2023
- Rural and small town ideas from the OU Placemaking Conference IQC 2023 - April 5, 2023
- Rural tourism trends say small towns are still cool - March 27, 2023
- Move Your Money and Bank Local - March 22, 2023
- Using a building as a warehouse or storage in a small town? Put up a sign - March 13, 2023
- How to get customers in the door of small town and rural retail stores - February 19, 2023
- Check your small business website for outdated pandemic changes, missing info - January 31, 2023
- Rural Tourism Trend: electric vehicle chargers can drive visitors - January 15, 2023
- 2023 trends for rural and small town businesses - December 26, 2022
Definitely creative ways here Becky to increase sales. Use the real estate you have. We see this during our frequent travels to SE Asia. Folks use ceilings, floors, walls, everything, to hawk their wares, since many people have limited space to work with.
Yes, Ryan. When you don’t have much space, you have to make the most of it. It goes along with the Innovative Rural Business Models and the trend toward Tiny businesses.
Great ideas!
Thanks!