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West Bloomfield, MI--As an interior designer working with jewelry store owners that are ready to plan the redesign or remodel their stores, the goal is to give the best experience to your customers while they shop. The way customers interact with your jewelry merchandise affects their purchase behavior. Therefore, the jewelry store layout is a strategic use of space to influence the customers’ experience. This principle is one of the many from Paco Underhill, author of Why We Buy: The Science of Shopping.

The interior jewelry store layout has two important components:

1. Store Design: The use of floorplans and space management are important when deciding the locations of jewelry cases, POS, furniture, displays, fixtures, decorative and technical lighting, walls, ceiling design, and signage. Think about creating a bridal area and other special placements for your brands. With flowing floorplans, owners encourage their customers to browse and discover everything you have to offer. For store owners, the goal is to get the use of every square foot of sales space to the best advantage. The Jewelry store floorplan is extremely important in helping the store increase its bottom-line sales. The overall presentation of the entire store layout affects the customers’ desire to purchase jewelry during their visit. When customers enter the store, it’s ideal to have a special table or different style case for the “WOW” factor. See the picture below of a store design being analyzed.

2. Customer Flow: There are patterns of behaviors and certain ways customers navigate through a store. See picture below of floorplans. Understanding customer flow and the common patterns that emerge when customers interact with jewelry merchandise based on the store layout is critical to jewelry management strategy and sales. Jewelry store owners can track this using analytics software and data from in-store video. The objective of jewelry store design with great customer flow is to positively impact customer experience and create value, which also is the primary goal of the owner and their employees.

When remodeling, store owners need to analyze their store layout and understand the traffic pattern. Space planning has changed in the past years, so my clients are requestioning a smaller amount of jewelry cases and more lounging areas. Building a comfortable area where you and your customers can sit and talk, builds relationships and the customers feel much more comfortable buying from your store. Keeping the space plan more open is an excellent way to make the customer feel that they are in a new updated space. These elements listed above in the “Store Design” just make the overall change even more beautiful than just redoing your space plan.  The store image should have interior design elements that cause the customers to feel an emotional need to buy. Giving customers the ability to use more of their five senses to enjoy the jewelry are also essential to close the emotional purchase through the updated interior design elements. It often takes a few interior design changes or updates to start increasing sales.

About the Author: Leslie McGwire™ has over 35 years in business development, interior design, equipment, furniture sales and marketing services in retail and jewelry-based businesses. Leslie has won 25 national design awards, including the prestigious Salon Today and INSTORE Jewelry Store ​awards. Leslie has a true passion for business, design for the jewelry and retail industries. Visit lesliemcgwire.com for more information.