Digital Planograms to Translate into Reality for Manufacturers in Germany

Experts believe that the use of such technologies will help retail chains and manufacturers to more easily endure crisis situations.

(PRESS RELEASE) BERLIN, 19-Jul-2022 — /EuropaWire/ — Manufacturers and distributors of FMCG and CPG throughout Europe are switching to customized digital planograms. Thanks to the development of IT, digital planograms can be created for each chain or even each individual store. This trend, which is also relevant for Germany, is closely related to the automation and customization of the entire retail and merchandising sector. Experts believe that the use of such technologies will help retail chains and manufacturers to more easily endure crisis situations.

This year has not become easier than the previous one. Despite the fact that the pandemic is receding, a politically volatile environment creates new challenges: inflation, rising prices, troubles with energy supplies. At the same time, new opportunities are opening up, say retail automation experts from IBA Group. FMCG and CPG companies can influence the sales of their products with the right planograms.

Traditional approach to creating planograms is largely human-dependent, so errors are common when preparing them. With a large number of planograms, the work of a manager becomes much more complicated: it is difficult to create and maintain data up to date, and adding product images takes a long time. Therefore, it is inconvenient to use such planograms, and, most importantly, they do not show true picture of the layout.

Today retailers are switching to digital planograms. This is one of the promising areas of automation that will assist in better interaction with customers. Digital planograms are easy to create and edit. They clearly show where each SKU should be placed. In addition, digital planograms can be created for each individual store. Thus, the company has the opportunity to adjust the layout depending on the demand at each outlet.

There are many IT tools for creating digital planograms. For example, the Goods Checker solution allows creating planograms for fast moving consumer goods: dairy products, carbonated drinks, tobacco products and much more. This tool is able to process goods of different sizes: small boxes of chocolates, bottles of yogurt and so on. With customizable shelf sizes and no pre-determined product cells, the IT tool makes it easy to create customized drag-and-drop planograms for products of different sizes.

“It is already the case that German manufacturers and distributors are investing in the digital transformation of merchandising in order to improve the quality of the customer experience and affect sales, and therefore profits,” say retail digital transformation experts from IBA Group.

Streamlining the creation and updating of planograms, centralized allocation of assignments for merchandisers and management of product range by analyzing store shelves is a necessity in today’s competitive environment among FMCG and CPG companies in Germany.

Media contact:

Dzmitry Kulbatski
dkulbatski@ibagroup.eu

SOURCE: IBA Group