Keeping Your Inventory Fresh Summary

Having a fresh and appealing product selection is one of the pillars of retail success. You can’t attract customers with dated or uninspired merchandise, so it’s important to constantly stay abreast of the latest product trends and be on the lookout for merchandise or suppliers that can help you keep up.
In this post, we’ll be talking about the resources you can turn to when you’re looking for product and trend insights or are in need of vendors who can deliver great new items. Check out our tips below:
First things first: Listen to your customers
Your customers are the richest and most reliable source of product insights, so before diving into the following resources, be sure to turn to them first. Pay attention to what shoppers are saying through various channels and look at product and sales reports to determine which products or brands are selling.
That’s what Cat Socrates, a beautiful design shop in Singapore, is doing. According to owner Hellen Jiang, Cat Socrates has a lot of regular customers, so keeping their product assortment fresh is a must. “We’re always trying to find new brands and items, and we look at sales reports to determine the quantity and type of goods,” she said. On top of that, “we listen to feedback from our customers.”
Also note that your sales staff and associates may not be your only sources for customer insights. If you have different departments (ex: marketing, ecommerce, customer service, etc.) you need to collect information from them as well.
As Kurt Kendall, partner at Kurt Salmon’s Retail and Consumer Products Group wrote, “Many retailers possess a treasure trove of customer insight, but it’s too often siloed within departments.” That’s why he recommends merchants gather data across all their departments. Your marketing team, for instance, can help you, “understand buying patterns and common item combinations,” while those in charge of ecommerce and web analytics “can provide an understanding of what items consumers search for, items they consider instead and which products receive minimal attention.”
Once you’ve gathered enough customer data and have gleaned insights into the types of products or brands you should be stocking more of, you’ll be able to go out there with more confidence and find the right merchandise and vendors for your store.
Where exactly should you look? The sources below will point you in the right direction:
1. Events
Expos, buying shows, and other industry events offer numerous opportunities to learn about upcoming trends in your industry. More important, they enable you to get essential face time with potential suppliers and their merchandise, so you can see and touch products firsthand.
There are a lot of huge retailer events out there whose main purpose is to connect buyers with suppliers. For example, there’s ASDLV in Las Vegas, the largest and most diverse general buying show in the US which brings together suppliers from categories like fashion accessories, health and beauty, toys, gift