Store gallery: Comet's new look

In the world of electricals retailing size matters and it seems that over the years as the complexity and diversity of the available products has mushroomed, so has the size of the retail units that contain them. And alongside this has come streamlining - which in turns means efficiency.

The thinking appears to have been that if you have a vast array of slick gadgets, then you’ll require a sleek store to house all of this. Translated to the shopfloor, this has meant that the old adage of ‘get in, get it, get out’ has become a central preoccupation - leading to what are, in effect, somewhat impersonal electronic warehouse spaces.

Nothing wrong with this particularly if large impersonal spaces are your thing, but if the words ‘experience’ or ‘environment’ carry any weight at all, then electricals retailing has, over the years, suffered from a distinct lack of personality.

Doubtless at this point the folk at Currys and Best Buy might feel inclined to take issue with this version of the sector’s evolution, but the general sense that big and all-encompassing is a passport to success is a little hard to avoid.

And perhaps with all of this in mind, Comet, the UK electricals arm of Anglo-French retail group Kesa, has created a new format that seeks to make the nature of buying hi-tech or electrical products a little warmer and more friendly. The new look for the store can be seen to advantage in the Purley Way store, on the outskirts of Croydon. Comet occupies the smallest store along this strip of edge-of-town retail and like all the others it is a box. And just like the great majority of the other sheds that fill this well-frequented retail destination, it has had a facelift; completed in October.

But before visiting the store, there is much to be gained from taking a look at the Comet website where a warmer tone of voice has been applied to everything that can be seen, from the faux-handwritten fonts to the product messages. This is about making technology feel rather less intimidating and less overtly masculine.

Comet managing director Hugh Harvey puts the case for change: “We want to be softer and family friendly. We don’t want to disenfranchise the techie. We have appropriate conversations with our customers. What is vital is the quality of the conversation. People buy from people.”

Make yourself at home

Now back to the store and standing outside the Purley Way store the aspect is certainly different from the traditional black and gold fascia that has become so familiar to shoppers. Instead, the logo is orange with white font - not a devastating change perhaps, but instantly more accessible for a general audience. Harvey comments: “One reason for the logo change was that customers found it heavy, especially female customers. The [new] colouration is far more of today and when it’s backlit at night it’s far more effective. Peak period shopping is important and a lot of it is done in the dark.”

Given that Comet’s core heartland is white goods (it represents about 45% of the total space in this store), this would seem to make sense as the decision to buy a new fridge, freezer or cooker tends to rely heavily on female input. Men may be involved but tend to take something of a back seat. The other point about the exterior of this store is that to the left of the main logo there is a secondary logo advertising the fact that there is a branch of ‘Game at Comet’.

Step inside and there are information and navigation beacons wherever you care to look. But somehow they look different from what you might normally expect of an electricals retailer, if only because of the choice of colour, which appears almost as if it has been taken from a children’s colouring set.

Nonetheless, it’s easy to find your way around this one with the coloured beacons bearing messages such as ‘Toast, Brew, Iron’, ‘Click, Type, Search’ and even ‘No Hanging About, We’ll deliver next day, any day and call you when we’re on our way’. It’s simple stuff, but delivered in the same friendly way as the website.

Shelf life

After finding your way to the product area of choice, look closely and the next thing that will probably be apparent is that while there is certainly metal shelving around the store, there is less of it. “We present fewer products on metal shelves. That’s to showcase the product. The role of the store is to showcase concepts and solutions,” says Harvey. This is something of a departure from the normal way of doing things in an electricals store where metal tends to be equated with efficiency and, by extension, technology. It also happens to be generally cheaper, but tends to look it. In place of matt or white painted metal, this store has stainless steel, Maplewood and glass to display product - which certainly lifts perceptions of what is being looked at.

And as well as white goods, small domestic appliances are high on the agenda: “We’ve always been strong in small domestic appliances and put a lot of emphasis on it. As in the rest of the store we’ve merchandised it to showcase and differentiate ourselves from the grocers or Argos. It’s closer to a department store than an out-of-town or technology shed. It’s easy for electricals stores to be big boxes,” Harvey comments.

There is also Game. As the space given to this retailer’s offer is quite substantial and it is one of six stores where this trial is being undertaken, the Comet jury is out on whether there will be other shop-in-shops of this kind elsewhere. Harvey is clear: “You could say it’s a concession model, but it fits in well. What will make it of interest will be the footfall brought into the store and how much will it benefit the rest of the store. We’ll take a view early in the new year about whether it’s good, bad or indifferent.”

A bold attempt at differentiation from a run-of-the-mill electricals store therefore and it does look and feel different from what you’d expect of a retailer in this sector. Harvey says that in the past, Comet has used external design consultancies but adds that this has changed. “We’ve learnt to do our own thing. Each of the fixtures tends to be bespoke to electrical. We got some inspiration for the graphics from an external agency,” says Harvey. The signage that has been used in this branch will be in 100 others in time for peak trading this year and according to Harvey the “validation” that has been carried out shows that “customers love it”. He adds that the customer proposition now is to “come in and play”.

It was raining heavily on the evening of visiting and yet there were plenty of shoppers in the store appearing to be doing just that. Perhaps some of the other, larger, technology retailers along the Purley Way could join them and maybe even pick up a few tips on improving how shoppers feel about their stores.