Importance Of Visual Merchandising

Visser, Preez and Noordwyk (2006) stated that: "Store image, that is the sum total of perceptions customers have about a store, is determined by these merchandise, service, and price factors; it is also determined by atmospherics, advertising, and store personnel. Retail store image is taken as a whole attitude of buyers to the store, its attributes mean various things, and each store has a relative location in the buyers mind”. All these contribute to favorable or unfavorable buyers attitudes in the direction of retail stores. These attributes were sell, service, customers, physical facilities, ease, promotion and endorsement, store atmosphere, and post-transaction satisfaction.

Store attributes are an essential part of most purchases for the customers attributes have been defined as criteria considered during merchandise selection. Store image come up with nine termed as the elements like: merchandise, service, clientele, physical facilities, comfort, promotion, store atmosphere, institutional and post-transaction satisfaction where as apparel retailer attributes comprise merchandise assortment, store layout, sales assistance, and displays dressing rooms, pricing strategy

Visual merchandising basically consists of five components as store design, fixtures, presentation techniques, mannequins and store atmospherics. Visual merchandising is defined by Bell and Ternus (2006:20) as “... the process of promoting and marketing the sale of products by developing mental images that urge potential buyers to make purchases”. Visual merchandising is an activity that synchronises effective merchandise selections with effective merchandise displays. . Dunne and Lusch describes various visual merchandising techniques can be used to establish and enhance the overall image of a store. Some of these