Many retail establishments such as wine stores, liquor stores, and grocery stores use menus to display information to their customers. When creating menus for a retail store that carries a wide selection of products, it’s important to think about the following things:
- What items are your customers most interested in?
- What information about the items is relevant to the customer?
- How feasible is updating and maintaining this information on a regular basis?
What items are customers the most interested in?
Many bottle shops, liquor stores, and wine shops have thousands of individual items for sale; however, you might not want to share a list containing every single item. Quite often customers aren’t inclined to browse a long menu just to find the specific thing they’re looking for. As such, we highly recommend keeping any single menu to less than 300 items.
Seasonal and rotational items are great to include on your menu. Customers are likely to assume you have some of the same core brands available year round, and are more interested in knowing what specialty or limited release items are available now. This can be especially useful during the holiday season when many brands release special gift packs; your menu can be a great way to advertise last minute gift options.
You'll also want to include new items in stock; like seasonal items, customers are more likely to be interested in seeing things that they don’t already know you have.
Many wine shops offer periodic tasting events. Your menu is a convenient way to create tasting notes for events or to show featured wines.
What information is relevant to my customers?
The biggest question here is whether you wish to include packaging/container sizes and prices. If your menu is going to be very large, you may wish to declutter your menu by omitting containers and prices. Container size info may not be relevant if your selection typically comes in only one or two sizes. Or, if your business is located in an area where prices are pretty consistent, you might not want to bother adding prices…although, if your prices are much lower than your competitors', you may want to!
How feasible is updating and maintaining this information on a regular basis?
One of the most important things to keep in mind is how easily you will be able to maintain the accuracy of your menu. If you are a business that has a large selection and your inventory rotates quickly, you definitely want to take that into consideration. Or, if you have a fairly consistent inventory selection but the prices fluctuate frequently, you might not want to include prices on your menu since editing the prices for each item could be too time consuming. It’s important to find a balance that works for you, your business, and your customers!
For more info on how to set up a menu, click here.