‘Creating the Experience – understanding the need for experiential retailing, developing a vision for your centre and daring to be different'

There is nothing in your garden centre that I need. I mean REALLY need. Yes, you may have many products that I like and that I want, but none that I really need.

So if all of the garden centres in the UK were to disappear tomorrow, life would go on, we would feed ourselves, our children would be educated and we would do our best to try and heal the sick. Life would go on.

What makes this harder to swallow is the ever increasing competition from online retailers. These online retailers are able to offer the customer wider choice, great prices and home delivery and after the first few times we have all got used to online shopping, the fear has gone and for some it has actually become enjoyable. And it is predicted that in the next 4 years online retailing will double.

How can today's and tomorrow's garden centres cope with this onslaught? I think the answer is simple. Make your garden centre a place that people truly want to visit. Make a visit to your garden centre an experience. It is no longer commodity retailing focussed around the products it is now all about how you create a place that people want to be.

It is no longer enough to be just a garden centre. You need to understand what type of garden centre you are. Create vision and direction for your business and then deliver this in everything you do. You can do this by creating your ideal customer/s and working out how you will provide what they want. Or you can develop an overall idea and key words to describe a vision. Whichever route you follow, a clear vision will help you make decisions about your business as well as helping your team to bring forward ideas. And it is not enough that you know what you vision is, you have to share it, share it with your staff, your suppliers, your bank manager, in fact everyone who is involved with your business but most of all you must share it with your customers.

A visit to any garden centre must be an experience. You need to offer physical attractions, the things that people can't get on line. Many garden centres are already doing this part very well by providing outstanding restaurant or café facilities, indoor and outdoor play and special events like ice skating.

But it needs to go further, centres need to appeal to the senses and to the emotions. They need to offer delight, make people smile and send them home happy. For many years we have been successful at doing this for just a few months of the year with the most amazing Christmas displays, but we have not yet applied this across the rest of the year.

For your garden centre to be outstanding you need to offer a memorable visit to every customer, every hour of every day. We need to build stories around your business and send customers home with something to tell their friends. This can be one of the most powerful forms of advertising - word of mouth (although this is rapidly being replaced by its modern equivalents - Facebook and Twitter).

Delivering your vision and making your centres stand out is best achieved by tackling four keys areas:

The Place
Overall your buildings, layout, features, shopfittings and displays should tell your story. Either your building should be a stunning piece of architecture or your retail areas should be designed to look fantastic. Too often a small areas is given over to a feature but with a clear vision and great stories to tell every part of the garden centre should make its contribution. Developing a retail concept and strategy will help to ensure that everything you invest in helps your garden centre to be successful. This will include materials and colours as well as retail principles and ideas to make your vision a reality. And to deliver experiences may need big spaces for large events, indoors or out - maybe a room adjoining the café or an outdoor events lawn. But also create the details. Make a place in every department for a 'conversation piece'. Add a range of signage around the centre that does nothing else but tell your story and that will make people smile.

The People
Today instore retail is about people. We need to see 'knit and natter' groups in the café; social areas where friends can meet; staff who speak before they are spoken to and in doing so tell your story. We need to see notice boards about local events and success stories; who the local farmer is who provided the sausages. We need to know about local causes you support; the work you are doing in local schools. Perhaps most important of all - the team on the shop floor must be 'people' people.

The Product
Select outstanding products that appeal directly to your customers, the true demographic that exists, and do this well. Seek out products that will inspire them and help them to understand how to use them well. Show products in combination creating themes and 'looks' for each season and search out the people in your team who have a true flare for display. Add 'one off' products that can't be found elsewhere, upcycled, vintage or antique pieces, things made by local craftspeople or artists, produce grown within twenty miles of your centres.

The Promotion
How you tell people about your business is what will get them in through the front door and is probably the most import aspect of today's retail market. Work out who your customers are, work out the message that you want to tell them, decide the best place to do this.

But most of all spend time coming up with ideas that will surprise your customers and create genuine reasons for them to visit which aren't just based around products. Do the unexpected and keep it fresh. Be individual and don't follow the rest. Ice rinks may work very well for some but it doesn't mean they are right for you. Maybe you could start a lunchtime Salsa class; have ostrich races; start a tool exchange or seed bank; develop a cookery club or recipe swap; offer a crèche for bored husbands; offer a personal shopper service for plants or decorate your centre with beautiful and vibrant colours.