Eckerd Drug Designs Photo Island Displays

In an effort to improve traditional film merchandising, Eckerd Drug Co. has designed a photo island display for its 1,700 drug stores. With about half the displays installed so far, the Clearwater, Fla.-based chain has seen a dramatic increase in sales across the film category.Ron Koch, vice president of photofinishing for Eckerd, says the display more logically merchandises the vast range of photo-related products. "Film is very hard to organize because the category is so diverse and it's easy to confuse the customer," he says. "Merchandising it in a jumble or splitting it up into different parts of the store is accepted in our industry because it's always been that way. With the photo island, we wanted to bring together all the film and related products in one place and organize them so customers get to the right [product] quicker."After creating initial designs, Eckerd worked with Elite Marketing Ltd. of Long Island City, N.Y., to create a series of prototypes, conduct field tests and manufacture the final displays. During development, Elite consulted Eastman Kodak Co., Rochester, N.Y., for color coordination and other assistance. Kodak is the drug chain's sole film supplier.The resulting photo island is a gondola combined with Eckerd's existing film drop-off kiosk, both of which feature the distinctive Kodak product colors. The gondola portion is a standard 6-foot-long freestanding fixture with wire racks and a fabricated sheet metal base. It is customized with extruded ABS valances and a vacuum-formed ABS base that curves out an additional 18 inches at one end. Also at that end are two spinner racks made of wire and metal tubing.The film drop-off kiosk is made of laminated particleboard with a metal base. It features fabricated acrylic and extruded ABS sign holders as well as standard wire racks. When assembled, the entire photo island measures 120 inches wide by 60 inches high by 40 inches deep. The four-sided spinners measure 14 inches in diameter and 38 inches high.One side of the gondola can merchandise up to 600 rolls of film, which are organized by speed using Kodak's color coding system. The other side holds an assortment of 24 conventional cameras by various makers. The less expensive models are displayed in blister packs, and pricier pieces are secured in a locked area. Single-use cameras are stocked in the spinners, each of which holds 16 items. Up to 200 bonus packs or sale film boxes can be found opposite the spinners on the end of the drop-off kiosk.The photo island's base and valances can be modified easily on site to highlight new products or sales promotions. Also, Eckerd plans to add 60 in-store photo processing labs each year to its current 486 labs. When a store acquires a lab, the kiosk can be removed from the island and the gondola rounded off to merchandise additional photo products.Introduced last August, the display was installed in about 800 stores by the end of November. As of this month, Eckerd will resume distribution, with approximately 800 more to be in the field by April. Each unit is installed by Eckerd employees who were trained by Elite Marketing. According to Koch, the installation process has gone smoothly. Display assembly requires about 45 minutes and planogramming takes an additional one to two hours.Although the display's price tag is $1,000, Koch believes the drug chain's sales results will justify the expense. "We have a lot invested in this, but we're looking for the photo category to drive our underlying strategy," he says. "With 70 percent of film now sold on impulse and 40 million tourists coming to Florida every year, we hope to boost everyday sales of film and cameras by letting the different film categories play off each other. This will increase the category's visibility and make it easy for customers to find what they want."

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