Whether you use your walk-in cooler for backroom inventory, product display, or as a beer cave, your cold store is one of the hardest working spaces in your business. Unfortunately, many stores leave the organization of this area as an afterthought. Your shelving shouldn’t be left to chance. Poor shelving leads to stockouts, spoilage, customer confusion, and ultimately, lost sales. Intentional fixture design and selection can shift all these problems into assets. Imagine well-stocked, in-date, easy to find merchandise. What should a retail store owner consider before making a shelving investment?
The Shelving Inside Your Cooler Matters
While your cooler shelving might seem to be merely functional and any old shelves will do, in actuality, your walk-in cooler fixtures have a big impact on day-to-day store operations and efficiency.
Refrigeration units rely on uninhibited, continuous cold air circulation to maintain consistent temperature zones throughout the room. When cold room shelving isn’t intentionally customized for a space, the flow of the cooled air is blocked, forcing longer compressor run times, and increased energy costs. Even worse, restricted airflow creates “hot spots” in the cooler. Compromising the flow of cooled air also inhibits consistent temperatures across the room, leading to spoilage, loss of value, or beverages that aren’t actually cold.
Additionally, disorganized shelving leads to further logistic nightmares for your store. When cold rooms are not carefully designed, keeping inventory up-to-date is more time consuming and tricky, leading to stocking errors. Out-of-stock instances actually cost your business real money. When customers can’t find what they want, you lose out on that sale, as well as future loyalty. The correct shelving, designed and installed by the DisplayMax experts, provides ample, organized space for increased brand variety and larger package sizes.
Cold room shelving also impacts the day-to-day function of your employees. When products have clear storage and display areas, employees are able to increase their pick efficiency and restocking speed.
The Main Shelving Types
Any walk-in cooler or cold room makes use of a variety of shelving types. Choosing these fixtures is vitally important to the successful use of this important area in your retail environment.
Beer Cave Shelving: These heavy-duty units are available in various dimensions to fit your custom configuration. These racks feature impressive structural capacities of up to 2,700 lbs per bay (up to 900 lbs per individual shelf).
Vault Shelving: These fixtures combine structural integrity with clean aesthetics. Heavy-duty steel frame and powder-coat finish shelves are constructed of 31 crossbars per foot and boast a 250-lb storage capacity, ensuring valuable products stay in place!
Powershelf Cooler Door System: This system represents the pinnacle of high-density cold room merchandising. Built specifically for standard 24″ wide glass cooler vault doors and accommodating 30″ deep gravity-feed shelf configurations, this system maximizes front-facing visibility. Integrated gravity-flow tracks ensure that products automatically slide to the front as items are removed, eliminating visual gaps, reducing labor required for manual product facing, and maximizing impulse purchases.
Mule Dollies: Mule Dollies are a must-have piece of equipment for every beer cave and walk-in cooler. These four-wheeled flatbed dollies that improve in-store efficiency and reduces heavy lifting injuries.
Each of these units is durable, sturdy, and able to withstand the test of a busy retail environment.
Walk-In Cooler vs. Beer Cave
A cold area can be a beer cave, walk-in cooler, or even something else. But what’s the real difference?
Beer caves are an immersive consumer experience. They are customer-facing, so the presentation and organization need to be strategic. A beer cave should have lighting, signage, and merchandising chosen and set up in a way that attracts customers and encourages purchases. The DisplayMax approach can make all the difference. Our designers can implement eye-catching lighting and well-placed signage, making your beer cave a destination experience for customers. This elite, luxe setting drives higher ticket values and repeat purchases.
A retail walk-in cooler generally holds extra product for restocking the sales floor. This room must be organized and efficient, with clear spaces for merchandise. Design should prioritize orderliness, simplicity, and safety.
Choose the Right Configuration
How does a retail business owner begin to think through the right configuration for the walk-in cooler?
First, begin with your store’s objectives. Do you need more storage space? Is your cold room customer facing? Are you seeking volume of sales or high-ticket purchases? At DisplayMax, we are committed to helping you understand your objectives and then achieve them.
“The key reason for our success is that we always begin a project by first understanding your objectives and expectations,” says Charlie Domen, President of DisplayMax. “We want to know what success looks like to you and do everything we can to achieve it. We then commit to completing the job as you designed it to the project scope of work at each location. We guarantee it.”
Next, assess your cold room physical size and space. Your fixtures should be proportional to the room that you actually have. Make sure to take into account entry door placement as well as any vault doors and display shelves. Consider customer and employee traffic flow.
Your shelves absolutely must be sturdy enough to stand up to the weight of your merchandise without bending, buckling, or breaking. That’s why we stock top-of-the-line shelving for walk-in coolers and beer caves. Fixture weight capacity must be matched to your heaviest SKUs. Your refrigerated merchandise is among the most valuable in your store, and needs to be properly supported so you can sell more.
Lastly, consider the practical implications of function in the room. Plan for employee restocking speed, not just storage capacity. This may mean providing more shelving than strictly necessary, but reaping dividends in ease and speed of labor.
Working With a Fixture Expert
Many store owners try to save money by cobbling together walk-in cooler fixtures, but this often ends up costing them more in time and money. A simple solution is to work with a DisplayMax design expert. When you partner with DisplayMax, you’re not merely getting a vendor, but a trusted partner throughout the whole process. From initial store survey, through design, fixture delivery, and installation exactly to your specs, our turn-key solutions are designed to work seamlessly, ultimately saving you frustration, time, and money. With over 30 years of experience, DisplayMax’s project-first approach has led to success for countless clients. With your store dimensions, cold room specs, product mix and budget range, our team designs and installs fixtures that work for you. Contact us today to begin partnering with the experts who will bring your projects to life with 100% compliance.
In Conclusion
Walk-in coolers & beer caves set retail businesses apart from the competition! Don’t let disorganized, under-engineered shelving drag down your operational performance or compromise your customer experience. Make sure your walk-in cooler is selling for you with the right fixtures for your space.
The right shelving supports better product variety, fewer stockouts, and stronger shopper experience, leading to profit expansion. Investing in the right cold room fixtures pays immediate dividends through lower energy costs, faster restocking speeds, superior product presentation, and increased overall sales.
Contact the fixture design experts at DisplayMax today to schedule your consultation!
