Retail Growth Audits
Our Retail Growth Audit is a structured, collaborative process that can be designed to refine your overarching brick-and-mortar strategy or to asses a specific store or issue you are facing in the retail space. Led by Christopher Peak, this iterative assessment combines a virtual "store walkthrough" with expert design scrums to evaluate your customer flow, merchandising, omnichannel touchpoints, and overall retail experience. The final deliverable is a 30 to 40-page workbook, a "living document" that captures critical learnings and defines a high-level, actionable plan to align your physical retail program with your strategic growth goals.
The Deliverable: A Retail Roadmap
We don’t just give you a report; we give you a guidebook. The core deliverable of our engagement is the Retail Workbook, a comprehensive 30- to 40-page strategic document designed to be shared, used, and evolved by your team.
Delivered in both PDF and editable PPT formats, this "living document" captures our expert analysis and provides a clear, actionable path for aligning your physical retail program with your growth goals.
What We Analyze
- Operational Audit Analysis: A rigorous review of your current store navigation, identifying high-traffic zones, bottlenecks, and dead zones to optimize customer flow.
- Customer Journey Mapping: A step-by-step evaluation of the shopping experience from entry to exit, ensuring every touchpoint aligns with your brand promise.
- Merchandising Strategy: Recommendations for product presentation, grouping, and visual storytelling to enhance engagement and increase basket size.
- Service & Experience: An assessment of clienteling, try-on experiences, and Point of Sale (POS) efficiency to reduce friction and build loyalty.
- Design & Omnichannel Integration: Top-level design recommendations and an audit of how your brick-and-mortar stores interface with your e-commerce channels.
- Actionable Next Steps: A prioritized list of strategic moves to fix immediate issues and seize long-term growth opportunities.
For brands choosing our Enhanced Track, the workbook expands to include 3-5 updated design prototype sketches and a deep-dive analysis (10-15 pages) into a specific "Enhanced Focus Area" critical to your business.
Why Choose A Retail Growth Audit?
- Access Iconic Expertise: Leverage direct insights from retail leaders who have driven strategy for some of the world's most iconic global brands, such as Apple and Universal Studios.
- Align Strategy & Identity: Ensure your physical retail program is perfectly calibrated with your strategic plan and strengthens your brand’s core identity.
- Optimize Operations: Identify specific bottlenecks, dead zones, and high-traffic areas to improve customer flow and merchandise effectiveness.
- Get an Actionable Roadmap: Walk away with a comprehensive Retail Workbook that captures key learnings and defines a high-level, executable action plan.
- Create a Living Resource: Receive your audit as a "living document" in editable formats, allowing your team to update and refine the strategy as you implement recommendations.
Timeline
Week 1: Intake
We begin with a collaborative intake process involving your brand lead and our retail team. This week is dedicated to collecting and reviewing your existing brand assets and scoping materials to ensure we align with your vision and identify key focus areas right from the start.
Week 2: Store Audit Walkthrough
During this two-hour virtual session, we conduct a Zoom-based "store walkthrough" to actively observe your space and operational flow. This interactive Q&A allows us to identify immediate opportunities, resulting in a six-page audit of findings that serves as the foundational content for your final Retail Workbook.
Week 3: Customer Experience Mapping
In this one-hour collaborative session, we work together to map your current brand identity and identify specific challenges. It is a creative exercise where we storyboard your ideal customer journey, helping us envision exactly how your brand should feel to a customer walking through the door.
Week 4: Retail Design Scrum
This two-hour focused workshop is where we get tactical. We run a design scrum to ideate specific improvements in design, technology, and strategy, ensuring every physical element of your store supports your broader growth goals
Week 5: Deliverable Preparation
During this week, our team synthesizes all the findings, data, and creative concepts into your final workbook. We will coordinate with you via email to clarify any final details, ensuring the strategic plan is comprehensive and perfectly accurate before presentation.
Week 6: Retail Workbook Presentation
In our final one-hour session, we present your comprehensive Retail Workbook to your team. We will walk through the analysis, design recommendations, and actionable next steps together, handing off a strategic "living document" that is ready for implementation.
Optional: Enhanced Focus Workshop
This intensive four-hour session is designed to go deep where it truly counts for your brand. Building on our fundamental work, we dedicate this workshop to exploring your chosen focus area—whether it is solving a specific problem or capitalizing on a strategic opportunity—to create detailed, customized deliverables for your workbook.