Facility Appearance Makes a Strategic Difference in Customer Perceptions — and Spending Habits

Lighting influences the feel of your stores and the appearance and desirability of products on shelves and in displays. The temperature inside your stores impacts shoppers’ comfort levels and thus their overall lingering time and what they buy. A great deal of research has been done regarding the impact of retail facility management on customer behavior over the past decades, and it’s clear that carefully managing these assets in your locations pays dividends:

For retailers with physical locations, ensuring the assets that govern these (lighting systems and types, HVAC systems, and signage) are well maintained is crucial. Online sales continue to grow throughout the pandemic. Digital sales accounted for $1 of every $6 spent on retail purchases in Q3 2021, and of the total share of retail sales, online accounted for 18.8% — up a hefty 3.6% over pre-pandemic levels. With the pandemic situation continuing to evolve, it’s likely that this trend will continue.

That’s why effective retail facility management should be a high priority for your brand. While your team has its hands full marketing to new buyers and existing customers, the last thing you need is to offset that hard work with malfunctioning HVAC systems rushing buyers out of stores due to discomfort, flickering or damaged lighting noticeably reducing visibility and safety, or signage with illumination issues putting a negative brand perception in customers’ minds.

Cover All Aspects of Retail Facility Management with CLS

For more than five decades, CLS Facility Services has been supporting some of the largest, most recognized brands in the U.S. with their asset management needs. Specializing in supporting retailers with anywhere from 25 to 1,000 locations, our team can design, execute, and manage virtually any retail facility management scope. However, brands achieve the greatest benefits by combining all of their facilities’ assets into a single program. Here’s how we support these critical assets.

Temperature: HVAC Preventive Maintenance

Commercial HVAC solutions are no small investment and demand a proactive maintenance program to keep them performing reliably. With CLS Facility Services, we document every detail about your HVAC systems at each of your stores — including make, model, age, serial number, condition, and more — and create a complete asset list that you can access at any time. We manage all warranty information and, overseeing our proven network of contractors and service providers, manage all aspects of service on these systems. Along the way, we evaluate equipment performance, replacement part data, and more to ensure you have a complete picture.

Learn more about HVAC preventive maintenance here (with a helpful video).

Lighting: LED Retrofits & Maintenance

Lighting is everything in a retail environment. Its impact is just as significant as how you stage and package products themselves. But with dozens of components making up your lighting system (ballasts, fixtures, wiring, sockets, switches, controls, etc.), there are ample opportunities for things to go wrong. That, and using outdated or underperforming lighting components can lead to not only higher energy costs but also reduced illumination, poor color temperature, and more. This literally puts your products in a bad light and makes customers antsy to move on. With lighting maintenance and LED retrofits for old systems, CLS Facility Services will ensure that this essential aspect of your retail facility management program is always accounted for, reviewed for performance, and well maintained.

Explore our lighting maintenance services and turnkey LED retrofit capabilities.

Signage: Proactive & On-Call Maintenance

Your signage is the first impression your customer has with your retail locations during each and every visit. They look for it, and how it’s performing (or not performing) will influence their perception of that location and your brand overall. It is far too important to not include in an ongoing retail facility management program. CLS Facility Services has decades of experience in various signage services that include repair, installation/removal, LED conversions or retrofits, track installation, and more. As with any other asset in your retail facility management program, every detail will be easily accessible in our client portal that you can access to understand where your program stands at any point.

Learn more about our signage maintenance services here.

Safety: Protecting Employees & Customers

While safety systems don’t consistently impact purchasing behavior like lighting and ambient temperature, customers most definitely take note of where exit signage, fire and life safety systems like fire extinguishers, and other details are located. Automatic doors, emergency exits, and other points of access are also noted — whether actively or subconsciously. Maintaining these systems is not only critical for helping your shoppers feel comfortable and protected but also for meeting local safety code requirements.

With CLS as your FLS and maintenance partner, these essential systems are included in your retail facility management program. Our team will help you design a consistent PM cycle that works for you, testing these systems, ensuring they’re working correctly, identifying replacements when needed, and managing all of the details for cost and program reporting.

Learn more about our FLS capabilities and emergency services.

Let’s Work Together to Make 2022 Your Best Year Yet

CLS Facility Services has been supporting the retail industry since we were founded more than 50 years ago. We’ve worked with our clients in multiple sectors within retail as they’ve grown, scaling our services alongside them as they’ve increased their footprint from a few stores to a few hundred or more. Today, we serve as the exclusive retail facility management partner for major brands — handling all aspects of their maintenance needs consistently, accurately, and with unmatched performance and dedication. We can do the same for your retail brand.

Whether you already have a partner in place or are looking to free up your existing facility management team to focus on more strategic priorities, put our expertise to work for your success.

Schedule a call with our team to discuss your retail facility management goals.