How To Find The Best Location For A Retail Store

Ideal Store Location: Some of the coolest, best known stores are in the most obscure locations. One famous streetwear / sneaker store in LA is in the back of a real fish market, but streetwear and sneaker enthusiasts flock there because it's a novel location. So be unique when choosing your retail store location, especially if you are a small business that can't afford a storefront in the middle of Times Sq.

Ideal Store Location: Location isn't just about visibility. Positioning your retail store just past a busy intersection where getting back out of the parking lot is a nightmare can influence customers to put off visiting your store in favor of a location with easier access. Check traffic patterns around possible locations and find a spot where you are not only visible but customers find it easy to access and exit your parking area.

Ideal Store Location: Your location can be an amazing marketing tool. Consult a commercial realtor experienced in locating space for businesses like yours. Visit the locations the realtor has secured for other business owners. Are they highly visible from the street? From the nearest intersection? Are they visible from the immediate vicinity of bus stops, driveways and most areas of the parking lot (or, if in a mall... can it be seen from a distance?). Can you access the entrance door easily and quickly?

Ideal Store Location: Having worked in commercial real estate for 15 years, I can say that you want good foot traffic. This can either be in the form of being right on a street that gets a lot of pedestrian traffic or in a center that has a good anchor tenant to bring the traffic to your door. Also, make sure that your location has plenty of accessible parking, so the customers will not be tempted go elsewhere. Signage is also important as you want to make sure your store is easily noticed.

Ideal Store Location: Retail Location depends on qualities. What are the qualities of your customer?

Think:

Fun? (amusement park)
Kidlike? (where most families might live)
Sophisticated? (high end neighborhoods)
Multicultural? (urban cities)
Stingy? (Find out what frugal people MUST have and build an easily accessible store around their needs).

Couple that with *convenience*, that it is easily accessible, and you should have a winner!

Ideal Store Location: The best strategy to find the ideal business location is to focus on locations that have neighboring businesses that have a similar customer base. This allows more foot-traffic & will improve visibility to your target market. Even if this requires a higher rent, it may pay for itself through additional revenues. For example, if your business involves computer repair, it may be beneficial to have an office near a computer retail store. Customers will associate you with your neighbors products.

Ideal Store Location: If you can find a location on a corner, rather than in the middle of the street you'll be far more likely to succeed. You're seen from each side directly across the street, from the opposite corner (kitty corner from you), from the car as people sit at a light, from the crosswalk in front of your store as people cross the street (from two directions). Use your windows and use that exposure and change them often to make sure people always notice and even learn to check to see what's new.

Ideal Store Location: The most important piece of advice for retail site selection is knowing your most profitable customers. A great question I usually ask is, "Close your eyes and envision your best customers. Now describe them to me." If you can describe your best customers using basic demographics (age, sex, income) or better yet, psychographics (hobbies, interests, vacation habits), then a great site selection agent can help you place your business in the area most densely populated with prospective customers.

Ideal Store Location: You can spend a fortune finding high priced shopping centers in high traffic areas to put your retail store. Which is fine, but if you use that money to focus more on building a great brand, your location won't matter as much and people will go out of their way to find you through word of mouth. We've all gone out of our way to find a superior retail experience, passing competitors on the way. So as long as your surroundings are clean and safe and you are focusing on your brand, you've won.

Ideal Store Location: To find the ideal retail store location, you must go where your target audience is. For example, I write and sell books about debt collection and business credit. My target audience is business owners that extend credit. Where do they hang out? Business people often hang out at coffee shops, "do lunch", bookstores and/or office supply stores. So that is my idea retail store location, in the midst of those places.

Ideal Store Location: Retail stores,that's where the end to end interaction between many brands and consumers happens everyday.
By common sense I mean we have to decide venues on the basis of the character of a product, For example a new consumer is more likely to cross the road for a food product but not for a trouser.
Don't just assume the human psychology, do your research find out where most competitors are and where your target audience hangs out the most.And yes stick to common sense..

Ideal Store Location: If you make it they will come? Maybe but in these challenging times taking that risk off the table is smart business. Traffic is always important but doesn't guarantee sales and will the cost of that traffic make you broke and your landlord happy?

Do your homework, who's your customer, where are they, then search for your A locations, B locations, and C locations. Target your search on who your customer is, their habits/lifestyle and purchasing tendencies then go and negotiate...

Ideal Store Location: Location is a key for retail success today. When looking for the perfect location, we recommend assessing the foot traffic around the proposed location to make sure it matches your target customer demographic.

Sit outside the proposed location at key traffic times to see who is walking by. Will they be good potential customers for your business? Also, ask neighboring businesses their demographic to make sure it meets your needs as well- they can be very helpful as you explore neighborhoods.

Ideal Store Location: Look at the stores you frequent. Then do some research and find stores in the same niched that you've never patronized and, perhaps, never heard of. What is the difference?

Think about how you found the stores you shop at and, if possible, why you didn't find the others until you hunted them down. What makes some store visible and others invisible?

Use what you learn to make your store easy to find and easy to shop at!

Ideal Store Location: After clearly identifying your customers in demographic terms, use the American FactFinder Data search function at the U.S. Census Bureau website to get a demographic profile by zip code. Locate the zip codes where your customers are located in the highest concentration and then factor other issues such as traffic counts and feeder businesses. Use a street map to highlight the areas of highest concentration. Find available sites from those areas to put your shop where your customers are.

Ideal Store Location: With so many vacancy's out there, I think it is equally important to choose the right business first. Retail is struggling, not to sound negative, I am an advocate of small business and support the "brick & mortar" infrastructure. A few key components you should look for is high foot traffic, accessible parking, good visibility and high road traffic. With vacancy's high be certain to negotiate rent with multiple landlords, one of them will fold like a box.

Ideal Store Location: Choose retail locations that "make it easy for the customer." Choose locations that have quick access, plenty of parking, no sharp turns into the driveway, minimal left hand turns or one way streets to get into the location. The harder the location is to find, get into and get out of, the less customers will attempt to do business there. Locations where there are complimentary businesses make it easy: groceries, gas, movie rental, dry cleaning, fast food.

Ideal Store Location: A common mistake that a lot of retail/restaurant location finders make is that they focus on finding a "good" location from a real estate LOCATION LOCATION LOCATION point of view. This generally means a lot of foot traffic etc.
When I started my first restaurant a couple of years ago, I first created a business plan with a crystal clear vision of WHO my customer is and then set about finding a location that would attract that exact kind of customer.
It seems basic, but its the FIRST STEP...

Ideal Store Location: The perfect location has several elements. Such as: Traffic by foot or car, visibility from the street, signage as well as a reason for your customers to patronize your area, i.e. an anchor store. The number one thing that makes it ideal is that what you sell fits into a community. Consider, opening a discount liquor store in Saudi Arabia is foolish. There must be a neighborhood need as well as a synergy with the goods you sell.

Ideal Store Location: I used to work for a retail store that was in the outskirts of a shopping mall, away from the food court. It was right across from a university - most students had never even heard of the store until my coworkers who were also students told them about it - most students just went straight to restaurants to eat and came right back out, and thus they never saw the store! So it's not just about a good location - being so close to a college - but about where exactly it is.

Ideal Store Location: Consider neighborhood, customer parking, ease of access, pedestrian/vehicle traffic, crime rate etc.

Once you have determined the hood look to your local police service to provide the crime stats for that area.

Now select a locations that will meet your business needs and once again get crime stats for the exact locations in question.

Now you will have a better understanding of the security requirement for that specific location and more important your employees and customers.

Ideal Store Location: Finding a lucrative retail location is similar to conducting market research prior to making a decision. To make any sale, you must deliver what your clientele needs, wants and desires.

What is the profile of the consumer who will purchase what you are selling? Compare your requirements against the economics of the town such as thriving restaurants and an active Chamber of Commerce. Community spirit too will create a desire for consumers in nearby cities to visit the town and your store.

Ideal Store Location: Whether they walk,run or drive to a store movement of people is essential for a retailer. Locate near populated places according to what you sell. Retailers of bulky items, are best near parking or public transport. Ensuring both comfortable access and a safe exit is vital for expensive product retailers. Having easy street access is essential for a deli or coffee shop - the list goes on..

Ideal Store Location: The best thing you can do to find the perfect location is to go to where the people are. No matter what retail business you have, you need customers. You can't put a business up where it's not very populated and think that the people will come. Find a nice place where other businesses are that people go to whether they're from there or visiting. Check out the demographics and lifestyle data. Does it fit your business? If you want a good location, you have to go where the people are.

Ideal Store Location: In retail, most people won't pass up one store to get to another one offering the same goods. If you locate next to your best competitor's top location, you'll have a chance to attract more traffic to both stores. Both of you will thrive as a result. If possible, have the more accessible parking.

Ideal Store Location: I own a retail store. I have learned that a lot of car traffic going by a store doesn't necessarily mean foot traffic in a store. If a lot of car traffic is going by your store,it's because they are on their way to somewhere else & very seldom stop where they don't plan to go. People are so busy these days that they don't take time to stop somewhere unless they've planned to go there. So find a place with a lot of foot traffic or a place that is a definite destination for people to go shopping.

Ideal Store Location: Finding the perfect retail store location does not mean finding the closest spot to your home. Three critical steps include running demographics on potential locations to see if they fit with your target customer, identify the nearest competitors to those locations, and have a specific budget identified including what you can pay for rent, utilities, security deposit and any construction to the space.

Ideal Store Location: The three must haves:
1. Must match category of your product to demographic pool of the area.
2. Must match foot fall of customers who are inclined to buy your product.
3. Must ensure surroundings to support basic needs of the profiled customers. Like parking, nice lounge or great restaurant & so on..

Ideal Store Location: Find a well established COMMERCIAL real estate firm not a residential firm. Ask for references, testimonials and if possible, current projects they are working on. Make sure they know the area you are looking at. Just because they are nationally recognized means nothing if they don't know your area at all. Also have them show you multiple sites with pros and cons about each. Make sure they know YOUR market needs. Do your homework and save yourself the headaches in the end.