CASE
A shop that performs well. Which is exactly why it stood out where the room still was.
Rijswijk, Netherlands · benchmark analysis, zoning, cold greenhouse and signage
GroenRijk 't Haantje sits in Rijswijk, between The Hague, Delft and Rotterdam, and it is a shop that performs well. That is a nicer starting point than a shop with a problem, and at the same time a harder one: whatever you change has to be demonstrably better than what was already there.
The assignment ran over several years and across three of our phases: first their own figures alongside our benchmark, then the zoning and the cold greenhouse down to object level, and finally the in-store communication and the signage. This case is about that completed work.
We worked through a full year of turnover and margin figures and set them against the European Garden Centre Benchmark, the set in which we measure garden centres from several countries the same way. That is phase B: know where the money sits before a single line is drawn.
The outcome was not that something was wrong. On the contrary: turnover per square metre runs a good sixty per cent above the median of that benchmark. Which is why the conversation afterwards went somewhere other than usual. Not about what is not working, but about where the next square metre should go in a shop that already runs well.
Precisely in a shop that is doing well, it is tempting to leave everything as it is. The figures per department showed why that would be a waste.
Alongside the catchment, a full year of turnover and margin was worked through and set against the benchmark. The shop as a whole does well: turnover per square metre runs a good sixty per cent above the median of the European Garden Centre Benchmark. That is exactly why two departments stood out.
where the benchmark averages 602 m², and still 71 per cent more turnover per square metre. Good for a tenth of shop turnover.
less than a third of the benchmark average, with more than double the turnover per square metre. Elsewhere this group sits in the top three.
Two departments performing exceptionally per square metre on a footprint that does not match. That is not a problem but a pointer to where the next square metre should go.
Measuring the heated greenhouse brought up a discrepancy that occurs in almost every garden centre and is rarely said out loud. On the drawing, the main aisle was mapped as a zone of its own, good for 1,270 of the 3,920 square metres. Almost a third of the floor.
Counted that way every department looks smaller than it is, and no share adds up any more. Our measuring rule therefore lets the product zones run on underneath the aisle. The fourteen departments together then come to 2,651 square metres, and only then can you see which cluster genuinely carries the shop: at 't Haantje that is non-garden, at 39 per cent.
It sounds like bookkeeping. It is the difference between a department that looks too small and one that is too small.
The cold greenhouse is the clearest example of where that analysis leads. Bedding plants from the cold greenhouse were the largest single item in turnover, so that is where it was worked out first: the layout, then the model, and finally down to which sign hangs above which shelf.
AND HERE IT IS
A signage scheme is a drawing until the moment someone is standing on a ladder. This is the same cold greenhouse, with the green bands where they sat on the sheet. Click a photo to see it full size.
Photos lookINsight. Unlike most of our cases, the rights here are ours.
The cold greenhouse has been built, with an object list stating exactly what had to be ordered, and the in-store communication was developed over several rounds into a plan of forty-eight sheets. The signage followed in 2026.
"We used to rebuild on gut feeling rather than on figures. Now that we really have insight, we make decisions about the departments far more easily and with more confidence. We had no idea beforehand how much there still was to gain in routing and layout. It is so much more logical and clearer now, certainly for the customer too."
Gerdien 't Hart, GroenRijk 't HaantjeWHAT THIS CASE SHOWS
In most assignments we see one link in the chain. Here there are three in a row, with the same client, and that makes it visible why the order matters.
Phase A, the location profile and brand positioning, did not come up at 't Haantje.
The sales and margin analysis over a full year, set against the European Garden Centre Benchmark. Measuring and zoning the heated greenhouse, with the measuring rule that does not count the main aisle as a department. The complete working out of the cold greenhouse including object list and 3D model. And the in-store communication plan with signage per department.
We do not supply shelving, we do not print signs and we do not build. Which means our advice on which department deserves more square metres cannot be steered by what we happen to sell.
Start with six figures in the free benchmark, or have your location worked through with the Location Profile.
