Kmart spruces up its L&G department - lawn and garden - Outdoor Living

Discount Store News, July 20, 1992 by Richard Halverson

Kmart has developed an expanded lawn & garden department in its Greenville, Mich., prototype that more than doubles selling space, permitting bulk displays in air-conditioned shopping comfort and enhancing its position as the dominant L&G player in discounting.

The new department prototype, developed in Jackson, Miss., made its first appearance in February at the Greenville, Mich., store north of Grand Rapids, and Kmart has rolled it out to 40 new stores.

Essentially the 16,400-sq.-ft. department is built as an annex to the main building, with its own front entrance and two year-round checkouts. Selling space, including outdoor green goods and bagged goods display areas, is more than twice the previous prototype of 7,400-sq.-ft., said Dennis Charles, senior horticultural buyer. An inside entrance lets customers flow to and from the store proper.

A wide sidewalk permits Kmart's traditional outside display of bedding plant,s and the department has a portable cash register to ring up sidewalk sales.

Inside the main store, a seasonal display area, now set with patio furniture, is next to the entrance to the L&G department for tie-in shopping.

A heating system allows the department to be used for Christmas trim-a-tree, following the fall L&G set, and possibly an expanded RTA furniture. display the rest of the year.

Outside, a sunshade that blocks 62% of the sun protects plants and shrubs from sun scald. At 11 p.m., a computer-controlled overhead sprinkler system turns on to give green goods a 20-minute soaking.

The combination of sunshading and automatic watering "dramatically lowers wastage," department manager Karl Winske said.

A third component of the department is a hurricane fenced outdoor storage area for bag goods and bulky items such as patio blocks.

With its own entrance, the L&G department opens in weekends and holidays an hour or two earlier than the main store, Charles said, resulting in extra sales.

The expanded garden center is expected to produce 40% more sales than the old version, Charles said. So far, the 40 prototype centers in operation are exceeding plan, Charles said. By the end of 1992, Kmart expects to be running 120 expanded centers in new stores.

On average around the country, the garden center space will be used for L&G sales nine months out of the year. That ranges from 11 months in the south to seven months in northern stores, such as Greenville.

During the rest of the year, other department will use the garden center space for seasonal promotional sales. Another use under consideration is for an expanded RTA furniture display.

Where space permits in existing stores, the expanded garden center will be added during remodeling, he said.

The main advantage of the new center is the air conditioning, Charles said, which permits the department to be merchandised the same way as the rest of the store.

The expanded garden center prototype has no backroom storage, so all merchandise is put on display upon receipt, Greenville store manager Jim McCormick said.

To provide extra storage, shelves are 22 inches wide, compared to the conventional 12 inches, McCormick said, and racking on the side and rear wall extends to 16 feet. Windows and countertop high shelving line the front wall and the side wall facing the outdoors green goods area.

The new department is easier to operate and merchandise. Because all merchandise is on display, "you can take a visual scan of stock on hand and you have no worries about what's in the stockroom," McCormick said.

All L&G items, including live plants, are scannable, McCormick said. "That ensures the capture of all sales for automatic replenishment."

To scan bulky items, such as bags of fertilizer, power mowers or trays of bedding plants, checkout clerks use the handheld scanners to scan from one of two checkout counter sources. They can use either a large circular wheel that lists the product name and bar code or a scanning album that features a picture of the item along with the bar code.

The extra space allows for bulk displays of merchandise on stack tables, such as 5-lb. boxes of K-Gro soluble fertilizer at $6.97, compared to Miracle-Gro at $10.97.

"We turn quite a bit of merchandise" on the stack tables, McCormick said.

The wider aisles also allow better display of power equipment, such as Kmart's new line of mowers from O.M. Scott.

"Customers like to touch riding mowers," McCormick said, "Kids like to climb on them."

In a merchandising wrinkle, the new department was displaying a Scott, 12.5 horsepower riding mower over a mirror, so customers can readily check the underside. The 40-in. mower, featuring all-wheel steering, was priced at $1,499, but Kmart has since temporarily trimmed the price to $1,399 as part of its price rollback program.

The department also carried a Dynamark riding mower, with a 12 horsepower engine and 38-in. cut, at $878.

Noma Manufacturing, Jackson, Tenn.,, makes both the Scott and Dynamark lines.

So far this year, Kmart has sold as many Scott riding mowers as it did $850 models in 1991, Charles said. The Scott offers the same features as John Deere mowers but for half the price, he said.