19 | Orgill Case Study things like competitive assortments and what products we will have to lift and replace. Then we come up with a plan that allows us to get moving on day one.” In most cases, this process not only involves converting product data and examining product mixes and adjacencies, but also identifying areas of opportunity where product can be added. To streamline this process as much as possible, the CNRG team relies on Orgill’s Smart Start program. The Smart Start program includes hundreds of different assortments and thousands of different planograms across a variety of departments and categories that ensure retailers offer a complete product presentation that is fully supported by Orgill’s warehouse programs. Orgill’s Smart Start program, which began in 2008, plays a key role in making store and departmental conversions quick and easy. Orgill’s Smart Starts are developed together with the industry’s leading vendors to offer retailers converting to Orgill the ability to replace their existing inventory with newly updated and enhanced assortments that are warehouse-backed and optimized to drive profitability and meet the unique needs of the market. “Using Smart Starts really streamlines the conversion process,” Freader says. “We have so many assortments available that we can implement based on the needs of the market and we already know each assortment is optimized to make sure the offering is robust. At the same time it allows us to eliminate a retailer’s dead stock or old SKUs with guaranteed vendor lift of the old merchandise.” In the case of the former H&M Lumber Company, the team utilized more than 175 different Smart Start assortments to fill product holes, replace private-label merchandise from the company’s former Ace Hardware programs and add additional products and brands to the store’s overall offering. Special attention was also paid during this process to ensure that the inventory and product offering at the former H&M Lumber Company was aligned with the product offering at other Home Hardware locations. This is a critical adjustment to ensure that all stores in the Home Hardware family are in alignment with offerings, promotional strategies, online offerings and buying opportunities. Although the CNRG and Orgill teams have a process they go through when converting any location, Freader explains that the actual results for each location are customized to the needs of the surrounding market. “We don’t do anything cookie cutter,” Freader says. “We look at the assortments and where we can normalize offerings, plug in Smart Starts or find opportunities to fill holes, but we also want to make sure we account for the specific or unique product needs of the market. In a way, it is a form of mass customization.” Helms adds that when they approach any conversion, they look at the assortment on several different levels. “We look at it from the local brand preference level, we look at it from the Home Hardware assortment level and then we look at it from a macro level as well,” he says. “We factor all of that into the decisions we make.” “Using Smart Starts really streamlines the conversion process... we have so many assortments available that we can implement based on the needs of the market and we already know each assortment is optimized to make sure the offering is robust.” Chris Freader, Orgill VP of Merchandising
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