GSP | Retailer Focus: Grapy Store

Grapy, the once Internet-only wine retailer, has recently opened its first store in Roosendaal, Netherlands. The Grapy Store and the Het Verborgen Rijk bookstore, which showcases a large selection of books on cooking, share the same shop front and complement each other with a crossover in merchandising.

Designed by Amsterdam-based retail design firm Storeage, Grapy Store features a vibrant wine-inspired palette, decorative fresh food wall graphics and a modular system of stackable, wooden wine-and-book units. The units can be altered to store wine, books or accessories and are painted in contrasting earthy tones with rich, purple hues that mimic Grapy.nl flavor charts. 3D block letters and chalkboard paint direct shoppers to fresh fish, pasta and wines from around the world.

A central interactive touchscreen suggests wine-and-food pairings, bringing Grapy’s originally online-dominated world into a physical realm. Since Storeage developed the 'flexible fixtures' concept, the 25 square meter Grapy shop could easily travel or relocate to other locations, such as a music store or gourmet deli. And since these mobile units can expand or condense, there is no need for a stock room.

Key lessons from Grapy Shop:
• Have a proprietary fixture that makes the product the hero.
• Modular fixture defines the space and becomes the signature of the brand and becomes the proprietary element that they own.
• Visually pleasing fixtures with the right use of color can create a feeling of warmth and enjoyment.
• Functional displays and shelving with lots of product space can eliminate the need for extra storage and can enable mobility as needed.
• Shared retail space can be an advantage to both storefronts – providing complimentary merchandise for a unique shopping experience.

A successfully integrated food and wine shop with a mouth-watering spread of food, wine and cookbooks, the Grapy Shop has the right recipe to entice passers-by inside.