Advice for refurbishing in food retail

In 2025, the role of the independent fine food retailer goes far beyond simply selling the best products on the market to consumers. These days, shoppers are looking for more than ever: an inspiring experience, a connection to the food and drink they’re purchasing, and somewhere to while away some quality time while filling their baskets with perfectly curated food and drink. 

For Michael Boyle, managing director of Fresh Retail, a ‘fresh eye survey’ is the first port of call for any refurb or revamp task. “We start at the car park and follow the journey that the customer does so we can see what they see. Very often there are things like dead plants outside, and out-of-date signage.” The goal is to inspire shopping from the customer’s first moments in your establishment, so if a scruffy exterior leads to an interior that is dusty and full of boxes you’re unlikely to get shoppers into the fine food spirit. “It doesn’t cost a lot to clean up and make things look right, but it’s often not prioritised,” says Michael. “It’s all about the customer journey, and making shopping an adventure rather than a chore, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be efficient too,” he says. 

Learn from experience

When it comes to larger scale projects, Michael recommends running feasibility studies before starting any work. “It’s very, very easy for projects to run away from you, and it’s important to create a shop that is aligned with what your customers want rather than what you want.” If your customers just want a convenient way to buy excellent food, focus on that before spending thousands of pounds on, for example, an events space or kids play area that will remain unused.

Bring the whole team together for an idea-generating session before signing any contracts with external consultants and contractors, he suggests. The butcher will be able to advise on how his section should be laid out for optimum practicality, and shop floor staff could well have ideas around the customer journey and the shop’s flow – potentially based on feedback they’ve had directly from customers.

It’s also worth travelling to see other retailers you can gain inspiration from; for example Neal’s Yard for your cheese counter, and even Marks & Spencer and Aldi for their fresh produce displays and efficiency respectively.

Creating a positive experience

Key to successful revamps is planning, says Michael, and this is true for every element of the customer journey. As much as you plan your product range and store layout, plan your signage and marketing ahead of time – when done thoroughly and well it can really lift the visuals and selling success of an area in your store, and when rushed it can run the risk of looking scruffy and unhelpful.

In terms of display, make sure that each section is considered on its own merits. For example, during the festive season an attractively packaged panettone will sell well as a gift, but year-round customers want to know why they should buy, say, a pork pie from your bakery counter rather than a smartly packaged supermarket one that was made days if not weeks before. The answer is to think of what customers want from each product. In the pork pie’s case, people want a freshly-baked smell and to know that they can trust its quality – a given if it’s made on-site and the butcher is there to answer queries – you don’t need smart packaging; a paper bag will suffice once the connection has been made. “This is something that supermarkets can’t do, so independents should make the most of the opportunity,” says Michael. 

“The biggest advantage that independent retailers have is that we’re not chains,” says Paul Hargreaves, CEO of Cotswold Fayre and two Flourish food hall sites in the Bath and Bristol area. “Make your store look beautiful and different. We have the opportunity to go beyond the mechanistic operations of supermarkets and be creative.”

Before writing things like self-serve orange juice machines off as gimmicks, consider their strengths in terms of what you want to achieve. If connecting your customers with the food you sell, increasing dwell time and tapping into the experiential retail trend is what you’re after, you’re onto a winner. “I’ve just finished a refit where a bakery added in a machine where customers could slice their own bread,” says Michael. “Customers of all ages love it as we’re helping them create a memory. We can’t beat supermarkets in terms of price, but we can give our customers experiences they’ll come back for.”

Decisions around fixtures and fittings, decor and other elements is up to each individual business, but the key point is to do it differently to the food retailers around you. “Get clear messaging out to make your point of differences clear, too,” suggests Paul. 

Maximise your assets

If you’re adding a cafe to your site, it pays to pay attention to the finer details – and make sure to allow it ample space – as it’s likely to provide more profit than you might expect. “We’ve found that it works to have your cafe take up at least half of the total space,” says Paul. This may seem excessive, but the number of covers quite often determines whether a site is to be profitable or not. Paul explains, “At Flourish, the profit split is about 60:40 in terms of restaurant versus retail space.” Give the kitchen plenty of room to breathe, too, and ideally keep it open so that customers gain a sense of connection with the chefs preparing their food.

Car parks are often low on the priority list but are an important consideration with new builds and full refurbishments. “A lot of rural retailers’ car parks aren’t big enough, but there are formulas you can use to determine how large your car park should be based on the number of covers in your restaurant,” says Paul. “Make sure you consider dwell time – a lot of local authorities don’t – as if people are sitting down to a meal before or after having a browse and buying a few items, their car is taking up space for a lot longer than you might originally plan for.”

Bring in the experts

Once you’ve got a plan together and are clear on what you need to get out of it, that’s the time to bring in the external experts. Michael doesn’t recommend bringing them into the project too soon as they can wow with innovative designs and ideas that might not work for you day-to-day; and make sure that there are clear parameters for everyone’s role. Once the experts are in place, it’s time to step back and focus on your product range and the customers’ experience. “What happens a lot is that shop owners get sucked into a build because it’s exciting, then these things are a mad rush at the end of the process,” says Michael. “They worry about the roof rather than how to get people through the till.”

Paul says that when it comes to building work it’s important to give builders a strict timescale to work to. “If there’s no set deadline, the work will never get done,” he says. “The reality is that by that date the work is probably not going to be completely finished, but you’re more than likely to be in a position to be able to open.” This is why Paul suggests bringing in a quantity surveyor and a project manager, too – it will cost a chunk of money, but you’ll make up for that with the funds that you’ll save by topping the builders over-spending and will help keep them to timescales. 

Paul Hargreaves shares his top tips for refurbishing successfully

1. Gender neutral toilets may be divisive, but they make a lot of sense if your site is tight on space

2. Future-proof the building – it is best to do more at the beginning which will cost more money, but it is three times more expensive to retro-fit

3. Check there is enough electric power to the site for future requirements

4. Don’t forget the acoustics – if you’re dealing with high ceilings, put in lots of soft furnishings and consider bringing in an expert to make sure everyone can hear each other

5. Go for the most expensive option you can afford to make it less likely to break down