As the much needed holiday selling season quickly approaches the retail industry, many big-box retailers are tightening inventories, suspending expansion and keeping a close eye on expenses. The financial crisis has no doubt had a direct impact on the retail industry and, consequently, the retail fixturing industry. In this unstable economic climate, it’s important to have good communication between retailer and supplier and ensure that changes are adapted too quickly and efficiently while sticking with core competencies. Value engineering has been taken to the next level with retail fixture manufacturers being given the challenge of designing and innovating fixtures while continuing to finds way to reduce costs.

Making sure the distribution center is being used at its highest efficiency level, reducing freight costs, finding new low-cost materials are all great examples of contributions to a final product that affect both supplier and retailer. While it may be difficult to find the silver lining in such a troubled and bleak economic environment, it’s times like these that often yield important and well-thought decisions and innovations that otherwise might not have surfaced in calm waters.

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