By Jeff Grant
The good weather of spring and summer rings in the start of outdoor sales season. Whether it’s a sidewalk sale in front of your store, a swap meet, or your once-a-year warehouse sale, selling al fresco is profitable but requires special merchandising and fixturing. Here’s a rundown of fixtures and equipment that will make your retail store mobile.

• Gridwall & Gridwall Accessories
Gridwall is light, cheap, easy to put up, and can accommodate fixtures to merchandise most products. You are limited on how much of a load the grid will hold, but regardless, this display standard is the perfect platform to build your portable store upon.

• Portable Display Cases
A glass-topped portable display case is a great way to display jewelry while keeping it secure. (Shoplifting is a big problem in the uncontrolled environment of outdoor retailing.)

• Jewelry Display
Black velvet, leatherette, and acrylic mini forms, earring hang bars, etc., accentuate, highlight, and organize your jewelry.

• Clamp-on Display Lighting
With a universal clamp, display lighting can attach to any high point and enables you to spotlight and offer after-dark shopping (of course, a nearby power source permitting).

• Acrylic Counter-top Mirror
How many hat or jewelry sales have been lost for lack of a nearby mirror? A small bullet-proof acrylic mirror is an invaluable sales tool.

• Collapsible Rolling Salesman Racks
Especially convenient for sidewalk sales, a collapsible rolling rack is perfect for merchandising shirts, skirts, and jackets.

• Folding Merchandiser Tables
Light and inexpensive, a folding merchandiser table will corral loose product and the grid design allows your customers to see your product clearly.

• Bags
Low-end kraft or plastic t-shirt bags are often forgotten in outdoor retailing but are very much appreciated by the customer. Put your logo on it and you have a walking advertisement.

• Shade/Shelter
On a hot day at the swap meet, shelter from the sun will attract intended and unintended customers. It’ll protect your product too. An EZ UP shelter collapses for easy transport and won’t break the bank. Taking it a step further, think about offering thirsty shoppers free cold water.

Hopefully this list will get you started. Remember: the basic rules of retail layout still apply outdoors. Keep the aisles and sightlines open. Mix racks, tables, and other fixture types. Alternate the heights of your displays. Incorporate big graphics if you can. Above all, keep it visually interesting and the product accessible. Good luck!