5 Essential Queuing & Safety Tips for Black Friday 2013

Black Friday draws serious shoppers, which means it requires serious queue management techniques to control the masses throughout the weekend. The following tips will help retailers keep their queues – inside and out – orderly, safe, and fast-moving.

1. Prepare ahead of time.

“Proactive” is the name of the game on Black Friday. Crowds are too big and unpredictable to assume you can manage whatever pops up without advanced planning. Begin your strategy by determining how you want customers to line up and make their way into your store. Set up rope lines that reflect your crowd management plan far in advance of customer arrival, including barricades that prevent lines from starting millimeters from the store entrance. Heavy-duty stanchions with retractable belt barriers are a strong but fluid solution that enables you to lengthen or shorten a line as needed or to break crowds into smaller groups for even greater crowd control at the entrance.

2. Design a clever, safe queue concept.

One of the nightmares queue managers have before Black Friday is seeing the domino effect happening right before their eyes. By designing lines that break and turn at regular intervals, the risk of customers pushing and crushing others into a toppling crowd – including employees – is significantly minimized. Black Friday comes with injuries – but they don’t have to happen on your store’s watch. Stanchions and belts will help create a snaking line and keep it moving rather than allowing one incredibly long line of people to bunch up behind each other; include retractable belts in the design to provide openings at various intervals to allow for extra room, if necessary, or to call people out of the line.

3. Give customers information.

No retailer can assume that the customers they’ll bring in on Black Friday are familiar with their store’s layout, entrances, or exits. Designate workers to explain this special shopping weekend’s rules to all people as they arrive, directing them to lines, entrances, or VIP spots. Signage can support the employees’ role in providing customers with as much information as possible to keep everyone calm. Tall banner signage is ideal for the most important messages (Line Forms Here) and post-top signage can explain the finer details as customers make their way through the line. You can even create signage naming the top deals available or offering a map of the store so customers can develop a plan of attack – and be distracted while they’re standing in line.

4. Utilize technology.

Rely on queue management technology to mitigate the craziness that is a Black Friday line. Allow customers to register for their spot in line ahead of time via smartphone or computer. Set up on-site kiosks that allow people to check-in when they arrive and then wait in a virtual queue. Waiting with an indisputable call number means customers will be appeased that no one can cut the line (just make sure you are very clear about how this method works so crowds don’t rush the door). Other options for crowd management in this vein can include numbered wristbands or tickets that provide customers who arrive early with special perks or first access to the hottest sale items.

5. Reinforce the rules.

Shoppers may have heard employees telling them the rules upon arrival, but that doesn’t mean they absorbed or memorized what was said. Designate people to remind waiting crowds of the entrance process, whatever it may be (e.g., people will enter the store in groups of 10, have your numbered tickets at the ready, etc.). This is also a great time to make good use of digital signage that reinforces the rules through clear visual messages and concise language that gets the point across for every shopper, no matter their level of distraction, tension, or anticipation. With planning, Black Friday is completely manageable. This crazy holiday shopping weekend is a beast for retailers, there’s no doubt about it, but the event can be kept in check through savvy planning and the implementation of smart crowd management techniques. Ask a Lavi expert for recommendations on queue management techniques for your Black Friday environment.