Merchandising: genesis, typology and definitions

Abstract

Merchandising has different meaning depending who and where is using this term. It has been found thet in Central and continental Europe merchandising is defined as all promotional efforts carried out in retail trade by category, shelf and floor management, by creating goods’ lines, managing assortment, by displaying, exhibiting, looping and visual presentation supporting all together overall marketing and sales. Different meaning of the word is applied in the United Kingdom, continental Europe or USA. Author presents semantic analysis of merchandising through genealogical three of the term. There are seven different meanings described. Discusion analyzes structures of identified definitions and meanings. The aim of this paper is to clarify the term of merchandising and propose modern understanding of it.