Key Insights

• Network reduction isn’t always about closing the weakest sites. Different location analysis methods can reveal whether a brand should cut underperformers, protect key coverage or concentrate on its strongest regions.
• Consolidation works best when you understand the role each location plays. Two nearby sites may overlap geographically, but closing one can still affect convenience, brand presence or omnichannel services.
• Expansion gets harder after the obvious locations are taken. One of the most valuable location intelligence use cases is identifying which markets, towns or regions offer genuine incremental growth rather than simply adding more sites.
• Infill depends on finding real gaps in demand, not empty spaces on a map. Facility location analysis can test potential openings against the existing network to understand whether they will generate additional sales or cannibalise nearby locations.

Every network tells a story if you look at it for long enough…

Not the story in the annual report - the one written in drive times, catchment overlaps and the gap between where a brand expects its customers to be and where they actually are.

Across GMAP’s recent work with automotive and retail brands rethinking their UK and European estates, five patterns keep coming up. They’re not always obvious when you look at sites individually - but once you analyse the network as a whole, the picture becomes much clearer.

Here are five location intelligence use cases we’ve noticed, and the questions your own data can help you answer.

Pattern one - network reduction

Let's get the least exciting one out of the way first: network reduction. Network reduction is what most people assume has been happening in retail for the best part of fifteen years - online growth, rising costs (with rent a big culprit here), and a pandemic that finished off a lot of high street stores.

There are a few different ways this can play out:

• Bottom-slicing: exactly what it sounds like - cutting the weakest-performing locations based on a range of performance data, starting from the bottom and working up until the numbers look healthier
• Building a minimum viable network: starting with a target for sales or market share, then working backwards to identify the smallest network that can still deliver it.
• Retreating to the heartlands: concentrating on the regions where the brand has the strongest customer base when maintaining a wider national network becomes harder to justify. Franco Manca is a recent example of this approach.

It’s worth adding a caveat here: the sites with the lowest turnover aren’t always the weakest sites in the network. As we’ve explored in why your ‘worst’ sites might be the most valuable, it pays to understand the wider role of a site before cutting it.

Pattern two - consolidation

Consolidation is one of the patterns we see most often, particularly across mature automotive and retail networks. It typically means maintaining similar levels of coverage with fewer, stronger sites.

One version of this is the "2-into-1" approach: two nearby stores become one, without losing the brand's presence in that area. Superdry's move in our local Leeds is a neat example: closing the city centre branch but keeping its presence at a nearby out-of-town location - protecting the physical side of click-and-collect and returns while trimming cost. 

It's most common among brands with a well-established multi-channel strategy, where the physical store is doing more than just selling.

The other approach is to concentrate the estate around the sites with the strongest role in the network - keeping the smaller "local hero" sites that punch above their weight for brand presence and convenience, while consolidating the bigger urban footprint.

Honestly, the line between the two isn't always clean. What matters is the underlying logic: same coverage, smaller estate.



Pattern three - strategic expansion into new markets

Now for something more positive! There are three approaches we tend to see when brands expand into new markets.

The first is full and rapid - going from a blank sheet of paper to broad network coverage as quickly as possible. It’s the approach we’ve seen from Chinese vehicle manufacturers expanding into Europe: establish a presence across multiple markets quickly, then work out the finer details later as the network develops.

The second is land and expand - a more phased approach that’s common among retailers moving between the UK, Europe and the Middle East. The first ten sites are often obvious: capital cities and flagship locations - places that build credibility and pull in investment. The harder, and more interesting question in our experience, is what comes next. Where are sites eleven through thirty, and which of them will actually move the needle on growth rather than simply adding another pin to the map? 

There's a third variant too: regional scaling, essentially the mirror image of retreating to the heartlands. Brands like Booths have built genuine strength in the North and are now working out how to break into new regions - but the question is how far that success can travel. Which new regions have the right market conditions, and where would expansion actually add value?

Pattern four - strategic expansion into niche markets

Slightly different from chasing new geography - this is about doubling down on a format or positioning that's already working somewhere specific. FatFace and White Stuff are good examples: both have found strong traction in smaller market towns with a steady flow of tourists and visitors, where the brands’ holiday feel and appeal for impulse purchases work particularly well.

This is actually something we’ve written about recently, in our article looking at how customer mix varies across a network and how location intelligence techniques can help identify where your brand performs best.

When a brand starts to outperform in a particular type of location, the next step is to understand what makes that location work so well. As we’ve seen throughout this article, the wider network can tell you much more than any individual site - and also help you identify where else that same opportunity exists.

Pattern five - infill

The last pattern shows up once a network is already strong and there's investment available for further growth. Infill is about finding the gaps inside an existing footprint that will generate the most incremental sales - and it tends to take one of two forms:

• Coverage gaps: identifying smaller towns or underserved pockets where a more compact format could work, even if individual site sales are lower than the rest of the network.
• Getting closer to demand: particularly important for brands where convenience drives demand. For convenience stores and coffee shops, opening closer to where customers live, work or shop can bring in new sales rather than just cannibalising your other site down the road.

The important part is understanding whether a gap in the network represents a genuine opportunity. A map can show an area with limited coverage, but what happens when you add a new site? Does it attract additional customers and sales, or just draw demand away from your existing locations?

Our IMPACT location planning tool lets teams test exactly this. Its Scenario Creator gives teams the ability to run facility location analysis by testing potential site openings against the existing network, using a model calibrated to their business. From there, you can compare different scenarios to see which locations are most likely to add sales to the network before making an investment.

Each pattern calls for a slightly different approach, but the underlying location analysis methods are broadly the same: understand how customers interact with the network, test different scenarios and look at the impact across the estate rather than site by site.

Reading the pattern in your own network

None of these five patterns are mutually exclusive, and most networks will be dealing with more than one at the same time. You might be consolidating in one region while looking for infill opportunities in another, or reducing the estate in a mature market while expanding into a new one. 

Each pattern calls for a slightly different approach, but the same location analysis techniques can help you understand what’s happening across the network: how customers interact with your sites, what changes when you test a new scenario, and where the biggest opportunities sit.

The name matters less than being honest about which pattern applies to which part of your network - and testing that against the data rather than the assumption. Our guide to stress-testing a location strategy goes into this in more detail. 

That’s the thread running through all five patterns: the bigger picture only emerges when you look at the whole network, rather than the site in front of you. Speak to the GMAP team today to uncover the opportunities hiding across your network.