A crucial part of merchandising involves the retailer’s product assortment with regard to colors, styles, sizes, and so forth. Do you realize how important that color is in driving retail sales and profit?

Consider this research by Stitch Labs:

“To uncover the impact of color choice when selling products, our data team analyzed the sales of products sold that had color as a product option over the course of one year. Although the types of products vary, most of them were apparel or accessories. We wanted to answer the question: ‘Does product color mix impact revenue for retailers? If so, what are the patterns and how can we mine our data to help retailers make smarter purchasing decisions?’”

“We hypothesized that getting color mix wrong can directly affect a business’ revenue. For example, we thought that offering too many colors might spread per color sales thin and make purchasing items difficult because suppliers require a certain minimum of a particular SKU. For example, say you have to buy 500 shirts of a certain color as a minimum from your supplier. If you offer too many colors, is it smart to stock that many units of items that potentially won’t sell? But on the other hand, does offering too few colors turn customers away, decreasing sales?”

Look at the infographic below to see highlights of Stitch Labs’ findings.