6 Creative Retail Display Ideas for CBD Products

To call the CBD industry a budding opportunity for retailers would be an understatement. 

The market for CBD has exploded and is expected to reach a value of nearly $1.3 billion USD by 2024. Because it’s still a relatively young industry, CBD has a lot to offer to entrepreneurs looking to start their own CBD businesses and to larger, well-established retailers who are looking to expand their product offerings as well.

But here’s the catch: Competition is fierce. In a market this diverse with such a vast array of products, how can CBD brands differentiate themselves from their competitors? 

By creating engaging in-store displays for your CBD products, you can catch the consumers’ eyes, express your brand story, and influence more sales in this highly competitive market. Here are some creative retail CBD display ideas to help you brainstorm your next design. 

6 Creative Retail Display Ideas for CBD Products

1. Don't forget about security

CBD is a high-value, high-quality product. Because of its price point, there’s a huge demand for it on the black market, so theft is often one of the greatest challenges that CBD retailers face. 

At InStore Design Display, we combat this challenge by designing displays that are more educational than shoppable in nature. Often, we use dummy packaging in the display—for example, we might feature an empty tincture bottle on the shelf—so consumers can explore the available products, read the product labels, and then find a sales representative when they’re ready to buy. 

Consider designs that are bright, open, and clean, so retailers can easily monitor customer activity and prevent theft. Meanwhile, the cannabis sampling table in the middle of the room gives consumers the ability to see, touch, and feel the product in a secure setting.  

2. Educate the consumer

For CBD and the cannabis industry as a whole, negative perceptions and misunderstandings abound. Many consumers are still unsure about the benefits of CBD and whether or not it causes the same mind-altering effects that THC does. On top of that, low-quality products in the market can give consumers a bad experience and turn them off from CBD as a whole. 

Consequently, one of the major goals of an effective CBD retail display should be to educate the consumer on the product and the brand. For example, we created this modular, under-counter display for Sunderstorm’s Wind Vapes that featured info cards beneath each of the products. Including a brief overview of the product specs, benefits, and other details can help consumers become more comfortable with your product, answer any lingering questions they might have, and sway them into making a purchase.

3. Appeal to the 5 senses

Any retail display can be more than just a catchy sign placed next to the product—it can offer an exceptional experience for consumers. Signs that you are achieving that level of experience are when your customers walk away from your display, product in hand, feeling like they just had a conversation with your brand. 

You can create these memorable experiences by engaging all five senses in your CBD display: sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste. For example, a custom cannabis sampling table provides consumers with a tactile experience, which is more likely to make a lasting impression than a display that forces consumers to peek at the product from behind a glass.

Additionally, you could incorporate video, moving elements like spinner displays or flipbooks, graphical imagery, music, and more into your display to maximize the consumer’s sensory experience. This is an opportunity to think outside of the box and create a retail display that truly stands out. 

4. Use technology

More and more brands are leveraging technology in their retail displays, and CBD brands are no exception. Technology provides a unique opportunity to educate consumers, engage them with eye-catching visuals and sounds, and cultivate an extraordinary in-store shopping experience. 

Often, this approach takes the form of a display screen playing an educational video to showcase the product. In these cases, the video functions as another sales rep for your brand—but there is a wide array of technology available to you, so the only limits to this approach are the limits of your imagination. Sesh’s video counter display is a great example of a small display that uses technology to maximize its impact. 

Additionally, consider brand consistency across your digital marketing channels and brick-and-mortar environments. Many consumers educate themselves online before purchasing in-store, so carrying your social media icons and other digital elements in your retail display are important as well. 

5. Emphasize quality

As we mentioned earlier, there are many low-quality CBD products on the market that can erode consumer trust. To overcome this challenge, CBD brands are responsible for emphasizing the quality of their products in their retail displays. 

And the first step to showcasing the quality of your product is leveraging a retail display, period. Because the majority of CBD brands aren’t using displays at all, taking that extra step to design a bold, creative, on-brand display—even if it’s just a small, countertop display—can make a huge impact. 

Showcase displays like the one we designed for Lola Lola can help communicate the premium quality of your products by giving them a polished, high-end look and feel. 

6. Allow for versatility

Another challenge that CBD brands face is a lack of consistency in the types of retailers who’ll carry their products and the general product mix. Products vary from tinctures and vapes to pet tablets and edibles, and some retailers will only carry specific skews because they sell better in their environment.

Because of this, it can be difficult to design and scale a display that covers all of those unique footprints. By incorporating versatility, modularity, and flexibility into your display, you can ensure that your products look their best in any retail environment. 

Ready to Design Your CBD Retail Display to Maximize Sales?

An effective CBD retail display needs to balance security with sensual experiences, high-tech educational elements with flexible, easy-to-use structures, and brand-consistent imagery and messaging. 

With extensive experience in the CBD and cannabis industry, InStore Design Display understands the unique challenges and opportunities in this space. Our creative designs can help you accelerate sales and accomplish your goals in diverse retail environments. 

Interested in working with InStore Design Display to design your next CBD retail display or environment? Get started by requesting a consult. It's that easy.