Split your showroom
Total area, category, and what else has to sit on the floor.
How this calculator works
- Back of house = total × your chosen share, covering stock, goods-in, staff and washrooms.
- Offices are 90 sq ft each and consultation pods 70, both taken off the customer floor before the display split.
- Net customer floor = total − back of house − offices − pods.
- Display area = net × category display share. Circulation is the remainder, reported explicitly so you can see what you are buying.
- Display zones = floor(display area ÷ area per zone), using a published figure per category.
- Lighting targets are reported per category: 400 lux ambient generally, 150 for a lighting showroom, with a 3:1 accent ratio on merchandise.
| Category | Display share | Area per zone | What a zone is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Automobile | 35% | 200 sq ft | One vehicle plus the walk-around |
| Furniture | 45% | 120 sq ft | A room set that reads as a room |
| Lighting | 50% | 25 sq ft | A switchable cluster with dark adjacency |
| Tiles and sanitaryware | 55% | 35 sq ft | A floor patch, a wall panel, the samples |
| Apparel and lifestyle | 60% | 40 sq ft | A merchandised vignette |
Automobile carries the lowest display share and the largest zone because a car needs to be walked around; lifestyle carries the highest share and the smallest zone because it sits closest to ordinary retail density.
Design and build under one accountable roof
Worked example — a 2,500 sq ft furniture showroom
| Step | Arithmetic | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Total area | as leased | 2,500 sq ft |
| Back of house at 18% | 2,500 × 0.18 | 450 sq ft |
| Offices and pods | none | 0 sq ft |
| Net customer floor | 2,500 − 450 | 2,050 sq ft |
| Display at 45% | 2,050 × 0.45 | 923 sq ft |
| Circulation | 2,050 − 923 | 1,128 sq ft |
| Room sets at 120 sq ft | floor(922.5 ÷ 120) | 7 zones |
| Lighting | ambient / accent | 400 lux, 3:1 on merchandise |
What a showroom is actually doing
A shop sells stock; a showroom sells a decision. The difference shows up in the plan as circulation. A customer choosing a ₹2 lakh sofa needs to sit on it, get up, walk away, look at it from ten feet, come back and sit again. If the next room set is four feet away, none of that happens and the customer leaves to think about it — which in furniture retail means leaving to buy elsewhere.
That is why the display share for furniture sits at 45% rather than the 60% a lifestyle store can carry. Seven well-separated room sets in 2,050 sq ft will outsell eleven crowded ones, and every furniture retailer we have fitted out who pushed past about 55% display has come back within two years asking for zones to be removed.
The element most often missing is the consultation pod. Furniture, tile, kitchen and lighting showrooms all close their sales at a table with a laptop, a sample tray and a quotation — not standing in the display. Two pods at 70 sq ft each take 140 sq ft out of the display budget and are usually where the revenue is actually generated. Plan them from the start, with power, data and somewhere to put a large sample board.
Every constant on this page comes from Greenbox site records — measured drawings, signed BOQs and completion certificates from projects delivered between 2023 and 2026 — rounded to the figures an estimator would actually write down. We publish them so the arithmetic can be audited rather than trusted. Treat the output as a planning figure: accurate enough to brief a landlord, a bank or a family, and not accurate enough to sign a contract against.
What this tool does not cover
- Fixture and display-system cost, which in a showroom is frequently more than the base fit-out.
- Lighting design and its power load, which for a 400 lux ambient plus 3:1 accent is substantially higher than an office.
- Goods-in route and lift dimensions, which for furniture and automobile showrooms often dictate the entire plan.
- Statutory occupancy, fire egress and the accessible route through the display.
- Landlord fit-out manuals, shopfront zones and signage rules in a mall.
- For a dense retail unit rather than a showroom, use the retail store fixture calculator.
Selected work by Greenbox Design Studio. Tap any image to enlarge.
Frequently asked questions
How much of a showroom should be display?+
Thirty-five per cent for automobile, 45% for furniture, 50% for lighting, 55% for tiles and 60% for lifestyle. The rest is circulation — the distance a customer needs to stand back and judge what they are looking at.
How much space does a furniture room set need?+
About 120 square feet. Below that it stops reading as a room and starts reading as stock, and the customer cannot get the distance needed to judge a sofa. Seven well-separated sets will outsell eleven crowded ones in the same floor area.
How many consultation pods does a showroom need?+
At least two for anything over 2,000 sq ft, at about 70 sq ft each. Furniture, tile, kitchen and lighting sales close at a table with a laptop and a sample tray, not standing in the display, and pods are the element most often left out of the area budget.
What lighting level does a showroom need?+
Four hundred lux ambient with accent lighting at three times that on the merchandise. A lighting showroom is the exception — it needs a low ambient of about 150 lux and dark adjacency, because you cannot sell a light fitting in a brightly lit room.
Can a showroom be too full?+
Easily, and it is the commonest error. Past about 55% display share in furniture, customers stop being able to separate one product from the next and the showroom reads as a warehouse. Every retailer we have fitted out who pushed beyond that has asked within two years for zones to be removed.