Truly Deeply/Madly

Wel­come to the New Retail Era
The world of retail is chang­ing more rapidly than ever. On-line stores com­pete with off-line stores, fash­ion bou­tiques fea­ture new ranges every month, and it seems almost every­thing can be made in China for next to noth­ing, cre­at­ing undif­fer­en­ti­ated com­mod­ity mar­kets where retail­ers of all descrip­tion find them­selves com­pet­ing with sim­i­lar prod­uct offers at a sim­i­lar price point.

But as con­sumers con­tinue to show great affec­tion for the face-to-face, bricks and mor­tar retail expe­ri­ence, the big ques­tion for retail­ers is; ‘how do we stand-out in-store?’ Cre­at­ing remark­able retail expe­ri­ences is fast becom­ing the new holy grail. From aug­mented real­ity point of sale (like this one we wrote about from Lego) to extra­or­di­nary, themed stores, retail­ers that wish to stand-out are investing-in the explo­ration of new design tech­niques. No longer is the store seen as a dis­play rack for prod­uct, but as an oppor­tu­nity to stamp an unfor­get­table brand expe­ri­ence into the minds of the mar­ket and set them apart from the pack.

If Noth­ing Changes, Noth­ing Changes
The the­ory sounds straight for­ward, but our expe­ri­ence defin­ing and design­ing brands in retail for more than twenty years has shown that many brand across vir­tu­ally all mar­kets shy away from the explo­ration of brand-led store for­mat inno­va­tion, pre­fer­ring to invest in doing more of the same; cat­a­logs, visual mer­chan­dis­ing, and above the line adver­tis­ing. As many brand con­tinue to tread the same-old path to mar­ket, those with a clearly defined brand and the courage to stand-out are cut­ting a new trail in cities all over the world, and in so-doing are cre­at­ing remark­able retail brand expe­ri­ences that help them to own a clear and val­ued posi­tion in the hearts and minds of more and more customers.

Here’s our show­case of seven of the world’s great­est exam­ples of inspi­ra­tional retail theater.

Aesop
Aus­tralian brand Aesop has more than twenty stores in Aus­tralia and around the world. Aesop offers a com­plete range of skin, hair and body prod­ucts pre­sented in dis­tinc­tive black & white labeled, brown glass pack­ag­ing. Each Aesop store is unique, whilst shar­ing a related aes­thetic, includ­ing the explo­ration of new mate­ri­als, a meet­ing of sci­ence lab & designer ele­gance, and an often mono­chro­matic colour palette. Aesop engages a fresh team of retail design­ers for vir­tu­ally each store and briefs them to inno­vate the theme.
The result is unique spaces that sur­prise and delight, set­ting the stage for remark­able inter­ac­tions with the prod­uct and staff that are as dis­tinc­tive as they are rich in brand messaging.

Alfred Dun­hill
Men’s fash­ion has often been an area of the mar­ket given scant regard for mem­o­rable retail. British lux­ury men’s brand Alfred Dun­hill recog­nised the oppor­tu­nity and show­cased their Win­ter 2010 col­lec­tion at New York Fash­ion Week in a vacant Meat­pack­ing Dis­trict ware­house trans­formed into a pop-up shop for the event. The result was a visual stun­ning stage for Alfred Dun­hill to show-off their lat­est range.

Vitra
Vitra has been craft­ing designer fur­ni­ture in Europe since 1957 when they man­u­fac­tured designs for Charles & Ray Eames and George Nel­son. Vitra has grown to become a global brand in fur­ni­ture design for home, office and pub­lic space. Vit­ra­Haus is a five-storey build­ing that show­cases Vitra’s fur­ni­ture and objects for the home as if they are in your home — cozy and wel­com­ing. In the same way inte­rior design mag­a­zines lever­age aspi­ra­tional homes to cre­ate an envi­ron­ment on their pages to sell their adver­tis­ers wares, Vitra has cre­ated an aspi­ra­tional space in-which to show-off their own fur­ni­ture. The approach is related in func­tion to the IKEA show­room con­cept, but Vitra’s form is a far more ele­gant and impres­sive take on retail brand the­ater.
Pho­tog­ra­phy Iwan Baan, © Vitra

Diesel
Diesel’s unique and inno­v­a­tive sig­na­ture store and art space in Aoyama, Tokyo is regarded as a shin­ing light of retail inno­va­tion, and for good rea­son. Tak­ing a loose approach to retail space design, the Diesel Denim Gallery is as much about dis­play­ing the tal­ents of artists, design­ers and archi­tects as it is about dis­play­ing Diesel prod­uct. The Diesel Denim Gallery pro­vides the fash­ion brand a strong asso­ci­a­tion with cut­ting edge design­ers, deliv­er­ing a highly aspi­ra­tional and ever-cool dimen­sion to the Diesel brand story.
It goes with­out say­ing, that few brands have the mar­ket­ing bud­gets to cre­ate gallery spaces where the role of brand asso­ci­a­tion is allowed to run free, sub­ju­gat­ing the act of sell­ing prod­uct. But the prin­ci­ples at play here remain incred­i­bly rel­e­vant. What is your brand doing at retail to cre­ate pos­i­tive, on-brand asso­ci­a­tions that rein­force your unique mar­ket propo­si­tion?
photo © Toshiyuki Yano (Nacasa & Partners)

Octium Jew­elry
Often the domain of ultra pre­mium brands, expen­sive cus­tom designed fit-outs like con­cept jew­elry bou­tique Octium Jew­elry in the lux­ury 360º mall in Kuwait cre­ate a mem­o­rable brand expe­ri­ence through the weight of their opu­lence alone. Nearly every piece of the ornate lux­ury of the Octium retail store is custom-designed — from the fur­nish­ings, tex­tiles and dis­plays to the light­ing fix­tures and wall treat­ments. Bud­get aside, the invest­ment in a store design that gen­uinely stands-apart from its com­peti­tors plays the lead role in cre­at­ing a unique, piece of retail brand the­ater.
photo and sketch © HAYON studio

Camper
I’ve long admired the Camper brand and must con­fess to own­ing a much-loved pair-or-two myself. From the design of the prod­uct to the design of the stores, from their mar­ket­ing and point of sale, prod­uct names and personality-filled brand voice to their two Casa Camper hotels, the Span­ish shoe brand has proven to be a mas­ter builder of a rich and unique brand. It’s no sur­prise, then that Camper’s Tokyo store has made our list of inspi­ra­tional retail theater.

Unlike some of the other exam­ples we’ve show­cased, Camper is an exam­ple of brand-led inno­v­a­tive retail the­ater. Whilst the rich and unique brand expe­ri­ences deliv­ered by the Camper stores are not cre­ated on a shoe string bud­get, it’s the clar­ity and cre­ativ­ity of the brand expres­sions that make them so mem­o­rable and effec­tive, not a mil­lion dol­lar invest­ment. How­ever, what all of these exam­ples demon­strate, is that in order to develop brand equity, enabling you to com­mand a pre­mium for your prod­ucts to increase your profit mar­gins, you must have a strat­egy for cre­at­ing highly val­ued and remark­able dif­fer­en­ti­a­tion through your retail brand deliv­ery points.
photo © Koji Fujii (Nacasa&Partners.Inc)

Tags: Aesop, Alfred Dunhill, Brand Agency, Brand Design, brand designers, Brand Experience, Brand Personality, Brand Strategy, brand-designers-Melbourne, brandamentalist, Camper, Camper Shoes, Camper Stores, casa-camper, Corporate Image, Dave Ansett, David Ansett, Diesel, Diesel-Denim-Gallery, Graphic Design Melbourne, Interior Design, Melbourne Brand Strategy, New York Fashion Week, octium jewelry, Retail, retail designers, retail designers Melbourne, Retail Interior, retail-brand, retail-concept, retail-theatre, Villa Sofa, Vitra, VitraHaus

This entry was posted on Monday, March 15th, 2010 at 7:00 am and is filed under Brand Agency, Brand Design, Brand Strategy, Brand-Storytelling, Corporate Image, Creative, Graphic Design Melbourne, Visual Language. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.