Articles

Johnnie Walker Madrid - The new competitive landscape

A digital screen invites you to explore the different labels from Red to Blue in Spanish or English. The storytelling is about craft and quality and how that impacts on every blend.

Three reasons Amazon is winning

Retailing is combative, success relies on transformation and constant adjustment, there must be innovation and change at every turn. It gets really interesting when channels merge, online goes in-store and vice versa. Take the Amazon book store, West 34 St, New York.

World Cup, what World Cup

Consider the football World Cup why isn’t it embraced in store as pure retail entertainment, are stores so hand tied by regulation, and fear of reprisals from getting on the wrong side of commercial deals paid by brands, that the players must remain mute.

Saturn Express – don’t let scan, pay and leave be the objective, encourage customers to stay a while

“Saturn Express fronts a new shopping concept designed to assist consumers in an increasingly digital world," declares Martin Wild, Chief Innovation Officer of the Media MarktSaturn Retail Group. "Our Scan, Pay and Leave technology brings the best of the online checkout experience to the physical store."

Amazon go, I miss you already.

Not consumer electronics, but grocery on the go, easy fit?

Immersive retail - the pursuit of quality, craftsmanship & innovation

There is much talk of immersive experiences enabled by VR and IR. but what makes immersive good right now is the human interaction. Consumers love storytelling, of that there is no doubt, it is part of what makes us human beings.

Avoid the interior cliché

Consumer tech retail should be sexy right, it’s a definite lifestyle winner. No longer about boring old radio’s and oversize TV’s it’s now all about creativity, AI, enabling tablets, it’s more about life than life itself.

Pitched performers, the unsung heroes at retail

Pitched performances change the energy in otherwise everyday retail experiences. Positive & negative energy, makes for good and bad retail.

Is retail at the tipping point?

There is a bright future for some retailers, real behaviours, actions and choices that will keep smart brands on top.

Manifesto for success

A winner for me is the Chrome store in Seattle, (@chrome_industries) apparel for city dwellers, an alternatice to predictable performance clothing. It has a look and feel in tune with a younger urban crowd, and manages to display merchandise and share ethos without being patronising or working off a script.

How many helpful people does it take to reach seat 12D?

We live in a post digital age influenceed by convenience, a time when technology enables and frictionless delivery is a brand experience goal. But it’s still the human stuff that glues it all together

Spare a thought for Maggie…

It is a funny world. One day I am struggling to work out how to use the Smart phone charger in a neighbourhood coffee shop, admittedly it’s free but that doesn’t make it any easier.

Customer journey - not always what it seems

Is the customer journey model outdated? How much of it simply satisfies our desire to be part of something and to serve our need to find new ways to drive sales?

China Safari 2016

Subscribe to: key lessons for UK brands, learnings from forthcoming field trip to China. Deep dive o2o and how m commerce is changing the shape of the consumer journey

The Politics of Brands: What branded experiences mean to real people

If you’re anything like me, you care about brands a lot more at some times than others.

“Daddy is a robber” …mystery shopping unmasked

My moral compass is 135cm tall, with sweet tooth she thinks herself a minion, and imagines she will one day become a hairdresser & water colour artist and a stand up comedian at night. My youngest daughter Rose is 9 & ¼ years old.

How the Care & Craft Movement Became Part of the Mainstream Fabric (And Why Brands Should Care)

Have you noticed how many of your friends like handmade and homemade stuff?