Category: branding & visual communication
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Body Shop: Rough-diamonds should never be over-polished!
in branding & visual communication, brave-words, customer experience, customer service, customer-engagement, disruptive retail, ethical retailing, health & beauty, impulse retailing, in-store services, packaging, product suppliers, recycling, retail, retail brand heritage, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, store theatre, sustainability, telling product storiesWhere do you begin with the story of Body Shop. So many twists and turns, and so many lessons. Anyone who remembers the 1980s and 1990s experienced a totally new retail concept. Body Shop was way ahead of its time in the world of conscientious cosmetics and toiletries. It was primarily a producer, ensuring that…
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Swimming with the current: Gymshark’s coffee conversations
As you may already be aware I am a huge fan of Gymshark, the gym wear producer and retailer. There are so many things to learn from the rags to riches business that began in a garage 10 years ago and is now valued at over $1 billion. I’ve been following their press during their…
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Let’s not deny Gen Z’s the rite to discover and enjoy things for the first time!
Seeing the opening of the new Superdry Athletic Essentials shop in London Westfield reminds me of how cyclical the world of fashion, retailing and customer taste is. To many seasoned retailers and customers such as myself, it probably takes us back to the world where brands such as Hollister, American Eagle & Aeropostale ruled the…
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Is Responsibility more Natural to Customers than Sustainability?
Getting the message across to customers about sustainability is a challenge. Not only is it one of those words that can mean many things to many people, but it often involves technical data and scientific concepts, and is a nightmare to assess with its veils of spurious marketing claims and dubious transparency. So whilst many…
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Trust M&S to be ‘Positively Dissatisfied!’
in assortment structure planning, branding & visual communication, customer experience, customer service, customer-engagement, disruptive retail, fashion accessories, food & drink, home, ladies fashion, multi-category, omni-channel retailing, retail, retail brand heritage, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, store experience, store operationsI remember this story from the halcyon days of M&S. That when customers bought food from M&S and it didn’t taste amazing, they immediately thought their cooker was not working properly and called an engineer. Of course this may well be folklore. However it does illustrate the level of trust that M&S commanded, and it…
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What customer perceptions do you want to change, or strengthen? ’52 Steps to the Perfect Shop!’
in analytics, branding & visual communication, customer experience, customer-engagement, location strategy, meaning in the retail madness, pop-up stores, retail, retail brand heritage, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, shop of the future, store experience, store theatrePost No.02 in the weekly newsletter series: ‘52 Steps to the Perfect Shop!’ You too can have ‘The Perfect Shop’ by this time next year! The second stage of preparing our vision for our new shop is to consider the customer, both existing and potential new ones. Certainly if you are a pureplay entering the…
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Who do you think you are? ’52 Steps to the Perfect Shop!’
Post No.01 in the weekly newsletter series: ‘52 Steps to the Perfect Shop!’ You too can have ‘The Perfect Shop’ by this time next year! When you create and deliver a new shop concept, your ‘Shop of the Future’ if you like, it is an incredibly complex process. It involves…it should involve many different stakeholders.…
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How and where to invest in the circular supply chain
in assortment structure planning, branding & visual communication, customer-engagement, disruptive retail, ethical retailing, fast fashion, meaning in the retail madness, new retail, pre-loved, preorder, product suppliers, pureplay, re-sell, recycling, renting, retail, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, secondhand, sustainabilityGreater than the disruptive markets we operate in, is the disrupted world that we live in. Time has long passed, from when a sustainable initiative was not much more than a smart marketing strategy. Sustainability has now irreversibly developed into something essential to establish commercial traction with many customers. Responsibility for sustainability has also shifted,…
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Where is your sales growth going to come from this year?
in assortment structure planning, branding & visual communication, customer experience, customer service, customer-engagement, ethical retailing, food & drink, health & beauty, in-store services, meaning in the retail madness, personalisation, retail, retail businesses, retail management, retail organisations, retail strategy, social savvy, store theatre, sustainability, telling product storiesWe are already in autumn, an important time of year for planning the commercial growth of our retail businesses. We may be considering extending our assortments, planning new product ranges, growing our human resources, even contemplating opening new physical shops and online sales channels. Growth can come in many ways to achieve these crucial additional…
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Before you look for ‘Shop Design Magic’ try some ‘Tender Loving Care’
in branding & visual communication, customer experience, disruptive retail, meaning in the retail madness, retail, shop of the future, space management, space planning, store experience, store layout, store operations, store operations audits, store operations compliance, visual merchandising, visual merchandising operations, vm compliance, vm operationsOur favourite discussion from the bespoke workshop: How to develop your ‘Shop of the Future’ The 10 steps to commercial success Don’t expect customers to love your shops if you don’t love them yourselves. Are your shops dirty and untidy, with broken lightbulbs? You wouldn’t leave your houses like that if guests were coming round.…
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You too can have ‘The Perfect Shop’ by this time next year!