fashion retail visual merchandising

Many brands start out being innovative. They are launched because the founders have a particular passion for something, and they try to do things differently at first. In other words, they inspire. But, over time, brands tend to fall back into a defensive mode.

As brands grow, many of them fall into the trap of playing it safe, and they start to defend their businesses. They stop playing to win, become more cautious, and innovate less. The focus shifts from inspiring to guarding, and this proves fatal in practically all cases, but especially in luxury.

Customers in search of inspiration will move on to the next brand when the brands that previously inspired become passive. The result? At first, growth rates falter, then brands stagnate, and then they decline fast.

That is why luxury management is the art of perpetual surprise creation. Sustaining extreme value creation depends on innovating, acting as an agent of change, and being a brand that is seen as intriguing, exhilarating and inspiring.

Storefronts can be an antiquated term in this digital age, but the detailed displays in shop windows often create a spectacle that pedestrians and potential consumers cannot resist stopping to marvel and admire. Creating an omnichannel display brings the in-person experience online and offers a cross between the traditional handcrafted artwork and digital creativity seen across different aspects of the luxury industry. Window displays are most noted around the holidays, but year-round themes and trends have created a spark in window art.

In the era when customers can order a growing array of luxury goods online, retailers have to offer something more to keep luring consumers into bricks-and-mortar stores.

In 2017, retailers took on that challenge with gusto, creating a number of unique in-store efforts designed to give consumers the type of experience they could not get online. As Amazon and other ecommerce platforms continue to dominate the retail conversation into 2018, these kinds of efforts will have to become even more common to keep in-store retail healthy.

Italian fashion house Prada is stationing itself at the Promenade Shops, Galaxy Macau for the holidays.

From Dec. 15 until Jan. 14, a Prada Station pop-up takes reference from the world of travel, retailing merchandise designed for different parts of a journey. This is the first of a series of train-themed pop-ups from Prada planned for 2018.

Founded in 2012 and based in New York, the Windows Wear company features an e-commerce website where customers can select and buy their favourite apparel, choosing from a virtual showroom of current window displays in top fashion stores.  The website features over 700 brands sold in stores such as Bergdorf Goodman, Berluti, Prada, Uniqlo and Raph Lauren, and offers a selection ranging from clothing to jewellery, accessories, beauty items and homeward. Alongside this, the site launched a service called 'WindowsWear Pro' a few months ago. It is exclusive to professionals and allows real-time access to more than 75,000 shop-windows in stores in Los Angeles, New York, Paris, Milan and London, unveiling the latest trends in visual merchandising.

As stores begin to reopen, many brands are trying to figure out the best way to lure customers back into shops and make employees feel safe to go to work after the pandemic has left many fearing for their health.

The reopening will likely move slowly, but brands can help boost interactions by creating a plan that makes consumers want to return.

The approach should be three-fold:

-Get the product to store, defining an exciting offer and addressing any supply chain and inventory issues. Get the store open and up to safety standards, while maintaining an engaging customer experience.

-Get customers to stores, invest in marketing to re-engage them, both on physical and digital channels, balancing reassurance with excitement.

-Many consumers are excited to emerge from their homes again, but they are doing so with extra caution.

Brands that want consumers to return to stores should consider how they can make consumers feel that shopping is not a risk to their health.

Safety standards will be extremely relevant for customers in the context of physical shopping.

Luxury brands across sectors are increasingly partnering with dining and spirits brands for collaborations that combine the culinary and the experiential. This includes activations such as London hotel Claridge’s doing a store takeover with a New York bar and DFS opening a whisky lounge.

In 2018, as experiences continue to be the preference of younger consumers over products, brands will bring food and beverage into the equation to turn standard interactions with customers into milestone memories.

Art and fashion are increasingly intertwined, whether it is with artists working with designers on collections, or artists making fashion films for designers. It is emblematic of a great convergence and in some ways leveling of popular visual culture. Certain contemporary artists and certain contemporary fashion designers have found resonance with each other, and the glamorati in the worlds of film, art, and fashion all feed off of one another and share the same spotlight.