POP Displays Category

Despite traditional notions of festive party-goers knocking back alcoholic shorts of brandy or glasses of wine and egg-nog, the reality is that most consumers of alcohol around the Christmas period tend to buy in longer drinks (like ale, beer and cider) that are less alcoholic in content and offer refreshment to the inevitable central-heating induced thirst.

It is due to this that so much in-store display space will be afforded to Long Alcoholic Drinks (LADs) over the coming weeks in supermarkets and convenience stores up and down the country. Retailers recognise the value in the product placement of branded alcoholic drinks on display as they are aware that it is these products that will drive festive business.

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Hot off the presses, our mob at Design 4 Retail are supporting the new Kickers collaboration with LEGO® by creating retail displays for the new Kickers Kick Hi range to be launched this October.

Naturally, we are delighted to work on such an iconic brand as Kickers and to support them in their new partnership with LEGO.

As always, we wanted to create retail displays that will really make an impact in-store and will communicate the fun loving personalities of these premium children’s products.

Kickers’ new range is targeted at children ages four to ten years, featuring the Kickers Kick Hi boots with LEGO detailing, including bricks on Velcro straps and eyelets. The Lego brick print is also featured on two of the styles in a rainbow of colours to reflect the brand. Lego bricks and characters can also be easily attached to the shoes providing extra fun.

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Exciting times are afoot; always a fan of the beautifully presented window and in-store displays offered by international jewellery powerhouse, Tiffany, Design 4 Retail are pleased to hear that the established brand is moving in a less formal direction to engage a different type of consumer.

This new style is reflected in a new Tiffany store opening this month at University Village, Seattle. With doors constructed from glass rather than the formidable stainless steel monolithic entrances usually seen at Tiffany, the hope is that the relaxed retail environment will remove the intimidation some customers feel when entering the statuesque store.

The more casual approach is in tone with the change in sales technique Tiffany is experimenting with. Take for example their new tactic of displaying pieces on table tops, allowing customers to freely touch without asking permission, and their use of “organic” large sculptural figure displays to present their collection.

It’s leaps away from the fusty image of locked glass cabinets that used to come to mind when thinking of Tiffany jewellery. Fortunately, now the “look, don’t touch” attitude has disappeared to be replaced with a much more inviting “please look and feel free to touch”.

Retaining the upscale brand identity and achieving mass appeal as an approachable style house for fashionable jewellery can’t have been easy, but the retail design presentation now offered promises to clinch the deal for them.

It is expected that Tiffany will open as many as 70 stores in the style of Seattle’s University Village retail unit by 2020. If only there were a few more over in the UK!

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We constantly talk about jaw dropping window displays and innovative interior design, and here’s yet another example of how it’s done right.

MagMa is an awesome example of innovative retail interior design. The funky book, gift and gadget shop based in Covent Garden knows how to attract a crowd and stand out from the hordes of shops in the West End.

The entire store from the window display, wall merchandising system, shelves and even cash desk are produced in corrugated card.

All the furniture is well designed and engineered to be extremely durable and stylish.

Surprisingly this is not a temporary store promotion but a permanent retail interior that was installed almost 2 years ago. Everything is fire rated so no worries about the store going up in smoke. Never the less it should be the cheapest retail interior to fit out again!

This certainly holds the flag for eco friendly and recyclable 3D retail design and display.

Just because the nation’s finances have gone to pot doesn’t mean that innovative new brands and retailers won’t start up. They’re still out there, but they’re just having to be a lot more cautious.

Struggling with the necessary set up costs to go it alone, a trend is starting to emerge. Concessions within department stores or other shops provide the platform necessary to build a brand presence from scratch in an environment already populated by the clientele you require.

Furthermore, a concession is far less risky than committing to a lease you can’t be sure you’ll be able to pay.

Setting up a kiosk in an existing retail environment undoubtedly has many advantages to new retailers; however, the difficulty remains that the newer brand will be fighting for attention within surroundings that are insistent on overseeing their brand isn’t diluted by the appearance of the concessions.

It’s important in this situation to ensure the kiosk you open is appropriately located with other brands that share a similar vision and audience. As much as the desire to remove yourself from competition is high, by clustering with other similar concessions, the chances of being found by the customers you’d like is generally always higher.

A recent example of where the concession model has been successful is Snog frozen yoghurt. With standalone stores in London’s South Kensington and Soho, Snog envisages being successful in an array of locations; including airports, train stations, cinemas and shopping centres.

This month a further Snog concession was opened in the Westfield shopping centre in London.

Although Snog’s presence was controlled to an extent in the centre’s requirement that the concession be freestanding. What they got was a glossy, dimpled and curved standalone display kiosk that’s pretty lush.

With a policy of vinyl graphics being a no-no in the centre, the accents that are carried across Snog’s other outlets were at risk of dilution. Instead the graphics are to be incorporated in to stylised tables.

Looks good to us here at Design 4 Retail!

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In the face of unemployment spiralling out of control and the wide spread debt suppressing the UK population during the current recession, an interesting outcome has been that luxury alcoholic products are flying off the shelves.

We’re not talking bog standard here, but the premium brands – which is odd given the results of research recently carried out by the International Wine and Spirit Record showing the market share increasing.

For example, sales of standard champagne brands have shrunk from 55.12% to 53.72%, whilst luxury champagne has grabbed a morsel more of the market share (up from 42.6% to 44%) over the last two years.

Interestingly, the way that premium alcohol has achieved this is largely by re-establishing older brands, and repackaging them in smaller proportions.

By reducing the bottle volume, say 75cl traditionally now appears in a 50cl bottle, and improving the packaging to appear more attractive, alcoholic brands are still retailing for the same price. Cunning heh? Sadly, we’re all too eager to snap it up so premium brands get away with this daylight robbery.

Prestigious champagne brand Taittinger has repackaged its full range in a bid to ensure that their six products are readily identifiable with the brand. Identically shaped labels, branded foils and smaller neck collars have been key to achieving this.

Keeping the redesign inhouse, artistic director Vitalie Taittinger, and daughter of managing director Pierre-Emmanuel Taittinger, was tasked with a redesign that respected ‘the existing codes of the house’.

She was to continue the tradition of evolutionary rebranding, rather than revolutionary in order to coordinate the display of their branded products.

What is remarkable is that sales are expected to continue to soar during the recession, as while society struggles financially, the desire to treat themselves to the occasional luxury will keep the premium market afloat.

And it’s not packaging alone that the drinks market is concentrating on. Vinance have recently gone through a whole rebranding process to bring their brand up-to-date.

This includes everything from their logo, down to their packaging, all in a bid to improve their positioning in the market place.  This kind of thing isn’t a short process, but in the long run, as Taittinger and Vinance will discover, can be very lucrative.

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Hold on a minute; let’s get our tastebuds back under control because quite frankly we’re salivating after seeing the snazzy new range of packaging chocolate retail giants Thorntons are launching on to the high street.

Almost a refined regurgitation of everything adored about the iconic circular Charbonnel et Walker chocolatiers truffle box packaging, the Thornton’s version is muted and enhanced with frosted matte palettes and combined with strong graphic text.

The hatbox design has always been successful in establishing quality brands as being just that whilst providing the connoisseur with enough fine chocolate to linger on the tongue rather than to gorge yourself upon.

In adopting the less is more strategy to packaging, Thorntons have managed to establish themselves as an important player in the market, something chocoholics like ourselves have known for a while!

For brands in the know, more and more companies are looking at their packaging as well and turning to Point Of Purchase experts and packaging enthusiasts like Design4Retail for advice.

If your POP packaging could do with a facelift, give us a call on 01455 203 352 or email enquiries@design4retail.net

Primark has quickly become the royalty of European throw-away fashion on the high street over the past 5 years.

And now it seems that this penny-pinching pound store has had a high class foray into the German market with its new flagship store on the Waterfront in Bremen.

One of the largest stores in the new shopping complex in Bremen, the single floor has not limited the retailer from fully making use of its height and length after installation of some impressive in-store displays.

Earmarked as the latest in Primark’s “concept stores”, the interior is proof of this bold claim. Intended to be clean and smart, the shop fittings have been designed to live up to the very German notion of efficiency.

A vast atrium allows all departments of the store to be visually accessible on entry, the plenitude of space enhanced by an abundance of mirrors and clever accents of floral wallpaper in contrast to the minimalist décor throughout the rest of the store.

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Nando’s know how to sell food. But they’ve just become even better at it.

Launching a new range of packaging which has been designed to incorporate content generated by their own consumers, Nando’s new takeaway containers ask a host of challenging questions to get their customers soul-searching whilst chowing down on some peri peri delights.

It was determined in the extensive research Nando’s carried out that combining fun iconography with social commentary and philanthropy was the way forward for the international brand.

They’ve teamed this nice range with a website to continue the dialogue with their customers, inviting them to respond to their tantalising questions online.

If you fancy a look at how the champions in chicken are doing it for themselves with questions like “Life. What’s it all about then?” or “What should you be famous for?”, then hop along to yourchirp.com

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Cupcakes at the ready; here’s a challenge any self-respecting bakery would be up for…

The idea is that cupcake consumption is promoted best by the lovely bakers who make them, so who better to front National Cupcake Week than bakers’ shops?

The only stipulation is that the powder pink icing themed poster is displayed proudly, other than that the creative inspiration is down to the individual!

Oven gloves come off as bakers across the country dress up their shop fittings with cupcake themed display stands and extravagant window displays, all in an effort to win two tickets to the Baking Industry Awards 2010.

Not our idea of a fantastic prize, but just think of all the cakes you’ll need to create the perfect window display.

You might need to do some quality control testing/eating in the process to be in with a real chance of winning, but we think it’s worth it!