The Journey
It is paramount to understand a shopper’s life context, how they relate to a particular category and the ways they connect with that category and specific brands in order to deliver intuitive shopper marketing along the path to purchase. Out-of-store marketing should fit naturally into the way shoppers search, research and connect—delivering emotional resonance, simplifying the path and offering relevant information and content that is ultimately paid off in the store.

The Retail Experience
An intuitive retail environment meets the expectations a person has created in their everyday life, not just what they experience in the store. The environment builds on positive associations when a category or brand has them, and borrows from more high-involvement or high-emotion categories when it doesn’t. Stopping power is necessary to get noticed in-store, but shoppers often dismiss messaging and visual stimuli that are not relevant to them. Success in intuitive environments means delivering both recognizable relevance and unexpected difference to create disruption. Balancing these opposing forces requires making strategic and orchestrated choices. Clarity in in-store communications means going beyond simple. Ultimately, intuitive retail effectively distills a brand and brand message into a split-second communication so shoppers can instantly connect the dots of the messaging hierarchy.

Breaking Through the In-Store Clutter
Engaging shoppers through retail orchestration that communicates different elements of the brand proposition (on point-of-sale and displays) allows your brand to stand out in-store—from ten feet away to standing right in front of messaging.

Stop & Pull (Within Ten Feet). Capture the shopper’s attention, create split-second interest and initiate movement towards the shelf.

Enroll (Within Three Feet). Communicate a reason for shoppers to care and visualize the benefit.

Interact & Close (At Display). Encourage shopper/product interaction and aid in selection and purchase.

1. Temporary urbanism. It’s the new term for pop-up retail. We love pop-up retail. And we love its new moniker as well.

2. The new Crate & Barrel catalog. Just hit mailboxes this week, complete with a redesign. It’s visually and graphically appealing and has loads of editorial content.

3. 3D. I’ve avoided the reincarnation of 3D for awhile, thinking it would be seizure-inducing. But I have to admit, on games and movies it’s made for (versus added in post-effects), it’s pretty awesome.

4. Print’s finest hour. Brands are showcasing their finest print in all the huge fall magazine issues on stands now.

5. Jay-Z and Kayne West’s much anticipated collaboration album “Watch the Throne” was released on Monday. It launched on iTunes first (at-retail follows next week), a great example of how musicians are leading with embracing digital first and thinking brick-and-mortar second.

6. Target’s back-to-school ads. In a sea of back-to-school promotions, Target is running one of the few (if not the only) television spots that is not price-driven. Has a great emotional hook about school and teachers.

7. Craftsman Public Parks Rehab Project. It’s exciting to see one of our programs do so well and to see consumers truly engage with it. Self-servingly, it’s also nice to see someone else give it a shout-out, JeffBullas.com.

8. Paging System. Why is it making us happy? Because that’s how marketing runs at Upshot.

What’s making you happy this week?

Now since you’ve deduced my sensitivity to sharing my space with others, I want to point out that there are some great ways that surfaces and spaces can be affected to effect people in a positive way!

If you’ve ever been to Upshot, it won’t surprise you that we love a collaborative space. Lounge seating areas and walls that you can write, pin, magnet and project on fill our office. To my delight, it seemed like companies are really embracing this idea with new products which will undoubtedly improve your space and your mood.

If the Walls Could Talk

In Chalk.
People really like to see their name and/or leave an impression. A full wall of chalkboard paint is a great way to do it (and this was covered after day 1 of the event).
www.magnamagic.com

In Marker.
This is for the chalk-averse in the group. Who wants to lean against this wall in their black tee?

It’s the first I’ve seen of custom colored magnet glass surface. Scaled to just about any size (within their 72” x 144” panel max) with varied ways of installation. Writeable, magnetic and tempered—it’s basically unbreakable. Pretty much any color that suits your fancy. Imagine full walls of this in your office, retail or pop-up space. www.skydesign.com/glass/collection/vitracolor

In A Different Kind of Marker.
This one’s been out there winning awards since its debut in 2009 and is one of my favorites. Dry erase paint is so simple and such a great way to interact work in a space. www.mdcwall.com/tabrasa

Check out the bottom right picture. It’s an example of how dry erase paint came to life in one of our projects (Disney Vacation Club’s Doorway to Dream store) as a life-sized coloring book wall for kids.

More NeoCon insights to come—stay tuned for SPACE INVASION: Share Your Seat.

We’ve blown through a slew of Sized Right examples in our trends report and Smartshot webinar, covering an admittedly wide range of applications. After all, Sized Right is our most versatile trend for 2011, with implications in-store, at home, in consumers’ daily lives, and even in their heads. With that in mind, it might help to step back and set the mood for the trend, pointing out a couple of examples that, while fringe in their specifics, powerfully illustrate the driving factors behind these sentiments.

The rise of Sized Right starts right at home, where Americans are retreating from the past few decades’ trend towards McMansions. Tired of maintaining homes that are too big – and increasingly wary of the massive mortgages they require – consumers are now opting for more appropriately-sized homes. But, don’t mistake this for self-denial. There’s a certain comfort in finding a home that fits your needs, especially with smarter solutions that allow you to get more out of smaller spaces.

What’s that look like in practice? How about fitting 24 rooms into a 330 square foot apartment? That’s what Hong Kong architect Gary Chang miraculously pulled off, as seen in the video above. Now, we’re not saying this is going to be the norm for home life, but we are saying there are valuable lessons to be learned here. While Chang literally packs multiple layers into a single space, this is indicative of a general trend (both at home and in-store) toward more flexible configurations that allow the same space to serve multiple functions. This can happen physically, as in Chang’s case, but as we’ve seen in our Life in the OOC trend, it’s also possible thanks to digital technologies that overlay virtual functions on real-world spaces.

It’s also noteworthy that Chang doesn’t see the small size of his abode as a constraint; rather, it’s an opportunity for efficiency. He uses plenty of practical tricks, ranging from mirrors that amplify the space to shades that bring in golden light, which all combine to give the impression of space without the burdens that would accompany that physical footprint. This is a sentiment that runs through everything we’ve seen with consumers seeking smaller (but not 330-foot) homes. Consumers are reassessing their priorities, and realizing the benefits of having less stuff to fret about. We tend to fill bigger houses with crap we don’t need, so small houses force the residents to be more proactive in their filtering. This ends up being a relief for consumers who otherwise feel the pull toward hoarderism, as well as (often younger, Millennial) homeowners who happily sacrifice square footage for the experiences offered by their ideal locations.

Clearly, Chang’s layout is very, very smart. So, the opposite would be… dumb? That’s the opinion of Smart Car USA, who recently kicked off a campaign “Against Dumb” that mocks everything supersized, as shown in the video below. On the one hand, this campaign bluntly speaks to the beliefs behind Sized Right, and manages to communicate the philosophy in a quick, visually appealing manner. Still, we have to take issue with the tone. It’s a little too condescending, a little too holier-than-thou, and even a bit obnoxious. The transition toward Sized Right is a huge undertaking for the Amercian consumer after half a century of moving in the other direction. You’re much better off offering helpful reassurance for consumers looking to make the switch, rather than ridiculing them for the mistakes of their past.

In fact, these consumers are probably willing to do most of the mocking themselves. And that’s the part of the Smart campaign that we really like. On the brand’s Facebook page, Smart encouraged fans to submit their dumbest purchases to be voted on by the community, with the winner getting a Smart car. It’s a much more playful tone than their ads, and does a better job of getting participants to think long and hard about their personal consumption histories. And there’s nothing dumb about that.

The process starts online, where visitors are given a choice of 68 WeActivists to manipulate. (Despite the insurgent tone of the company, WeActivists aren’t smashing Starbucks windows at G20 summits – they’re simply people who the company identifies as role models in creative fields. Heck, what revolution would make Jason Lee one of its martyrs?) A short clip of the WeActivist jumping, spinning, or displaying other forms of spunkiness can be tweaked in three dimensions, while the user also chooses a pattern (e.g. zooming in on the sleeve of the WeActivist) to be shown as a kaleidoscopic background.

One the user has generated his or her preferred content, the clip gets sent to the interactive store windows, where the clip will respond to the motions of passersby – the video below shows how it looks in action. The creator of each clip gets his or her name displayed in the window, which comes in handy thanks to a live web feed that shows the reactions of passing pedestrians.

While the window displays are pretty slick, our favorite part of this execution in the thoughtful integration between the online and offline experiences. Better yet, WeSC has managed to connect the two worlds in a seamless manner for the user (despite the high-tech heavy lifting on the back end). There are no hoops for the participants to jump through, and there are no concerns about device compatibility. It’s just a good time all around for everyone involved, whether they’re at the store or in their homes.

Bergdorf Goodman’s windows are expected to be a spectacle, with enough texture to seduce passersby into a slack-jawed awe. This year’s “Wish You Were Here” theme illustrates a number of fantasy travel scenarios, such as the one pictured above (for clearer shots of the windows, head this way). But these windows aren’t the products of magical processes – as you can imagine, there’s a ton of hard work done behind the scenes. Now, Bergdorf is making these efforts visible via a QR code, which directs window gawkers to the video below. (We’re glad to see the store recognize that their shoppers are Living in the OOC, and that they’re well-equipped for this experience.)

Not everyone’s buying the escapism charade, though. A cranky review from the New York Times reminds us that travel today is anything but glamorous; rather, it’s defined by “[TSA] officers’ hands in your pants, another passenger’s knees in your back, crumbling bridges and roads, Somali pirates.” But while the author claims that a more relevant fantasy for the current shopper might be “a great bargain store that hasn’t yet been picked over,” we admire Bergdorf not masterfully navigating (without caving to) this Future Fear. While the displays are no doubt indulgent (as they damn well should be – it’s the holidays!), there are also a number of subtle elements that evoke more approachable escapes. There’s the inclusion of yesteryear’s travel technologies for the masses (from steamboats to a caboose pulling out of Penn Station), and even the campaign’s soundtrack – a bubbly song from a 17-year old about dropping everything for an impulsive getaway – reflects the scaled back desires of the current consumer. But in case you think that’s all a bit abstract, those aforementioned QR codes also link shoppers to a holiday gift finder that highlights the store’s best deals from $6 to $100. Taken all together, the displays strike a difficult balance between wistful fantasy and small little indulgences, and we’re on-board.

In the six months since we first covered Facebook’s social plugins and instant personalization features, over two million sites have implemented these services. It’s safe to say that Facebook’s little experiment is going well. But while the Like button has been a boon for marketers in the online world, there’s still some pervasive cynicism about what this technology means in the offline world.

Oh, wait, we see the problem: skeptics still think there’s a boundary between the online and offline worlds! Apparently someone needs to hop on the 405 and get themselves to The OOC, where Online-Offline Convergence is everywhere. (Y’know, this is the kind of thing that should really be a trend for 2011, dontcha think?) Generally, this trend has been driven by the explosive growth of smartphone ownership, since this is clearly the best tool for using online information to augment our offline lives. But we need not get so fancy.

Consider the Coca-Cola Village shown above. (Thanks to Adam Stipanuk for the tip!) The “village” is an annual 3-day pop-up amusement park in Israel, which provides teens with outdoor activities ranging from basketball courts to swimming pools. Those settings aren’t particularly conducive to lugging a phone around, so Coke provided the attendees with RFID-chipped wristbands that were linked to their individual Facebook accounts. If the kids wanted to let their friends know where they were headed, they simply touched their bracelet to the thumbs-up sign to “Like” that particular attraction, which would be automatically registered on Facebook (and viewable on kiosks around the Village). The same strategy allowed the teens to tag themselves in photos that were being taken by the park’s staff, so their memories would be preserved and shared after the event. The result: 35,000 (!) posts. You think Coke “liked” those results?

This brilliant execution seems almost borne out of necessity; i.e. how do you get teens to share their Village experience on Facebook if the environment is not conducive to smartphones? Their solution was to make the most important elements of the teens’ Facebook experience (namely, photo tagging and sharing what they’re doing) as seamless as possible via the RFID bracelet. Event marketers, take note!

Likewise, when a new IKEA opened in the Swedish town of Malmo, the retailer wanted to use social media to spread the word. But rather than using an intrusive means of interaction, the store tried to assimilate itself into the activities that Facebook users were already doing. So, the store manager uploaded a handful of photos featuring rooms filled with IKEA products, and made a simple offer: the first person to tag themselves as the featured items would win those items (see the video below). Predictably, it set off a social media frenzy, but also managed to spread these shots through the taggers’ own networks, ultimately spreading the word about the new store opening.

“Like” it or not, the Facebooks of the world are no longer confined solely to the online space, and brick-and-mortar retailers ignore them at their own peril. The next year (and beyond) will present significant challenges to retailers as they fend off an all-out assault from non-traditional competitors on the (mobile) web. Focusing on the smartphone is clearly an important part of this strategy, but these examples show that some of the most innovative responses circumvent the phone altogether.

(Say, that almost sounds like a trend worth bringing back for 2011. Hmm… stay tuned on Twitter for more developments on that.)

But back to present. H&M recently partnered with the GoldRun AR platform to spice up their store windows, which are currently displaying H&M’s fall and winter collections. When a shopper accesses the GPS-enabled iPhone app within the vicinity of the store windows, they’ll get access to a virtual fashion show featuring digital versions of those clothes and accessories. Through augmented reality, these items are overlaid on the real street scene depicted on the user’s phone, which can then be photographed and sent to Facebook (such as the floating bag photo above). This allows users to position the clothes on themselves and send to friends for feedback, too.

While this element captures the fun, shiny-object part of augmented reality, there’s a concrete benefit for the brick and mortar stores too (yeah, pun intended). Snapping pics of the items generates a 10% discount off of in-store purchases, and also enters users into a sweepstakes for gift certificates and a trip to Las Vegas. If getting shoppers to the store is half the battle, this sure seems like a compelling weapon for H&M to bring to the holiday wars.

But what if your brand doesn’t have a dedicated retail outlet? Certainly, pop-up stores are an attractive option, but that requires you to find an available retail space, come up with a design, build it out… gosh, that’s so much work. Wouldn’t it be easier if you just picked a pristine beachfront location and stuck a virtual store there? That’s so much easier – just ask Airwalk. They recently launched “invisible” pop-up stores at Venice Beach and NYC’s Washington Square Park, thanks to a clever use of augmented reality. In order to purchase the limited-edition reissue of the Airwalk Jim shoe, sneakerheads had to go to the designated location and use the smartphone app to snap a photo of the spot. A virtual pair of the shoes would be added via AR, which then became the user’s pass for ordering the kicks online. [Update: We've just learned that GoldRun is behind this campaign as well. We promise we didn't intend for this post to be an ad for them!]

So, what have we learned here? For starters, using augmented reality in practical applications shouldn’t forsake the fun parts of the technology. Plus, combining this feature with location data enables brands to add a hyperlocal element to their promotions. Finally, don’t be turned off by the fact that these campaigns aren’t likely to be adopted by the masses. Rather, look at the level of engagement these brands have inspired among micro communities in the real world, thanks to a couple of digital flourishes.

Part of the explanation for the rise of these machines is that they’re especially well suited to today’s consumer, who wants everything on-demand around-the-clock. (Geez, a little demanding, aren’t we?) Since vending machines don’t require an overtime salary, they can fill this need when your doors close. Basically, we’re trying to say that you can get fresh meat from your butcher in the middle of the night, okay?

It also doesn’t hurt that brands get humongous bang for their buc– err, footprint in a tough retailing environment. While traditional shopping malls generate about $330 per square foot, vending machines in malls are estimated to earn up to $10,000 in the same space (and, like everything else at the airport, that number is about four times higher there.)

Advances in technology are certainly helping, too. A prototype from a recent conference showed a vending machine that integrates PayPal accounts, QR codes, a smartphone camera and Twitter to allow consumers to make mobile e-payments for goods. Meanwhile, a Japanese company has created vending machines that use face and body recognition cameras to recommend drinks according to the customer’s profile (gee, I can’t imagine any scenario where this could backfire). And, just to prove the point that you can distribute anything via vending machines, there’s a line of Japanese machines that can now distribute live crabs.

The point isn’t that you need all of those bells and whistles to make the vending machine work; just know that the technology is available to make these machines as flexible as you can imagine. For instance, this vending machine that dispenses gold bars is, admittedly, ridiculous.  But, the fact that it dispenses the gold based on the real-time price of gold is the intriguing part – what kind of data could you integrate into your brand’s vending machine? A particular temperature? A number of tweets that mention the brand? A foursquare check-in at the location?

Some brands are turning the vending machine concept on its head, such as Pepsi’s Dream Machine pictured above. It’s a branded version of the Greenopolis Kiosk, which, in exchange for consumers recycling glass, plastic, and aluminum containers, provides participants with points that can be redeemed for travel, movies, shopping, and more. Pepsi’s version sweetens that pot by also contributing to the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities (EBV) for each item recycled, which is a nice touch.

Finally, you might remember when we shared Coke’s “Happiness Machine,” calling it out as an example of delighting consumers with hidden surprises. It’s interesting to consider that a vending machine is seen as an inherently fun way of making purchases, an insight that wasn’t lost on a new program that is replacing the snacks in high school vending machines with veggies that are dressed up to look like junk food (and it’s working, too!). If you go down this path, don’t miss that insight for your brand; be sure to make the interaction a fun experience.

It certainly doesn’t hurt that Verizon is now calling attention to the ScanBuy barcode reader in their TV, print, and in-store ads (thanks to Kyle Bruner for the tip). As more consumers are exposed to these codes (and, more importantly, how to use them), we can expect QR codes to become more ubiquitous in marketing applications. Of course, this means that if you’re going to wait around and see what happens, your competitors are bound to beat you to the punch.

Case in point: Heineken has started rolling out their “Plug Into Summer” campaign, and QR codes are playing a prominent role on the packaging. By no means are we touting our rival’s work, but we think you should know that consumers who scan the code have the opportunity to download three Heineken smartphone apps: a music trivia game, a sobriety test, and an app for finding a cab. Taken as a whole, if you’re having trouble remembering who’s the lead singer of the Rolling Stones, you can test your (non-) sobriety and realize that, yes, you need cab. Or at least I think that’s the gist of the campaign.

But while brands are slowly coming around to the QRevolution, retailers (and retail-relevant services like Cellfire) have been dabbling in this technology for much longer. Now, the Norma Kamali boutique in NYC is taking this technology a step further. In addition to tagging her clothes with videos that provide more information about each product, Kamali’s QR codes also enable nighttime shoppers to purchase the items even when the store is closed, just by snapping the QR code through the window. For those who are wondering how brick-and-mortar will compete with online shopping in the future, this appeal to the digitally-enabled shopper is one big weapon in retailers’ arsenals.