Today’s brands face numerous obstacles: What is the correct positioning of my brand? How do I reflect my positioning correctly with high impact across a variety of marketing and sales channels? How can I balance high quality with the total investment cost? We’d like to share a couple of project examples that showcase how we solve these problems together with our clients.
Challenge #1: How can a brand express its DNA, its positioning, and its core values, while creating a look and feel tailored to the particular target market to engage local consumers?
Showcase 1: KJUS Store Concept for China
– Challenge: A great, luxury-positioned brand with products that are made of high-tech textiles. The international store concept was not suitable for the Chinese market and did not reflect the price positioning. Chinese consumers are sophisticated, are offered a large choice of competing brands, and are expecting to be engaged on all levels.
+ Approach: We developed a store design concept that used the high-tech aspect of the textiles and the unique approach towards product design as inspiration and feel for the space. The core competitive advantage of the products was extended to the store design concept to distinguish KJUS visually from other competing brands in the premium outdoor sports fashion market. Click here for more details on the project.
Showcase 2: Tricker’s Store Concept for China
– Challenge: An inspirational English brand with great products and a strong focus on sustainability. The existing international store design standard focused exclusively on heritage and tradition and was not modern and trendy enough for China.
+ Approach: We developed a store concept for Tricker’s that expresses the brand’s DNA while modernizing the look to suit the particular requirements of the Chinese market. Design elements reflecting the heritage and manufacturing process are balanced with clean surfaces and a lot of white. Click here for more details on the project.
Challenge #2: How can a brand leverage a high-traffic location with a challenging layout without damaging the brand image?
Showcase 1: Hanna Trachten
– Challenge: The latest store of Austrian traditional clothing brand Hanna Trachten was to be located in a listed building in the heritage city center of Vienna. Six individual rooms spread out over 100 square meters, with limited height and arched walls all with different dimensions, making the planning of retail fixtures and the placement of large numbers of SKUs very difficult.
+ Approach: We started with a careful analysis of strategically important areas for the placement of branding and feature displays and then planned the ideal customer flow. This ensured a great branded, professional feel of the store. Retail fixtures in rooms with big arches were designed to emphasize vertical lines to counterbalance the effect of the low ceiling. As a result, the space feels more experiential, and different areas are clearly defined. The six small rooms were integrated into a concept of a journey of discovery – customers enter a magical forest and venture towards the deeper woods. Each room has its own product categories and theme. Click here for more details on the project.
Showcase 2: Melchers Beijing Office Re-Design
– Challenge: Located in Beijing’s city center in the prestigious Chang’An Club building, the office space had a low ceiling and not ideally placed equipment like ducts and air condition systems. The requirement was to create a space that felt spacious and airy, opened up the views to the outside, and had several well-being spaces with high tables and sofas.
+ Approach: We took out all original walls and re-organized the layout to maximize public space and natural lighting and created additional informal work areas. The ceiling in the open workspace was opened up to generate a more generous room feeling, and engineering equipment in the wrong places was moved to the sides. Click here for more details on the project.
Challenge #3: How can Storytelling and Customer Experience Elements be integrated into the Design to Make the Brand more Relevant and Engaging?
Showcase 1: Swiss National Pavilion at China International Consumer Products Expo
– Challenge: Switzerland participated as Country of Honor at the 2021 China International Consumer Import Expo and required enough space for exhibiting Swiss brands, yet also needed to showcase both traditional aspects and Swiss innovation in a dedicated country area. Key challenge here was to integrate all the different positioning factors and required functionalities into one harmonious, powerful concept, develop visitor experience areas, and design an intuitive customer flow.
+ Approach: We knew that we had to create an impressive visitor experience and many engaging stories throughout the space. We separated the floor plan into two main areas, the first one being an “animation area” with a Swiss bar, a kitchen space, a Swiss landscape photo area with a cow, an event space and a Swatch pop-up store. The second part was the exhibitor area with more than 40 brands. We developed a strategic customer flow and placed branding elements like the Swiss cross at important locations to attract visitors from afar and draw them into the stand. Typical Swiss stereotype elements were placed at the entrance to increase country recognition and increase the experience factor. Click here for more details on the project.
Stay tuned – We will explore some of these brand challenges in more detail in our next articles.
What challenge is your brand facing? Send an email to office@5starplusdesign.com and we’ll share best practice examples or help you to develop a solution.
