Retail design trends you can't afford to miss
A space to inspire, share our thoughts and to set imaginations free.
This week we’ve been wondering: What's hot or not in retail design right now? How do you cut-through holiday advertising clichés? And is Instagram really dead in the water?
In this new era for retail, what's trending?
Are concept stores back in fashion? Have window displays become outdated? In our latest blog post, our Senior Strategist Mike Tristram gives his very own power-ranking of the latest retail design trends. Find out all you need to know in our ‘what’s hot and what’s not’ in retail design right now. You heard it here first.
Holiday Home platform Plum Guide shows us why ‘honesty is the best policy’
There’s a new breed of Airbnb in town. It’s called Plum Guide. This new holiday home platform offers travellers the chance to stay in ‘one of the best homes in the world’. With a rigorous vetting process and only listing 3% of homes in each destination - bringing to life their USP has been the job of our former client at Hunter, Ali Lowry - who now leads this start-up’s brand and marketing.
For their latest campaign Plum Guide didn’t hold anything back. Based on the insight that 90% feel that they should have done better with their choice of accommodation, the brand’s campaign strategy - ‘No time for average stays’ - puts the fear of missing out into consumers. Their recent marketing activity includes key messages such as ‘If you’re 38, you’ve only got 42 holidays left’ and ‘HONEYMOON. Statistically, this probably won’t be the only one.’ This works alongside holiday guides to the most ‘over-the-top holiday homes’ - creating a clear call-to-action to up your holiday game, via Plum Guide. Everyone’s talking about it, so it’s done its job. This is the holiday campaign we never knew we needed, and we’re here for it! Taxi…
"Holiday disappointment is all too real. Our new campaign is a punchy reminder to make every holiday count because, who knows, it could be your last. Love it, or hate it - it’s working. And I still have a job."
Has Instagram’s heyday come to an end?
Instagram is dead. Or so everyone on Instagram is saying. But it’s not only them. Digital media sites like Mashable state that ‘Instagram is currently in its flop era’ and online magazine Stuff is asking ‘is the social media app on the way out?’ due to its surge in engagement loss.
So what’s going on for the once social media golden boy? Well engagement levels are at rock bottom. The algorithm penalises you for not posting almost daily. Content creators and brands are fed up with its constant changes and desire to become more like TikTok – and making this very publicly known across the platform. This is lead into Influencers leaving in their droves. Even our very own in-house skin-influencer has decided to take a break from the platform. On top of this Time has previously called out Instagram as ‘the Worst Social Media for Mental Health’. When something makes you feel like nothing you do is working and it’s just not cool anymore – you start to look elsewhere. If Instagram doesn’t turn things around quickly, brands will start pulling content creation and ad budgets, which will surely be the start of the doomsday clock for the platform. As our IT team would say: have you tried turning it off and on again?