Dress Barn Launches In-Store Shop

Dress Barn (Mahwah, N.J.) is installing “Dressbar” shops-within-shops along with a freestanding pop-up shop in New York and a coordinating dressbar.com online presence. The concept will market a runway-inspired dress collection – at value price points from $42 to $70 – from fashion designers such as Carmen Marc Valvo, Heidi Weisel and Michael Smaldone from Adrianna Papell.

Immediate plans call for 25 in-store installations of the Dressbar concept, with hundreds more to be added to Dress Barn’s chain of 830 stores over time, according to Women’s Wear Daily. Fixtures, mannequins, signage, bar-style seating and iPads featuring promotional and product content were designed to make Dressbar distinct from the rest of the store. Dressbars will occupy 25 percent of Dress Barns’ selling floor space.

Robin Kramer of the Kramer Design Group (New York) designed the project. Dress Barn and Kramer are also working on an overall rebranding plan for the chain; Those details will be released later this year. Immediate plans for all stores include merchandising dresses at the front of the selling floor, where there will be “some degree of Dressbar designation,” according to Lori Wagner, chief marketing officer and executive vp of e-commerce.

Dressbar.com will feature e-commerce, editorial content and social content. Advertising for the first time since 2011, Dress Barn will promote the new concept in Marie Claire, InStyle and O magazine.