It’s “Just Design,” But it Works

Maria Gustafson says she gets really excited about seeing all her marketing strategies come to 3-D-life inside a store.

After spending time in the worlds of advertising and retail, Gustafson is senior vp of  global creative and retail design for Kiehl’s, the premium cosmetics brand (a division of the L’Oréal Group).

She says she loved the energy of ad agencies, but felt she lost some contact with the brands once the campaign was turned over to clients. Working directly with a brand, however, she can watch it all come together, participating in the strategy sessions, developing the story, figuring out all the things that will entice the customer – the brand message, the packaging, the shelving, the in-store experience – and then managing the final flourish.

“With an agency, you don’t get to touch the store experience,” she says. “There’s nothing as satisfying as talking about an idea, then seeing it come to life and watching the customer touch it.”

I was struck by her comments because it seems finally to verify what I thought about this industry 20 years ago: that store designers and visual merchandisers deserve a seat at the table. What this industry does isn’t fluff, neither purely architecture and construction, nor purely arts and crafts, not a diversion, not an unnecessary line on the budget, but a key and central part of the marketing strategy – really the only part of that strategy that actually reaches out and touches the consumer, takes her hand and leads her along the path to purchase.

It’s not just Gustafson saying it, it’s an entire consumer brand industry taking ownership of what we once called “display,” subsequently diminished to “design” (as if it were an art school project) and dismissed as “visual merchandising.” It’s critical, it’s powerful and attention must be paid.

I bring this up now because Lee Carpenter has announced his retirement. I’ve often said that I had many mentors when I came into this industry 20 years ago, and each imparted something. James Mansour showed me how effective the creative parts of the industry could be, and Eric Feigenbaum made me fall in love with the history and tradition of it. People like Jack Hruska and Tony Mancini brought ideas to life from within two very different retail organizations; Ken Nisch and Denny Gerdeman brought wisdom and intelligence to clients’ needs from outside the retail organizations.

But Lee Carpenter, at Design Forum, talked about the marketing strategy of design. His firm didn’t win a lot of splashy awards, it just won a lot of substantial contracts. He could outline, better than most at the time, how store design could be effective and productive, how it connected all the dots.

It’s probably not coincidental that when the huge advertising and marketing behemoths began noticing the importance of store design – or “experience,” as everyone was now calling it – Design Forum was gobbled up by The Omnicom Group and made part of its Interbrand branding and design consultancy.

Lee may be moving on, but his legacy remains stronger than ever.

As a journalist, writer, editor and commentator, Steve Kaufman has been watching the store design industry for 20 years. He has seen the business cycle through retailtainment, minimalism, category killers, big boxes, pop-ups, custom stores, global roll-outs, international sourcing, interactive kiosks, the emergence of China, the various definitions of “branding” and Amazon.com. He has reported on the rise of brand concept shops, the demise of brand concept shops and the resurgence of brand concept shops. He has been an eyewitness to the reality that nothing stays the same, except the retailer-shopper relationship.