M&M’s, NY style

Mars Retail Group (Henderson, Nev.) has opened its third M&M’s World store, in New York’s Times Square. The 25,000-square-foot space was designed by Chute Gerdeman (Columbus, Ohio), which also created the company’s Orlando store.

“We used dynamic color to make the M&M’s candies larger than life,” explained Denny Gerdeman, principal of Chute Gerdeman. “But we had to compete with the intense color already visible on Times Square, so our challenge was to make this space glow. The technology we implemented makes the store about 40 percent brighter than anything else in the area and includes two enormous video billboards featuring a moving kaleidoscope of M&M’s in color.”

Brian Shafley, Chute’s president and creative director, said another challenge designers faced was very little wall space because of the surrounding glass. “We had to invent a completely different merchandising format,” he said. “So we turned the existing 22 columns on the three floors into color-changing beacons bearing M&M’s branding.”

Shafley said the overall goal was to translate the entire space into an orchestrated expression of color, shape, and scale, while leveraging the character-driven story of some of the world’s most recognized candies. Each character is located somewhere in the store, depicting something typically New York. For example, one portrays the Statue of Liberty, who beckons visitors up the escalator to the second floor.

Another design element is the world’s largest wall of chocolate. Two stories high, the wall is made up of 72 continuous candy-filled tubes. Visitors can create their own customized color mix based on flags of the world.

In addition, visitors use an interactive “color mood analyzer” to determine which M&M’s color best suits their current mood. A video component posts images of their faces and personalized mixes on giant real-time video screens.

To help bring the M&M’s colors to life, designers used LED lighting to immerse guests in dramatic color effects that can be changed for holidays or promotions, making the in-store experience different every time someone visits.

“The entire retail experience is an orchestrated expression in color,” Gerdeman said. “This is an experiential destination for guests to indulge in a world of chocolate and collectable treats – a place where chocolate really is better in color.”