New Year, New Directions

VM+SD has been published since the turn of the century under a variety of titles, basically covering the same topic: how to design stores to increase sales.

Over the years, changes and consolidations in the retail industry and the way people shop have been chronicled in the pages of VM+SD to reflect current trends. In 2005, VM+SD is again making changes, by expanding its editorial coverage with the addition of new columns specifically for food, drug and mass-merchandise retailers, plus new columns covering in-store marketing, retail construction and electronic digital signage. Add this to our continuing coverage of new projects in all retail sectors – wherever people shop for goods and services.

The retail industry loves hard numbers and quantifiable data, so we will be increasing the number of surveys we conduct this year. In addition to the Top 50 Retail Design Firms and Top 50 Fixture Manufacturers surveys, we will gather product-specific information via surveys for lighting (April issue), signage and graphics (July) and electronic digital signage (November).

Our web site vmsd.com is not new – it was launched in 1997 – but it is an increasingly important tool for communicating and gathering information about the retail design industry. Qualities inherent to the Internet, including searchability and immediacy (such as our News of the Day postings) complement VM+SD the magazine. Keep an eye out this year for exciting new functionalities on vmsd.com.

Great products can only stay on top by adapting to changes in the market. The “new” VM+SD will continue to be the retail design industry's leading source on information for many years to come.