Talking to Your Designer - The Retail Workshop

I met with a prospective client recently, to discuss the interior design of a retail outlet they intend to launch. As with earlier experiences, I found that it was necessary to spend some time with them asking them to give me a brief on their corporate philosophy, branding specifics and product dilineation. The interior design would have to wait till this exercise was complete. Often, SMEs and other boutique enterprises tend to assume that such things are for the big boys. Not true at all.

That meeting inspired me to write this post, which was an email I had sent them subsequent to our first meeting. Now, of course, we have graduated to the interior design stage

When you are talking to your architect/interior designer, the first three meetings should have absolutely nothing to do with the design of your store. Ideally, what you should be talking a great deal about is given below. Finish the ‘Retail Workshop’ and then talk about design. When you read on, you will understand why. Ideally, you should also have your marketing and public relations person at this workshop.Put it all on paper. Read it . Talk about it. Sleep over it. Act on it

1. Talk about your corporate philosophy. If you do not have one, go get one. Without it, you will be swallowed up by the ghosts of retailing and thrown into a cauldron of bankruptcy by the wizards of marketing.

2. Get into the depths of what your company is all about. Then move ahead and talk about what you want it to be all about. You will realise there is a marked difference between the actuality and the aspiration. Build the first bridge here.

3. Think about what you want the store to do for you. Yes, of course, it should generate sales and make you rich and all that–but get into specifics.


Find out why a consumer should come to you and not your neighbour. If you haven’t found five reasons , work on that first.

4. Chart out your customer profile–the target, the present client base and the ‘avoidables’. You will have to cater for all three in the design of your store. The three of them will not necessarily get along, so you have to make sure each one does not realise the other two are also being thought about in the ‘design’. It is a challenge. But one that has to be dealt with.

5. List out your product line into the following categories

—-the showcase range : this is your ‘face’. Get the make-up right

—-the profit range: this is what keeps the fires burning and generates the numbers and profits.

—-the budget buy : to prove that you can cater to a budget buyer. Even a top end designer has a budget buy section. The section exists–the budget is all that is variable.

—-the impulse buy : things that consumers pick up on impulse. I have seen stores where these impulse buys are placed right at the back….bad positioning.

You could have more categories.In which case, list them all out and explain the significance of each to the designer. Remember, YOU have to make the interior designer aware of this. Understand the subtle and not-so-subtle differences in your products, so that they can figure out the accurate positioning.

6. If you have an active branding and advertising campaign, talk about that with the designer. It would be useful to tie that into the design and create a comfort level that results out of familiarity in the mind of the consumer.

7. Talk about the image in your head when you visualise your product in terms of a store. What are the colours you identify it with ? What style of decor does it have a synergy with ? What do the words trendy,stylish,fashionable etc mean in the context of your product.

Work on these aspects with your designer and you would have gone a long way in helping them create a design that would reflect your image in the most effective manner.