Case study of interactive space

In efforts to get out of slumping sales and an ever shrinking population of loyal shoppers J.C Penny has opted to try a new method of reaching out to the consumers. They have adopted the strategy of "pop up" stores where a temporary store is created in a high profile high traffic area in order to showcase their newest products.

The "temporary physical virtual store" opened from between March 2-26 in a vacant building in One Times Square.

There have been other "pop up" stores, but the thing that separates this from other similar stores is that this temporary store actually does not carry any merchandise. It is basically a showcase for their newest brand items. Its basically an exhibit where you walk around and view the items that are on display. The interactive aspect of this store is that there are 22 kiosks at various locations in the store that allow consumers to buy the items that they are presently
viewing. There are no fancy lights or mechanical elements that creates a dialog with the shoppers however you can see how the marketing team at JCPenney has made an effort to somehow tie in their enormous virtual store with a physical store.

The store isn't very interesting in architectural terms.

Although the case study wasn't to interesting it did turn me in a new direction, exhibits. The temporary JCPenney had the feel of a really boring exhibit. The only difference is that you could buy the items that were on display on the spot.

So for my second case study I looked at some exhibits. I came across the Sony exhibit designed by Design Company Agentur from the IFA trade fair 2005. In this exhibit, Sony made every effort to encourage consumer interaction with their product by having absolutely no staff within the exhibit. They wanted this to be a personal experience between their customers and their products. To completely immerse the consumers into experiencing their products they focused their efforts on making the display highly entertaining and interactive.

Viewing from the outside of the display the exhibit looks entirely closed off by dark banners.Upon entering the exhibit you are greeted by these vertical displays and music.
The visitor is free to move around the exhibit and try all the new gadgets at their own pace. With staff not present visitors are forced/encouraged to explore and test how the new products work making it a more personal experience. This idea of allowing the consumer to interact with the product freely without having a staff member watching over their shoulders makes sense. I hate listening to how much these punks know about the product. I like figuring out things on my own. Its just more fun that way.

The exhibit had areas where you can have an even more personal experience with the Sony product such as in these sound tubes.



Here they can download from Sony's Connect, a music downloading site much like iTunes, and listen to them in their own private sound tubes.

From these case studies I imagined a store completely free of employees. Where the only interaction occurring is between the consumers and the products and on occasion between consumers and consumers. All products inside can be tested, explored, experienced and can also be purchased online on easy to use kiosks.

references:
http://www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/feb2006/id20060214_171142.htm
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/2006-03-02-penney-cover-usat_x.htm