"at O'Hare" Concessions Marketing Campaign

Challenge:  Promote the concessionaires at O’Hare

Deliverable:  Campaign strategy and concept

Concept: Highlight the extraordinary "at O'Hare"

The concessions team at O'Hare was looking for a way to shift perceptions without relying on an expensive redesign.  At first glance, the visual landscape looks tired and out of date creating a negative impression among travelers.  

Look a bit closer, however, and one quickly finds that there are many hidden gems.  New local food options are popping up regularly and many great products can be found across the terminals.  We needed to highlight these extraordinary finds. 

The "at O'Hare" campaign strategy utilizes vibrant colors and location-specific trend stories to help travelers find the extraordinary products around them.  

Pop-up activations and social media are planned to create more awareness and encourage travelers to share what they find extraordinary "at O'Hare."

“at O’Hare” Marketing Campaign Standards - O’Hare Concessions

Challenge:  Training and quality control

Deliverable:  Campaign standards manual

Concept: Interactive instructional training document.

The O’Hare concessions team asked us to develop a standards and training piece to support the “at O’hare” campaign.  

It would serve to educate, empower and guide their partners in designing stories for the campaign.  The standards were key in helping a small marketing team manage and maintain the campaign’s design standards.

Guest Experience Strategy - Starwood Retail Properties

Challenge:  Develop a guest experience strategy for 30 malls

Deliverable:  Customer Experience Strategy and Tactics

Concept:  "I love it here"

Starwood Retail Properties purchased 30 malls across the US and needed a customer experience strategy that would unify the properties and build equity for this new brand.

We started by asking shoppers to dream about their ideal future mall.  We quickly learned there’s a lot of love for the local mall.  Shoppers were bullish about its future. However, none of them felt at home in the mall.

So we set out to create an inclusive guest experience strategy that would meet the needs of all shoppers and make the mall an easier, more comfortable and authentically engaging destination.

Southpark Center Court - Starwood Retail Partners

Challenge:  Complete the center court experience

Deliverable: Southpark Center Court HUB space strategy and concept

Concept:  The Docks at Southlake

The concept at Southlake was to re-design the center court space as a multi-purpose Social HUB space that would allow guests of all ages and genders to gather and share this space. 

Research told us people wanted to be "together but separate" at the mall.  Families want to come and be able to split up and meet up in an area that is fun for everyone.

The Dock's at Southlake design was inspired by the mall's location at the south end of Lake Michigan.

Parkway Center Court – Starwood Retail Properties

Challenge:  Design a center court experience

Deliverable:  Parkway Center Court HUB space strategy and concept

Concept:  The Arches at Parkway

Parkway was the second center court design project Starwood asked us to design.  Our goal was to ladder back to the global HUB space strategy while localizing our design.  Each explores a multi-purpose approach with play, relaxation, community, food and shopping in a unified experience.  The Arches were inspired by the Arch of El Cajon and some of the famous people and brands, like Fender guitar, from the area.

The Art of Living Locally - Starwood Retail Properties

Challenge:  Activate the mall and engage the local community

Deliverable: Local activation strategy and tactics

Concept: Happy, Healthy Communities through Arts and Wellness

As a new player in mall management, Starwood Retail Properties had some foundational work to do first.  With this behind them, they are ready to tackle the challenge of changing the perception of the local mall.

Continuing the co-creative spirit of the brand, we teamed up with Urban revitalization and placemaking experts Team Better Block to help bring our customer engagement strategy to life.  Unlike most mall activations, this is a bottoms-up strategy, designed and executed by the community for the community.

Starwood is launching the program at two prototype properties in 2016 with plans to begin rolling out the program in 2017.

Peru Board of Tourism – Starwood Retail Properties

Challenge:  Design a pop-up experience selling Peru

Deliverable:  Peru Pop-up Strategy and concept

Concept: Picture yourself in Peru

The Peru board of tourism wanted to do a pop-up experience to educate people on the beautiful country and promote travel to Peru. Our concept was to create an experience where people were immersed into the sights and sounds of different aspects of Peru from the countries beautiful mountains and beaches to the people in their homes, their food and their celebrations in life.  We designed a concept for a pop-up exhibit with a form factor that created curiosity and a desire to pop-in and experience Peru.

Rethinking the gift shop

Challenge:  Reinvent a Japanese gift shop to be a premium Japanese shopping destination with broader appeal among western shoppers.  

Deliverable:  Full brand package and design documentation

Concept: J•Avenue Japanese Collections

Agency: Sidecar Creatives

J•Avenue is a Japanese goods boutique that opened in north Columbus this past July.  We at Sidecar, engaged with Pacific Food Inc. (Akai Hanna) to redevelop the existing retail shop "Hana Gifts". The goal was to transform the overall guest experience into one that further engaged with their core Asian guests, as well as generate new interest from western and younger shoppers. We started the process with logo development around the name J•Avenue. We were looking to evoke a friendly and welcoming connection to the Japanese culture, so we took inspiration from the art of Origami and created a folded paper "J" icon. 

We also wanted to elevate the guest perception of quality, so we altered the description from a "gift store" to a store of "Japanese Collections." To deliver this elevated perception, we greatly reduced the quantity of unique products sold, and emphasized a more curated merchandise strategy. We then shaped a deliberate customer journey that encouraged exploration, and crafted key visual impact areas to highlight organized product categories. The result is a seamless in-store experience that is as fun to explore as it is easy to shop. Further, the consistent use of natural colors and materials provides a warm atmosphere and our careful use of the brand color green strengthens its effect as a branded space.