{ 2018 Agenda }

PRE-CONFERENCE EVENT IRDC 2018’s host city, Seattle, was one of the first cities in the world to sell recreational cannabis from licensed store fronts. There are more than 450 retail dispensaries in the state of Washington, and this year, retail sales are expected to reach nearly $2 billion.

This trend is occurring all over the country, yet despite the number of cannabis-related events and trade shows, quality information on retail strategy and design is badly needed in the marketplace.

IRDC’s mission with this inaugural pre-conference event is to provide cannabis retailers the critical information they need to wrap their arms around the most mission-critical concepts and philosophies that are top of mind for any retailer in the 21st century.

Co-chairs Jennifer Acevedo, Editor-in-Chief, VMSD, and Megan Stone, Owner, Interior Designer, The High Road Design Studio, are assembling an expert array of respected authorities to deliver case studies, conduct panel discussions and educational sessions, designed to provide actionable takeaways for those engaged in this burgeoning and dynamic industry.

Stay tuned for the full agenda to come!

Registration also includes IRDC's Opening Keynote with Mike Walsh, Futurist and Global Strategist and CEO of Tomorrow, plus IRDC's Opening Reception.

• OPTIONAL REG FEE MAY APPLY - $195 (retailer and non-retailer Oct 2 event only) / FREE (retailer - full conference attendee) / $95 (non-retailer - full conference attendee) 

REGISTER NOW

Presenter(s)

• Jennifer Acevedo, Editor-in-Chief VMSD (Moderator)
• Megan Stone, Owner, Interior Designer The High Road Design Studio (Moderator)

Mike Walsh is a futurist and global strategist who helps business leaders and Fortune 500 companies thrive in this era of disruptive technological change. A global nomad, he travels more than 300 days a year interviewing innovators, entrepreneurs and corporate revolutionaries. In his keynote, Mike addresses how to design a company for the 21st century while sharing examples of innovators who have already taken some interesting steps toward what the future of business might look like. The CEO of Tomorrow, a global consultancy on designing business for the 21st century, Mike brings a strong research background to personalizing his keynotes for clients. He is the author of the best-selling books The Dictionary of Dangerous Ideas and FUTURETAINMENT and winner of the design award by the Art Director’s Club in New York.

Presenter(s)

• Mike Walsh, CEO, Futurist and Global Strategist Tomorrow (Speaker)

Held at The Motif Hotel Seattle, this casual get-together is the perfect way to kick off this year’s IRDC event with speakers, Editorial Advisory Board members and friends, both old and new. Plus,  we’ll honor our 2018 Designer Dozen Award winners at this opening soirée.

Join fellow attendees for coffee, juice and serve-yourself breakfast items prior to Wednesday’s program line-up.

Candy Pratts Price has enjoyed an impressive career in both fashion and retail, which began by designing windows and creating visual presentations for Bloomingdale’s, where she influenced a generation of visual merchandisers by setting new standards and fearlessly breaking the rules. In those days, any visual merchandiser who had visions of success was compelled to visit Bloomingdale’s on a regular basis to “see what Candy [is] doing” in the famed Lexington Avenue windows.

Her stellar resume also includes terms as creative director and accessories director at Vogue, executive fashion director at Style.com, creative director at Ralph Lauren, fashion director for Harper’s Bazaar and creative director of the VH1/Vogue Fashion Awards.

After many years, this industry icon has returned to her position behind the window glass with a brilliant global installation for Michael Kors. She will share the stage with Eric Feigenbaum, Editorial Advisor/New York Editor, VMSD magazine, to discuss her groundbreaking work while at Bloomingdale’s and her new visions through the windows of Michael Kors.

Presenter(s)

• Candy Pratts Price, former Creative Director / fashion editor and style maven Bloomingdale's window display (Speaker)
• Eric Feigenbaum, President and Editorial Advisor/New York Editor Embrace Design and VMSD Magazine (Speaker)

Women control 85 percent of consumer spending in the U.S. and collectively represent the second largest economy in the world, yet retailers continue to innovate and evolve through invisible biases or “code patriarchy.” The female perspective has been overlooked and, as a result, many facets within the retail industry miss the mark on engaging their most impactful consumer.   Myra Vaughn will moderate a panel of remarkable retail leaders in Seattle. These women have amazing stories, unique backgrounds and represent a variety of retail categories and platforms. The panel discussion will uncover prominent, yet overlooked, ways retailers have missed the mark in engaging their female customers and what retailers can do to benefit from the enormous momentum and heightened awareness of the female-driven economy.   Key takeaways:

• Gain insights, perspectives and recommendations about the rise of the female-driven economy
• Explore its increasing impact on the retail industry
• Learn how retailers can benefit from this shift in awareness, expectations and social momentum

Presenter(s)

• Myra Vaughn, Principal MG2 (Moderator)
• Amy Nelson, CEO and Founder The Riveter (Speaker)
• Jean Thompson, Owner and CEO Seattle Chocolates (Speaker)

Hailed as one of this year’s top retail brands to watch, Allbirds has gained international attention for its unique approach to shoe design and commitment to socially and environmentally responsible business practices. From the pastures of New Zealand to the streets of San Francisco, Allbirds, a certified B-Corp,  is transforming the way we think about the importance of making educated purchasing decisions. In this presentation, discover how this up-and-coming brand is using brick-and-mortar locations to build on pre-existing aesthetics and concepts to further expand the narrative and transform spaces into experiences.

Key takeaways:

• Learn how to empower consumers to touch, see, learn and understand a brand’s values through experience
• Be reminded of how to take notice of the world around us via the store environment and the products
• See how a brand story can be illustrated through its corporate values, product and architecture

Presenter(s)

• Tim Brown, Co-Founder Allbirds (Speaker)
• Ryan McNulty, Senior Associate MBH Architects (Speaker)

With growing online sales threatening traditional brick-and-mortar retailers, it’s more important than ever for brands to create an environment that makes not only a memorable connection with shoppers, but an emotional one as well. The old concept of a one-size-fits-all strategy is not going to create loyal customers or advocacy. Traditional retailers need to take a page out of the book of “themed retail” when it comes to customer engagement. Through the lens of Hershey’s new Times Square flagship, discover how environments that engage all five senses, celebrate beloved icons and bring back nostalgic memories strike an emotional chord to create meaningful connections between consumer and brand.  

Key takeaways:

• Discover how the mix of analog and digital helps guests engage
• Learn how engaging all five senses brings an environment to life
• Reinvention is not always easy, but it is possible

Presenter(s)

• Jose Padron, Lead Global Retail Design Hershey Co. (Speaker)
• Monica Gerhardt, Vice President, Specialty Retail and Design Managing Director FRCH Design Worldwide (Speaker)

One of the most critical tenets of consumer centricity is meeting your customers where they are. Today, even when they’re in your store, they’re bringing their digital footprint with them. As the physical and digital worlds become more and more seamlessly integrated, retailers, brands and their supporting agencies need to think and design from a consumer perspective. Airstream, America's premier travel adventure company, uses an extensive digital platform and dealer network to educate, entertain and inspire consumers to make their own adventures. Learn how Airstream's digital connections with consumers bring them in to the dealerships and how the in-store experience defines a lifetime relationship with the Airstream community.

Key takeaways:

• Store experience design feeds online engagement and e-commerce and vice versa.
• Designing stores that can collect and leverage customer data benefits the consumer, retailer and brand alike.
• Engaging design backed up with empirical data holds the potential to create highly localized and personalized retail experiences.

Presenter(s)

• Mollie Hansen, CMO Airstream (Speaker)
• Chuck Palmer, Principal ConsumerX (Speaker)

Retail has never evolved as quickly as it is today. Brand name recognition no longer drives foot traffic or sales. Shoppers are looking for immersive, entertaining and individual experiences. Incorporating experiential elements into your store may seem a daunting task, but it’s one you won’t regret. Backed by data and firsthand experience, learn how to make your store more engaging for customers while staying true to your brand and recognizing the pitfalls of doing something the wrong way.

Key takeaways:

• Learn cost-effective ways to incorporate experiential shopping into your store design
• Understand the key elements that attract and retain customers
• Acquire the skills to learn from your mistakes in experimenting with your store design

Presenter(s)

• Doug Pearl, National VP Architecture Placemaking Regency Center (Speaker)

When traveling, there’s nothing worse than a long layover or delayed flight. But imagine your favorite local café had a location at the airport. Suddenly, it’s not so bad. With airports reporting more and more passengers every year, airport retailers have a significant advantage over other brick-and-mortar retail due in large part to dedicated foot traffic. SSP and MG2 have worked together to bring local Seattle favorites into the airport, increasing their global recognition and sales. Be inspired by the site-specific concepts that capture the essence of neighborhoods to create multi-vendor concepts.

Key takeaways:

• Learn more about retail opportunities at airports
• Understand how local design partners can help reimagine airport retail to provide a truly unique connection with the best a city has to offer
• Learn more about the renovation at Sea-Tac and what’s in store for those who fly in and out of our international airport

Presenter(s)

• Sebastiaan Rotteveel, Senior Director of Restaurant Development & Innovation SSP America (Speaker)
• Peter Stocker, Principal MG2 (Speaker)

IRDC’s lively lunchtime discussions are as much about learning from peers as they are about networking with them. Hosted by VMSD Advisory Board members, editorial staff and conference sponsors, the Roundtables are the perfect forum for exchanging problems and solutions, best and worst practices, and challenges unique to your retail sector or design specialization. Choose your topics when you register. Tables are filled on a first-come, first-served basis, so register early to secure your choice of topics.

The name of the game is “experiential” – and what better way to create something immersive for consumers than by combining the best practices of hospitality, leisure, career and retail? The Collective, a new urban social club in Seattle, does just that. Featuring a gym, sunken fire pit, day/night bar, a two-story hammock garden and collective workspaces, this engaging concept creates a “third space” for visitors. How can you take a similar philosophy and apply it to your own brand? Discover why authenticity is paramount to designing an experiential setting like The Collective, namely for millennials, as well as the importance of planning your space around a retail agenda that will likely evolve over time.

Key takeaways:

• Discover how to project the feeling of authenticity through materials and experiences
• Understand why consumers seek out experiences that cater to locality
• Gain insights on adapting a design that may evolve over time

Presenter(s)

• Tommy Trause, VP of Innovation ClubCorp (Speaker)
• Adriana Oxford, Interior Designer Gensler (Speaker)

Millennials and Gen Z are transforming the landscape of retail and the industry as we know it. What would the future of retail be if these conscious consumers redefined the customer journey based on their ideologies? During the 2018 spring semester in the Design Department at The Ohio State University, students in a multidisciplinary design studio were asked to redefine the purpose of the retail store to align with their values and to create a community experience that connects the customers to each other and the brand's mission through the physical environment. Attendees will see all of the students’ innovative designs and hear from the winning design team on their approach to what the future of retail looks like to them.

Key takeaways:

• How a strategic approach for translating online retailer into innovative physical experiences elevates a community
• How can store design rethink its programmatic elements in order to cultivate a community around their brand purpose
• How can the retail store leverage both physical and digital touchpoints to promote community outreach

Presenter(s)

• Rebekah Matheny, Assistant Professor of Interior Design The Ohio State University (Moderator)
• Libby Riddell, Interior Design The Ohio State University (Speaker)
• Bianca Adams, Visual Communication The Ohio State University (Speaker)
• Bryan Lightfield, Interior Design The Ohio State University (Speaker)

ALL TOURS ARE SPONSORED BY AVIXA.

Known for its spectacular natural beauty, the iconic Space Needle landmark and a progressive, cutting-edge vibe, Seattle is considered a top destination for travelers from around the world. This forward-thinking city is the home base for industry leaders such as Nordstrom, Starbucks, Costco and Amazon, as well as technology giants like Microsoft. A thriving center of commerce, Seattle is flush with a plethora of retail stores, a range of dining from food trucks to haute cuisine and many wonderfully diverse neighborhoods to explore.

The IRDC 2018 program provides several hours on Wednesday, Oct. 3, to explore this fascinating city. Venture out on your own or with a group of friends, guide book in hand, and explore one of three districts that are conveniently located near The Motif:

Capitol Hill: Directly east of our host hotel lies Capitol Hill, hub of Seattle’s LGBTQ community and an eclectic mix of tree-lined residential streets and commercial pockets of local shops and dining. The Pike/Pine corridor is a main artery and teeming with coffee shops, bars, restaurants and live music venues. Capitol Hill is also home to 48-acre Volunteer Park and its famous Lake View Cemetery, where Bruce Lee and his son are buried.

A/V Experience Design Tour: An exploration of Seattle’s most engaging installations in public, retail and hospitality venues that will leave no stone unturned. We’ll visit top-of-class integrated AV experiences that serve as a vital part of the way these brands engage their customers in this tech-savvy market. Open your eyes to the power of technology to delight and inspire while connecting on a human level.

Amazon Self-Guided Tour: Venture into Amazonia, land of colored lanyards and ID cards, during this 1.5-hour self-guided tour, available on-demand (Audible account required). The tour offers a glimpse into Amazon’s unique philosophy, culture and urban campus. Be sure to check out the AmazonGo store in the lobby of the Day 1 Building. Please note that The Spheres are only open to visitors on weekends. However, the Spheres Discovery at Understory visitor center is open to the public during the week and worth the visit.

The annual Iron Merchant visual merchandising challenge (now in its 13th year) is a mashup of improvisation, performance art and design science – plus one secret ingredient to shake things up! Team spirit and audience participation add to the excitement. There will be plenty of flexing of design muscles and clinking of cocktail glasses.   It’s a happy hour networking event too fun to be called a networking event, wherein six teams of 10, including attendees, speakers and sponsors, are given a theme, a hodgepodge of materials, the aforementioned secret ingredient and 60 minutes to conceive and create a winning display – with a few hundred fellow attendees looking on.   As always, this year’s theme is a secret guarded closely by the event’s founder and emcee Joe Baer (CEO and Creative Director, ZenGenius Inc.). With Seattle as the backdrop, it’s bound to be equal parts fun and funky.   Team slots are filling now, so if you’re ready to show off your design skills, check the “participate” box when you register now for IRDC. (You’ll have the option to “spectate” as well.) The first 60 registrants who check the “participate” box will be placed on a team and contacted by IRDC staff prior to the event.   Questions about the Iron Merchant Challenge? Email jodie.kitchell@stmediagroup.com.

&pizza is committed to making sure each shop experience is unique through thoughtful, inclusive design and layouts that evoke the spirit and aesthetic specific to the neighborhood and community it’s a part of. To bring this inclusive design ethos to life, &pizza works with local artists and designers to infuse each shop with the vibe and style of the surrounding streets. In this session, discover how &pizza’s unique approach reimagines and challenges traditional notions of localized design, inviting in the community and promoting connectedness.

Key takeaways:

• Discover why engaging local artists and designers resonates with guests
• Learn how brands can give back to communities and foster friendship
• Understand how a specific, but flexible, design can work in your favor

Presenter(s)

• Heidi Guerard, Design Consultant &pizza (Speaker)

Retail spaces are morphing into cultural spaces, where customers are looking for more than just products, and instead for fulfilling experiences that emotionally drive or inspire them. In this session, find out what the retail industry can learn from observing live events and cultural exhibitions, where experience is the main commodity. Through the lens of Sephora, see how immersive, interactive activations can catch consumer interest and keep it – if your touchpoints aren’t creating true interaction, then where’s the experience? Discover how to create disruptive moments that shoppers love and will help spread, ultimately connecting online and offline channels in unexpected ways. Key takeaways:

• Understand how experiential design creates valuable customer connection
• Learn how to capture customer attention in a busy in-store environment
• See how examining live events can help inspire a retail journey

Presenter(s)

• Speaker – TBA, Sephora (Speaker)
• Julio Obelleiro, CEO Wildbytes (Speaker)

Food halls are coming. Done right, they engage a diverse community, and add a new level of excitement to the age-old process of going out to eat. Responding to the social alienation from technology, consumers and makers now want to connect in a physical environment. Food halls serve to connect hubs of retail and entertainment through an immersive, dynamic, diverse social experience. Legacy Hall’s success is rooted in the programmatic mix and entertainment provided through food as performance art, a local craft brewery, and the Box Garden – an outdoor venue for dining amidst live entertainment. As retail forever transforms itself, the future-oriented lifestyle and mixed use developments come to the forefront to meet the generational demands of consumers searching for authentic experiences. Food halls fill the needs of highly social, connected lifestyles and are becoming a new form of anchor in retail developments.  

Key takeaways:

• Using case studies, participants will acquire the skills to apply principles and lessons learned to a new context for future food hall developments.
• Participants will thoroughly evaluate the breadth and depth of the design and engineering complexities of a mix of food and brewing uses.
• Participants will anticipate and navigate the complexities of acquiring municipal approvals for this new building typology.

Presenter(s)

• Barry Hand, Principal Gensler (Speaker)
• Bryan Lewis, Founder and President Press Waffle Company (Speaker)
• Dana Foley, Design Director Gensler (Speaker)

How does a brand open a successful retail experience when its focus isn’t retail? Through the lens of Samsung’s latest experiential brand activation in Toronto, designers sought to shake up any “business as usual” attitudes and replace them with a “sky’s the limit” mindset. With the creative freedom to implement a narrative design for the space and aim to reintroduce the tech giant to shoppers through a holistic aesthetic, this experience store is a prime example of how a sale isn’t as important as the journey to get there. From the beginning stages of planning to the final result, attendees will witness how the finished design supports genuine engagement while fostering a lasting emotional connection between consumer and brand. Key takeaways:

• See how a “non-retail” company approaches retail
• Understand how to create unique, attention-grabbing experiences
• Discover why giving designers increased creative freedom can help the design process

Presenter(s)

• George Foussias, Design Director, Senior Associate Quadrangle (Speaker)
• Patricia Heath, Vice President, Retail Excellence Samsung Electronics Canada, Inc. (Speaker)

Thursday’s Roundtable lunches will be followed by VMSD’s annual awards presentation: The winning Iron Merchant team will be unveiled, and the winners of the 2018 International Visual Competition and Retail Renovation Competition will be recognized. VMSD editors will also reveal the highly anticipated 2018 winner of the annual VMSD/Peter Glen Retailer of the Year award live on stage.

People of all ages have a natural instinct to play. While that drive may be dampened by societal pressures as we become adults, the propensity to play is still there. Not only does play help us learn, it fuels our creativity; and brands can tap into that same feeling, too. Attend this workshop to learn how play can be incorporated into the design process, team building activities, and even into physical retail environments, in order to benefit from a deeper level of consumer engagement. Experience the first-hand benefits of play through a group hands-on activity, reinforcing why this innate behavior is important to all facets of creativity, as well as design at large.

Key takeaways:

• Understand why play has become a global trend
• Learn how play can be incorporated into physical retail stores
• Experience the first-hand benefits of play

Presenter(s)

• Karen Kritzer, Merchandiser & Visual Merchandising Arts Professor Sheridan College (Speaker)
• Diane Spiridoulias, Stylist and Visual Merchandising Arts Professor Sheridan College (Speaker)

Retail today is about mash-ups and hybrid solutions, from barber shops with baristas to a laundromat with a lounge. During this interactive session, teams will be asked to randomly select two words; then they will need to create a retail solution, complete with name, look and feel, etc. For example, what would you get if you combined a bakery with a bank? How about, The Donut Vault? Or, what if you combined a telecom store with a bar? A SpeakEasy? Teams will create a white model or similar and present their solutions, which will be voted on to identify the winning concept.

Presenter(s)

• Joan Insel, Vice President, CallisonRTKL (Moderator)

A lively and interactive idea exchange focusing on topical subjects including targeting why certain brands thrive while others fail or fade into obscurity and the relationship of risk and reward. Together in teams and fueled by a healthy dose of friendly competition, we will collaborate in identifying markers for success and longevity in consumer culture, envision our ideal future retail experiences, and explore the diversity of influences revitalizing retail environments. Reinvigorate your professional passion through tapping into the ideas and energy of your colleagues and testing your industry knowledge and critical thinking skills as we collectively define what’s NEXT.

Key takeaways:

• Explore the interconnection between recurring themes at IRDC 2018 and discuss what’s new and next in retail
• Engage with your colleagues in a meaningful, entertaining and memorable way
• Participate in inspirational and fresh thinking on the future of retail design

 

Presenter(s)

• Mare Weiss, Principal Bergmeyer Associates (Speaker)
• Rachel Zsembery, Vice President Bergmeyer Associates (Speaker)

Shoppers do more than just buy product; they tell us the future. What a customer thinks of a store, and what their experience was in it, hints at future trends and how a store, and retail overall, should continue to evolve. Learn from Under Armour’s experience how consumer insights inform changes to store design, visual merchandising, signage and associate behavior that immediately improve design performance and sales.

Key takeaways:

• Hone in on what attributes shoppers really look for and care about
• Understand shopper mindsets to improve in-store communication
• Learn how designing to basic human behaviors can improve shopability

Presenter(s)

• Tom Walsh, Vice President, Global Store Development Under Armour (Speaker)
• Diana Dawson, Vice President, Director of Consulting Services Envirosell Inc. (Speaker)

Experience matters, but achieving true customer pleasure leads to real gains in customer loyalty, basket size, recommendations to friends, employee engagement and most importantly, brand affinity. This session focuses on shedding insight into how multiple factors – price, convenience, digital elements and more – can be leveraged to achieve differentiation and drive destination. If, as research suggests, it takes 12 positive experiences to make up for one negative experience, then it’s well worth working toward reaching the top of a shopper’s Pleasure Index. Key takeaways:

• Understand the changing customer landscape and new expectations around desired customer experiences
• Understand why delivering customer satisfaction is no longer good enough to secure customer loyalty
• Learn the key factors driving customer’s value equation

Presenter(s)

• Vince Guzzi, Managing Partner Watt International (Speaker)
• Argelia Fueyo, National Director, Store Design, Planning and Visual Merchandising Grupo Coppel (Speaker)

It’s no doubt that online retail has made an impact on the bricks-and-mortar world – especially when it comes to grocery and specialty food retail. Whether through basic training, advanced technologies, data reconnaissance, setting alliances or asset redeployment, food retailers are now on a march to the front line in order to innovate and stay fresh. Attend this mock boot camp that will examine a range of ideas and strategies, presented through videos, invasion maps and more, led by two “drill sergeants” charged with preparing attendees for their coveted, design-driven mission.

Key takeaways:

• Explore innovative grocer strategies that have been tested in the market
• Discover how new approaches can be applied to other formats and channels
• Be inspired to adapt to growing challenges in the marketplace

Presenter(s)

• Arthur Ackles, VP of Design, Merchandising and Buying Roche Bros. (Speaker)
• Andrew McQuilkin, Retailer Leader, Partner BHDP Architecture (Speaker)

Imagine a store where everything is free; where there isn’t a particular object or product line on sale. In New York’s Lower East Side, The Inutilious Retailer sits as a beacon of pure experience – much more than a creative artist’s fantasy. Upon entering and exploring the space, customers are encouraged to design a piece of clothing to leave in place of whatever article they would like to take home with them – truly pushing its visitors to dive into a hands-on, immersive art-marking session. In this presentation, see how this innovative idea uncovered lessons about human nature, how it connected consumers far beyond the in-store experience, and ultimately, how it blurred the lines between retail, art and community.

Key takeaways:

• Understand the importance of being genuine to your brand
• Discover tips on how to inspire and motivate customers
• Why a sale is just the beginning of an experience, not the end

Presenter(s)

• Adrian Wilson, Owner The Inutilious Retailer (Speaker)