Merchant City

Today we took  trip to Glasgow to Examine Merchant City and visit the surrounding retail environment in the surrounding area.

Situated only minutes away from bustle of Glasgow's busiest shopping spots.  We were asked to look at the space itself at how it brands its identity.  First of All we were dropped of right at the courtyard of Merchant City courtyard, there lies a lot of bars, high classed shops and drink emporiums set in period featured buildings. It reminded me of being very italian and upmarket, with the square being italian  commercial restaurants, like Pizza Express and Toni Macaroni and the shops beset that them were such as  Emporio Armani, Cruise and Versace.  It reminds me as a place of Plastic leisure, whether eating out, shopping or going for a drink in a local cocktail bar, people would be flashing the cash- or card.  The walkways were very wide and innovated. And many connected in squares with many dynamic innovated street attached. it seemed very quiet compared to the main street. Most street signs in the sorrounded area had Merchant City below, being still reminded that these street are part of the city, but for someone who is not familiar of the area, i don't think it is well advertised enough in the main street of the town.  There is existing Metal permanent sinage on posts, and overhanging on arches,but with the hustle and bustle of Buchanan Street or Argile Street i feel it could be easily missed, onlookers or tourists.  This may be deliberate. As what appears to be a high classed area they might only want the existing clients to revisit that area, or advertise it to that certain audiences that fits the criteria- upperclass client. 

The Apple Store- Buchanan Street 

From then on we began to study the shops near the  surrounding area.  The first shop we arrived at was The Apple shop, the Historic bank location is hard to miss, full of charachter and heavily listed, it stand proud and tall right in centre of the heart of retail district of Glasgow's  Buchanan street. First thing i noticed was it was very bright and full of natural light, due to the large curved windows.  The colours and materials of the products and apple logo, grey stainless steel, white and black laminated glass panels were followed throughout the sinage and materials that furnished the building. As you first walk through the door on the back wall direct above the products you see their latest product advertised in laminted glass light boxes, in this case the new iphone 4.  These attract you attention straight away and the light against the laminate material makes a strong statement. 

The building it'self is very much open planned with everything in eyesight with lot's of staff surrounding it.   The staff range from all ages and are all dressed informal in the same casual blue t shirts, with the white apple logo printed onto them.  I also noticed there were a multiple number of staff, each ratio for 1 customer in the shop, whom were all wearing some sort of id tags which were aesthetically like ipods.  This gave the impression that they had a good customer service and customers would be able to get  personal assistance, for as long as needed.  The customer could asked lot's of questions and don't have to feel like they are rushed.  Also the fact they are using their products and promoting them in many different approaches, such as the name tag i thought was very clever as a customer would notice that, giving the impression everyone own's an i pod.   

The building itself is a historical and listed building, but they have refurbished it giving it a contemporary and minimal feel.  Each product is displayed on wooden benches alone, with no sinage or price-tag, this means the customer would have to speak to the staff who would persuade the customer to buy.  The fact they are displayed along and the customer can interact with the product gives the impression that the products speak for themselves.  I also noticed that they would attach other devices from apple products for example ipad's into i pods, showing the range of products that can be used together, this is a tactile way called unselling to attract or persuade the customer to buy other accessories that works with the product they are interested in. 

The mezzanine floor, formed as a concrete slab eliminated the need for downstair beams and therefore maximising the headroom space on the sales floor beneath, The statement featured laminated spiral staircase, forming a continuous structural ribbon of glass takes you up to upper level.  There lies the GENUIS BAR, a helpdesk for the software products.  Also all the products advertised on the shelfs in packaging actually have the products in them, usually for security reasons expensive products are kept securely in the back office, but apple feel the need to have their products in they're packaging and have a high level of security.

John Lewis 

Firstly when you enter John Lewis There is a display virtual advertising their website, reminding customers that you can shop online as well as in the department store.  the display carries the renown colours of the John lewis brand, green, black and white.

When you first walk into the store you notice it is very bright, with different stalls selling different brands of produce, each produce has it's own tall display,mainly white, with the names situated on the top of the stalls.  The layout of the space, leads you to many different pathways, and he escalators situated at the back of the shop, making the customer walk round in a circle to access the area that they want.  The toilets and food courts are also situated on the top floor, directing the customer cleverly all through the store.  The bright spotllights are positioned to focused directly on certain items, leading the customers eye around the whole shop, and tall glass display cabinets give distactions on the way through the customers journey. For example at the escalators the customer is looking around, these display cabinets and lighting displays are to attract the customers eye.  

Hanging from the ceiling on each floor and department were green banners advertising a promotion price matching other stores, the colours of the brand are carried througout these, green, white and black.

All saints

The stricking window display of all saints is very eye catching and dynamic.  A repetitive lineal display of sewing machines and the manifesto is then carried through the outside right through to the to the interior.  With large sewing machines exhibited in different areas of the shops.  The shops theme has a very atmospheric industrial and factory aesthetic. Large theatrical spotlights are suspended from the ceiling, which are purposely positioned,emphasising certain areas in the shop, making them a vocal point to the customer. The bold statement clothing, much of which was a range of 4 different colours.  Black, brown, grey and cream.   The style particular cut of the clothing was the main statement of the company.  The designers have particularly targeted their clothes to a small niche market and can be easily identified to from an exterior environment.  Experimental music is played in the shop which may be suited to the buyer.

      

  

One Day Brief

Our third workshop day was related to our lectures we had the day before. We were shown a video giving examples of how different advertising agencies work as a team.  That day we were assigned a one day brief, in which we were put together from different teams to form one big team.  After we were assigned most of us got together and read the brief.  The aim of the project was to ' Encourage young adult men to visit their Gp's by targeting young women.'  As it is well renowned that men are notoriously bad at visiting the GP and we had to look and research this into more depth and to produce a campaign that would encourage men to attend their Gp's, but our audience would be particularly targeted towards Women.

So got together collectively and decided that that day we would all do some personal research and on the day discuss what we found and compare the research.
I actually had to go to Ninewells ( a local hospital) that night, so with this advantage i took the time to ask the doctor on why he thinks men don't go to the doctor that much and later on went home to look at some statistics online.  When we spoke about it a lot of people did come up with a lot of similar information. Either it was embarrassing for them or some facts such as 'more women get skin cancer than men, but more men die of it'.  Jennifer produced something that was rather interesting and another few people did also.

In the Morning

We all met up in the morning and sat together in a circular desk and listening to what everyone had researched, we collected all this evidence. After the discussion we all went into pairs and each pair went around Dundee with 1 of the 3 research methods we came up with.

Influence chart 

This was one i had been assigned to , the way it worked is we would go around the streets of Dundee City centre and ask men ' which of these women would you take advise from when regarding health advise?  And we would tick the women who they mentioned. it was a quick and easy method and you didn't feel you were hassling people.

Chart Interview.

This was involved questions to men regarding their attitude towards going to the doctors. The strategy was while they were asking these questions, they would get more in depth answers and personal stories.

Body Concerns.

This included a black outline of the male body, women would mark the areas that would worry her most if he were having pain there.  They would approach women on the street and ask them to circle on the outline of the male figurine.  This tool appeared to e useful and the drawing method began to strike conversations with the subject, this  appeared to be a more intimate approach.

I had an interview with a company for my GIDE project, but having a little time i went with My team jennifer and Lynsey around Dundee City with the influence chart asking males what women what influence them.  Most men were cooperative, but i seemed it restricted talking to them more about the subject as it was just one simple question and they would answer and leave because you didn't have their attention for long.  Some of them would associate the celebrity to the women rather than the name.

The Results 

When this was complete we had all arranged to meet a certain time and got together to discuss our morning research results.

It appeared that some of the influence charts are not the results that we predicted.  When people were doing the influence chart we were asking men of different ages and i suppose anyone that would get our attention. we then discussed it may have been better to focus on the age group given. Had we stuck to this and focused on the age group stated in the brief and were contestant in doing so  the results  may have come out differently. (For example most of thee men who mentioned their mum or friend were 18-30. The men who said wife were 35+ and the men over sixty would say their daughter.) This would have been because the stage men were at in their life's, for example a 18-30 year old are very unlikely to say their wife's as most men would not be married.

The group doing the body chart found out that the main areas that women were concerned about were the heart, joints and head areas. And the group doing the questionnaires said that men were more likely to wait until their conditions got serious before they would actually do anything 

Brainstorming And Mind mapping

After brainstorming the main theme that we came up with was that most men were 'embarrased' to go to the doctors or because of 'nagging.' The majority of the group wanted to take these aspects into consideration and go down the humorous route, as looking at our research and we decided this would maybe be more effective to the audience, we also decided  to focus on small ailments, such as coughs and cold or a rashes that would get worse when left untreated.  we felt that featuring serious illnesses such as heart disease or cancer would not be appropriate for the light hearted humorous approach we were aiming for.

We then watched a video on youtube about a wife constantly nagging at her husband, which he kept on ignoring, but it was done in a humorous way not an argumentative way and an element of fun was used  we felt that we would like to use this to our advantage.

One idea that came from this was women looking at a mans symptoms on the NHS website, and he was pretending not to take any notice or not bother. When she walks off he quickly goes to look at the laptop behind her back.  The idea being he does it when she is not looking, as he doesn't her to make a fuss.  Tag line being  '' it does make a difference.''

Afternoon session

After lunch we did some  quick persona's based on our research.

We kept these in mind for our campaign .

We felt that we were all just listening to each other and maybey there was too much talking and not enough drawing, also not everyone could say what they really wanted as some people were more dominant than others. So we decided to draw up some ads that would work for our campaign we all thinking alone the same lines, we wanted a man who was ill and the wife nagging him to go to the doctors, he decided to ignore i and he progressively his symptoms started to get worse.  Our group came up with this ad that we all agreed on, but just developed. In this the wife would leave notes everywhere to remind him to go to the doctors, on her pillow for him to notice when he gets up , on the toothpaste cabinet, written on the steamy shower, on his juice bottle . As the day goes on he progressively gets worse until he ends up back at the cabinet and notices it.

We decided to to combine some ideas together relating back to the girlfriend placing notes everywhere, but also focus on the comedy factor.  It seemed there was a lot of people with different opinions and it took us a while to come up with a final idea.  Some of the illustration students drew up the final product ad the others discussed the advertising pitch and other possible advertising tactile tat would link with our pitch.  We all agreed on a strapline to '' eventually hell get the message.'' which we then later presented in the evening

Workshop 2 Smash

In our second workshop we were given a brief, we had to try and encourage people to try SMASH, the famous instant mash potato in a packet.

                                                                                                  

                                                         

Basically '' smash is s dehydrated mash potato.  When boiling water is added it reconstitutes into hot mash that can be served as part of a meal.

We were asked to try it, but i must admit i don't think i could bring myself to eat that. In saying that after this workshop took place i notice it more in shops and thin 'should I?'  Maybe one day.

It also connected with the lectures we were given the day before about market research.  We were given noted about SMASH on for example swot a swat analysis, which i spoke about before in week 1.  We wee put in our teams again and asked to also do some market research on the product, by collecting reactive data which involved connecting peoples attitudes and relationships with food.  Involving looking at the nostalgia, happiness, friendships, memories and experiences, particularly related to food context. We were shown this video in the our lecture the day before. Basically connecting SMash with the idea of it being futuristic, fast and easy to use.  Still healthy and nutritious as it is made of 98% potato and ideal for a family to take on holiday with them.  The robots then get it confiscated cause, giving the impression that the guards want it for themselves it is that good. 

Morning

We all met up at the Dalhousie building on Campus to decide on a stagey of market research to take. We done this rather quickly  We then decided to find out what people's favourite meals were.  We decided a less formal approach would be best and interactive rather than doing a questionnaire, which most people we figured, wouldn't take part in.  So we drew up lots of plates with felt tip pens and asked the public a to draw their favourite meal, we particularly used coloured felt tips, as people are more likely to draw, than write.

We split into groups of two to gain and cover reverent information from different backgrounds.  While they were drawing the food, we noticed we got people's attention more and asked them a series of questions while they were doing it. to gain more evidence.

I suggested Jennifer that we would head down to Magdelin Green ( a local park) as is was a nice day and we figured people would be out socialising and sitting on the grass, which i witnessed the day before as we thought would be easier to appraoch people.  But when we arrived we discovered it was a little early and it would of probably been bet to go at lunchtime.  None the less we spoted a couple of people and more as we walked towards the town.

Here are a few pictures of the people who took part in our exercise.

This Swedish student on the right we both found very interesting.  As he drew up a traditional meal as he drew we began to ask him a series of questions and discovered that he would have in Sweden maybe only once a year a it was very expensive meal that a group of family and friends would eat.  He wasn't sure how to say it in English, but he told us that his uncle would hunt the reindeer, de skin and carve it up for the family.  It obviously meant a lot to him, connecting family and community with the meal.  This type of meal could easily be served with smash, as he said he would have it with potatoes and vegetables.

Most people were co-operate in getting their picture taken, while asking them we also gave them the option to cover their faces as they have felt uncomfortable and then we would still have the evidence when collecting our research.

I also think asking the to draw using felt tips was an effect way as they were more comfortable in doing that rather than being asked a series of questions.  Even though some people were a bit reluctant to draw at first, we mentioned it doesn't have to be a masterpiece to them and that seemed to work.  Using felt tips, people would automatically draw and not write.  These were both useful tips we were told that Lauren Currie's experienced and would use when doing her Service designs.

When people were drawing, we found that is was a good way to get peoples attention more. So we asked them a number of other question's relating to the meal.  For example, who would make the meal?  If it reminded them of anyone, or if it would be eaten on a special occasion.  We got some responses that were repeated like ' mum used to make it' or ' it's not as good as mum's cooking.  Altho we felt that we could have pushed this further and thought about the questions a bit more.  I felt that it was a very effective tool to use and have used it in different ways with other projects.

Afternoon Session.

We all got together in the afternoon, to review and look over each groups results.  We discovered most people decided not to mention SMASH to the public, but  a couple of people did, also a lot of them used pictures or image for our research as a way to communicate with the public.  The group tat did mention it to the public set up a questionnaire, the results were that is was lumpy, watery and didn't taste very nice.  Strangely one woman mentioned they used it as a pizza base and another remembered a old jingle '' for smashed get mashed.' but mentioned that she would never actually buy it.  Another done a questionnaire  and discovered that i wasn't that effective, but offered them chocolates to do it.  This may have tempted people more.  Most people in the class said they would never buy it or try it as they are put of by the fact it is in a packet, even though it was made from 98% potato, then again a lot of them had never tried it, which we all should have really.


We were then asked to create some personas of people that we might want to target in the market, given one of the lectures mentioning that it is simple but effective way to target small niches, rather than a ramnge of people. Relating back to the 80/20 rule 80% of profit it given by 20% of customers.
For example one of the girls in out team mentioned her parents used to send it to her as it was a quick and easy way for her to cook mash like her mum, again relating back to the comments made earlier that the public suggested. " just like mum'   The persona had to represent a type of person, who would have similar views interests and use the product for similar purposes.

Here are a few examples of Persona's we came up with.

 

The first one we created was a busy mum, who insist on cooking nutritious food for her children, but doesn't have the time on her hands to cook from scratch all the time.  We decided we would investigate the nutritious properties of SMASH and play on that fact, giving it would be a nutritious and tasty meal and only take half the amount of time to cook if she is already cooking the main part of the meal.  The our lecturer also mentioned that people tend to buy things more when they are instructed to add something, as it would feel they are actually taking part in cooking the food and have some sort of control.  For example saying things like, 'just add water' or 'just add an egg,' It's still giving people the feeling of them cooking, but it's quick and simple.