There is a book called "Crazy Concise", which boils down all of Apple's "simple", saying that any company, as long as it can control simplicity, can "master the world." Everything, to the extreme, is doomed to be no ordinary. As a representative of simplicity and simplicity, Apple delivers this message all the time, and the ultimate external manifestation is the Apple Store.
1. Cultural entity expression
When it comes to the Apple Store, I have to talk about Ron Johnson, the former vice president of Apple's retail division.
At the earliest, Apple didn't have the idea of opening a store. They didn't have a lot of products, and they were basically placed in retail stores. Over time, Jobs discovered a serious problem: most employees in retail stores do not have the basic knowledge of Apple products, nor are they willing to explain the unique performance of products to customers. All salesmen only care about the $50. Sales commission.
If Apple wants to achieve further success, it must communicate the innovation to the customer, and it must be changed.
In 1999, Ron Johnson told Jobs about a past, the first time he stepped into the New York flagship store of RALPH LAUREN (famous clothing brand) - magnificent storefront, quaint wooden floors The oncoming artistic atmosphere immediately captured him: whenever I buy a POLO shirt, I will think of that building, which is the physical expression of the Ralph concept.
After listening to Johnson's story, Jobs suddenly realized that he could not let customers drive a 10-mile car to see our products, but within 10 steps.
Therefore, no matter how expensive the rent is, Apple retail stores should open in shopping malls in the bustling neighborhoods, because that area has the most pedestrians.
Apple's retail store is the physical expression of Apple culture.
Beijing Wangfujing Apple Store
In order to implement this concept, Jobs decided to open a store and set a few rules for the Apple Store:
1. Let customers know the overall layout of the store as soon as they enter the door.
2. The product is “less and fine”, but it has to provide customers with a large number of product experience.
3. The decoration is as simple as possible, reducing the factors that distract customers.
On May 19, 2001, the first Apple Store was grandly opened at the Tyson Mall in Virginia.
2. From retail stores to art
The first Apple Store was quite simple: black and white counters, light wood floors, and huge posters of “Think Different” – however, in the big storefront, Apple only sold four computers, not even the iPod...
"Business Weekly" taunts Jobs: "Sorry, Steve, this is why Apple retail stores can't succeed."
First Apple retail store
But it turns out that Jobs’s judgment is correct. The Apple Store has not only declined, but has become a clear stream at that time, attracting countless fans.
Today, Apple has more than 500 Apple Stores around the world, and the articles that ridiculed the Apple Store have long been dusty, but hundreds of Apple Stores have stood up.
Real Jobs store
The Apple Store on Fifth Avenue in New York was once called "the real Jobs store" by Johnson. Glass, cubes, straight ladders... Jobs' favorite elements are gathered here, and minimalism has reached its limit.
Open 24 hours a day, the first year of the year, with a weekly passenger flow of 50,000, it is already a famous landmark in New York City.
This is the case with Jobs. Even in the case of cancer, he thought that he could invent a "glass defoaming machine", which would turn 18 pieces of glass into 4 pieces of large glass. They looked like jewel boxes.
Apple Store on Fifth Avenue, New York
The success of Apple Store on Fifth Avenue effectively corroborated the theory of "Apple's retail store, which is the physical expression of Apple culture."
Regarding the nature of design, Jobs understands this:
“For most people, design means plywood, which means interior decoration, curtains and sofa structure. But for me, everything can't be separated from design. Design is the soul of man-made objects, and ultimately through continuous products. (Service) shell to express yourself."
If the product is the soul of Apple, then the Apple Store is the shell of Apple's self-expression.
Apple Store always gives you a clear view
Located in the Oriental Pearl Tower, the "Shanghai Pudong Apple Store" officially opened in September 2010. Unlike the New York cube, the Shanghai store uses curved glass. The whole building looks like a transparent bucket, cylindrical glass. The curtain wall is very eye-catching. Apple's flagship store and Shanghai's landmark Oriental Pearl are in harmony.
3. Unified design style
It's not hard to find that the Apple Store's design style is based on three key words:
Bright
The biggest change in the storefront of the Apple store is that it makes people shine.
Apple put forward the design concept of "wall to wall".
The ceiling is perfectly integrated as part of the wall and the overall illumination, so the overall interior is brighter. This is the first biggest feeling for people.
It uses the design of the overall soft film ceiling to bring the lighting to the ultimate concept.
2. Open
It is well known that Apple's ultimate use of glass is also relished, from the 12M curved glass entrance of Shanghai Guojin, to this day.
This time, Apple once again unified the glass facade of the store as a design standard: fully open and fully open.
Allow the outdoor to fully see the interior, achieving maximum integration indoors and outdoors.
So you can see that all the storefronts under the template copy are fully glazed on the facade, which is a great interpretation of “openness”.
3. Interaction
Apple's interaction is unique in addition to the operating system experience, and the iconic wooden table design in the store.
A new large HD electronic screen.
This will be the largest visual center in the entire store, and the interaction between people and things will be the ultimate.
4. Discover the relationship between "people and people"
When Apple transitioned the interaction between “people and things” in the Apple Store design concept to the “human-to-human” interaction, things changed qualitatively.
The Apple Store wants to give customers more communication, learning and entertainment opportunities. To sum up, it is the community atmosphere.
The Apple Store is a retail store, a free mobile game, a classroom, or a lecture space.
Faced with consumers, retail-related vendors are increasingly paying attention to store design, which is an obvious conclusion.
But the more core consciousness awakens, far from it. Accompanied by beauty, they realize that “the relationship between people and people”, especially how to deal with young people.
Young people nowadays, giving them excessive enthusiasm for marketing is often counterproductive. The stress-free shopping space is the basic appeal. As a result, the big names seem to have a newer understanding of the space, prefer the black and white gray tea, has a similar color to Apple, and is equally sensitive in the sense of spatial change.
Hi Tea Shenzhen City DP shop layout
Even though most of the tea shops are still lined up, when they start designing the store, the designers are trying to understand the relationship between people and people.
The Xidian Shenzhen City DP store combines 19 small tables of different sizes into one large table. When overlooking, it is like a bubble colliding together, different small tables, corresponding to different "person-to-human relationship."
The “Shanxiyu” Xicha DP store in Shenzhen Shenye Shangcheng runs through the whole store with a table like a stream.
The inspiration for this table comes from the ancient Chinese culture of Qushui. The literati squats along the river, puts the wine on the 觞, let it go with the water, and whoever stops in front of it, whoever The impromptu poetry and drinking have enhanced the interaction between people.
This change is like the era of function machines. The mobile phone is only used for telephone and text messages. The UI and UX (user interface and user experience) are not important. The functions of the early stores are mostly limited to one-handed delivery.
In the era of smart phones, product functions and user needs go hand in hand, the store form is similar, selling is still a basic business, but in addition, the store needs to make a comprehensive innovation on UI and UX, after all, "person-to-person relationship “meaning extremely complex “interactions”.
5. The core meaning of the store
When the major brands have focused their attention on the store, we can't help but ask, how much benefit does the Apple Store that Jobs's painstaking efforts bring to Apple?
According to public data, the Apple Store's ping performance is in the industry, and it can generate RMB 367,000 per square meter per year.
In addition to the Apple Store, Howard Schultz, former chairman and CEO of food and beverage giant Starbucks, has previously revealed that in the United States, a Starbucks store earns about $32,000 a week.
In the eight weeks since the opening of the Shanghai Baking Workshop, its average daily operating income was twice that number.
The real "one store top ten stores." The Apple Store is always crowded during business hours. Starbucks Shanghai Baking Workshop is hard to find on weekdays. Two American importers from the United States tell their peers and consumers as their leader: the store is also a product.
Starbucks Shanghai Baking Factory
We don't know how much Apple or Starbucks put into a store, but the many profiles are enough to let us know how much they value offline stores.
What is reflected behind such a high degree of attention is the core value of the store: the product. Apple has challenged many of the limits of construction technology, regardless of cost, as well as in store construction.
Hangzhou West Lake Apple Store
We often refer to the details of the Apple Store, such as the texture of wood tables and chairs, the cutting and gloss of metal, the translucent of glass and so on. In general, the details and textures are the most representative of the brand's taste.
More importantly, the Apple Store has been following Steve Jobs's strategy in the early years, two of which are still shining today: the location is in the bustling business district, simple and stylish and unified decoration.
Macao Sands Apple Store Exterior
When Apple built the Apple Store in Sands, it put a piece of glass in a marble stone of only 1mm thick, which showed a translucent visual effect. The daytime was warm and jade, and the night was carved.
The fact that the company's soul figures determine the style of the store, not only in Apple, but also in Starbucks.
After Starbucks former CEO Howard Schultz stepped down as CEO, his main job became to create a selection of stores (including selection shops and selection of baking workshops). Compared to ordinary stores, Starbucks selection stores can Provide better quality coffee beans and a more varied coffee experience.
Former CEO of Starbucks at Starbucks' first store
Apple and Starbucks are sparing no effort to build stores because the store is also a product. The value brought by the store is far more than an intuitive benefit. Through the store, customers can intuitively perceive the brand culture and get close contact with the brand.
In the specific situation carefully arranged, to familiarize yourself with the brand in the shortest time and the highest efficiency, understand the brand, and really feel the charm of the brand.
The value of the product itself is important, but the sense of experience above the many consumer factors is the point that the brand is more worthy of attention, and the terminal of the experience is the store.
Therefore, Steve Jobs will make the Apple Store's simplicity the ultimate, and later generations will continue to integrate and integrate new design concepts, in order to give consumers the best store experience, to create product responsibility and energy to build stores. Driving the product with "products" is the essence of Apple's brand building.
The joy of tea is the same, and the knowledge of Starbucks is known to the heart. The development of stores in the catering industry is moving towards the same path, and we cannot stop at the immediate interests and stop.
How to get the trust and affirmation of consumers through the creation of stores, and bring a unique user experience to consumers is the problem we need to solve.
Source : Ziran Food Brand Design
Reprinting provides knowledge support for retailers. We respect copyright and will indicate the author and source unless it is indeed unrecognizable. I am sorry that some of the articles failed to contact the original author during the push. If the source of the label is wrong, please contact us to discuss the solution, and you can leave a message directly in the background of this micro signal.
