Latest / The Retail Podcast / Updated: Five Things Friday (UK): Fashion Week activations, Tala at Westfield, DYLON’s repair pop-up, Apple × Dua Lipa, brand TV

Transcript

Updated: Five Things Friday (UK): Fashion Week activations, Tala at Westfield, DYLON’s repair pop-up, Apple × Dua Lipa, brand TV · The Retail Podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome to Five Things Friday, UK edition.
• 0:15
  Simone, Good morning. I got, I keep telling you this.
• 0:18
  I've got to stop clapping every. I just keep clapping.
• 0:21
  Hello. How are you?
• 0:23
  Welcome. Maybe it's I'm a pastor in an
• 0:27
  old in a previous slide where I do a lot of prank.
• 0:30
  Anyway, it's Friday. We've got five stories.
• 0:33
  We've got short short on time. We'll just get cracking straight
• 0:37
  away. I'm Alex.
• 0:38
  For those who don't know, I help businesses that sell to
• 0:41
  retailers maintain their retail thought leadership.
• 0:44
  I travel the world, go to over 15 conferences a air and take
• 0:48
  those insights and bring them to my clients and your good selves
• 0:53
  and my wonderful Co host Simone. Hi everyone, I'm Simone, the Co
• 0:58
  founder and CEO of Need it for Tonight, also known as NIFT.
• 1:02
  I always say the easiest way to describe us is kind of like
• 1:05
  delivery but for quality fashion, so rapid and localised
• 1:10
  delivery. Fantastic.
• 1:11
  So I'm going to start. We're coming up to London
• 1:14
  Fashion Week and we've got a couple of stories.
• 1:16
  The first one is British Vogue, everyone's favourite fashion
• 1:20
  magazine with their new editor in the US, by the way, creating
• 1:25
  a concept Cafe with night. And so during the London Fashion
• 1:30
  Week, you can go in there, obviously get coffee, but
• 1:33
  they're doing mindful sessions. When I asked chat tippity, it's
• 1:35
  like, you know, they're doing free get air sessions.
• 1:38
  So go along and get some free air with them.
• 1:41
  But they'll be taking the the CAF in in some different
• 1:44
  concepts. Well, they'll have activations
• 1:46
  from Nike and, you know, for those who've listened to my
• 1:50
  commentary and night, night has lost its relevance because
• 1:52
  they've gone for these old, you know, 90s campaign of big stars.
• 1:57
  And what they need is to create more relevance and more cultural
• 2:00
  relevance and be being part of people's lives.
• 2:02
  And I think this is a nice way to sort of tip the toe back into
• 2:06
  coming into people's lives through things like meditation,
• 2:09
  yoga and engagement. Yeah.
• 2:12
  I think if you can get down to it, I will put the in the show
• 2:15
  notes where it is. It's open to everyone.
• 2:17
  Saturday starts on the 20th to the 21st.
• 2:20
  Yeah, I'll put the the I know it's that 7 Arndale St, which is
• 2:24
  near Temple for those who are near Temple.
• 2:27
  Moving on to you. Yes, so Tarla is opening a new
• 2:32
  store in the Westfield. It was announced this week,
• 2:35
  announced with a very cool video actually on Instagram if it
• 2:38
  looked like kidnapping. It's very fun.
• 2:41
  But this has come just months after they opened their first
• 2:45
  ever physical space in Carnaby. I think it's a very smart move
• 2:48
  and it shows that they're not just testing bricks and mortars.
• 2:51
  You know, they're really investing in it.
• 2:53
  Obviously, Westfield is really about reach.
• 2:55
  It's scale, it's high footfall, broad demographics that I always
• 2:59
  find with the Westfield shoppers who are really already in, I
• 3:04
  guess discovery mode. But what I loved about that
• 3:08
  Carnaby school, they've done lots of things, you know,
• 3:11
  they've done run clubs from there.
• 3:13
  There's always stuff going on there, you know, and it's it's
• 3:17
  that what we've popped in about so many times is that the in
• 3:21
  store experience really kind of gets shared and it really
• 3:25
  becomes part of how the brand shows up online.
• 3:28
  And obviously when people are sharing the space, that then
• 3:30
  turns into new traffic both in store and online.
• 3:35
  So yeah, I'm excited about that. And I won't be surprised if they
• 3:39
  have another couple opening next year as well as that smashing
• 3:45
  it. Yeah, you, you, you like this
• 3:47
  brand? Yeah, I do so gross.
• 3:50
  Badly. Because I remember when we did
• 3:52
  this, their diving range, yes. It was the scuba.
• 3:57
  Scuba. Scuba range.
• 3:58
  That's it, right? I like, you know, they're super
• 4:01
  community driven. I love the marketing.
• 4:04
  Yeah. I just, I like what they stand
• 4:06
  for. I think they've done very well
• 4:08
  at it. They always seem to really
• 4:10
  create a lot of buzz, which I love.
• 4:13
  OK, cool, fantastic. Moving on, I'm going to talk
• 4:16
  about detergent and what an interesting thing to talk about.
• 4:19
  But I think this is the power of sorry, this is where we are in
• 4:23
  the world right now. How do I sell my detergent to a
• 4:27
  new generation of shopper or consumer that doesn't
• 4:31
  particularly engage like the old world or like their parents used
• 4:35
  to? And it's everything that my, my
• 4:38
  fantastic Co host and I are saying in terms of make it
• 4:41
  relevant. And Dylan, the producers of
• 4:45
  fabric softener and detergent and dyes, has created an
• 4:49
  activation during London Fashion Week where they want you to come
• 4:53
  in with your pre love, you know, your most favourite item that
• 4:56
  maybe needs repair, maybe it needs a wash, maybe it needs to
• 5:00
  be bought back to live. And they've created this store
• 5:04
  where there's different types of activations in, in that store
• 5:08
  where you can just walk in and, you know, take part.
• 5:11
  But they've also got sections, which I think I thought I had a
• 5:15
  picture of where you can actually repair stuff.
• 5:17
  So they've got a repair station. Is that here?
• 5:20
  No, that's there. So you can go in, have the
• 5:23
  different experiences, have the Instagram moment, but they do
• 5:26
  have a sort of rejuvenation station where you can stitch
• 5:31
  things together and they'll have experts there in embroidery and
• 5:35
  personalization station. So I think a fantastic example
• 5:39
  of we all love circular, we all love sustainability.
• 5:42
  There is that one garment that maybe has a hole somewhere that
• 5:45
  can be fixed, but maybe we don't have the confidence in fixing
• 5:49
  it. And so get yourself down to the
• 5:51
  deal. On Activation again I'll put in
• 5:53
  the show notes, the address and where you can find it.
• 5:56
  Sticking with me, my favourite, your favourite Geo Lipa.
• 6:01
  Apple is having a bit of a tough time in selling iPhones to this
• 6:06
  new younger generation who doesn't just want to buy a
• 6:10
  slightly upgraded phone and who also lives in this sort of
• 6:15
  nostalgic world where they prefer wired headphones.
• 6:19
  They like devices that are one use devices such as the iPod.
• 6:24
  And so for this new generation, Apple has engaged with Dua Lipa.
• 6:29
  I think you know, it's who doesn't like Dua Lipa, right?
• 6:32
  And here they're showing how they shot the the whole advert
• 6:36
  on the iPhone 17. And during the Tim Cook when he
• 6:41
  was talking in the background, Addison Ray had a sort of hit in
• 6:45
  the summer where she was actually the song was about the
• 6:48
  nostalgic headphones that were wired and they used it during
• 6:52
  the the launch. So again, an interesting way of
• 6:56
  how one of the world's largest brands is trying to interact
• 7:01
  with this new generation, which is cool and we will end with.
• 7:06
  You. Yeah.
• 7:07
  So we've really whizzed through today.
• 7:08
  I was reading an article in the business of fashion the other
• 7:13
  day, which I thought, oh, this would be great to speak about on
• 7:15
  the podcast. And it really made me think as
• 7:18
  well. And it was all about how brands
• 7:20
  are now making their own TV shows now, not like ads or like
• 7:27
  influencer UGC, but it's proper scripted, story driven shows and
• 7:34
  not just for entertainment, but more in a, in a long form way of
• 7:38
  connecting with customers. They used Vera Bradley as the
• 7:42
  example in the article. I think the campaign must call
• 7:44
  it the most perfect couple, and that really kind of tapped into
• 7:49
  this early 2000s nostalgia which they were known for.
• 7:53
  But I think just what I found is.
• 7:54
  Coronation Street. No, it's the it's.
• 7:57
  Vera Bradley, I don't know who she.
• 7:59
  Is it's a brand? I like this Vera Bradley.
• 8:04
  But I think you're thinking of, I know who Vera is from
• 8:07
  Coronation Street, that you're. Thinking, I don't know, who is
• 8:10
  Vera Bradley? Sorry.
• 8:11
  I was like, someone's talking about Coronation Street.
• 8:13
  It's like. Not Coronation Street, but yeah,
• 8:20
  I know it's it's a brand and others have done it as well.
• 8:24
  You know, Glossy have done it with this YouTube series.
• 8:27
  Skims have done it as well with they're doing this more kind of
• 8:31
  campaign films. But what I liked is that brands
• 8:34
  are no longer just paying creators to make content about
• 8:37
  them. You know, they're becoming the
• 8:38
  creatives themselves, and they are because AD fatigue is real.
• 8:42
  Like people are really tuning out of this kind of hard sell.
• 8:46
  You know, they're skipping ads, even these UGC ads.
• 8:49
  You know, everybody kind of pivoted to UGC and that kind of
• 8:55
  three second talking. I've become sick of it.
• 8:57
  I've become sick of seeing it. But I think Gen Z, there it is.
• 9:02
  Gen Z grew up on obviously story driven content, you know, the
• 9:06
  TikTok point of views, YouTube series creators.
• 9:10
  And that's how they consume. You know, they don't want a
• 9:13
  product, you know, they want to connect with humour or a voice.
• 9:17
  And I think if if you're not able to do that, then they're
• 9:20
  not as interested. So yeah, I really like it.
• 9:24
  It also just one last thing before I, I'm really rambling
• 9:28
  now, but we've got time is it's kind of been, you know, I've
• 9:33
  always thought of content and it's kind of been installed in
• 9:37
  drilled into a lot of people that, you know, that thumb
• 9:40
  stopping content, you know, the quick hits, you know, that 3
• 9:44
  seconds. But actually, I think it's
• 9:46
  interesting looking at longer engagement because I think
• 9:50
  there's a lot of power in this slow burn because storytelling
• 9:55
  or ongoing series, whatever you want to call it, that creates
• 9:58
  consistency and it creates something that people will come
• 10:01
  back to, which ads don't do. If I get hit with a 30 second
• 10:06
  ad, I'm not going to go back to that, but an episode I would go
• 10:09
  back to. So yeah, I think it's really
• 10:11
  interesting and I think we're going to see a really big shift
• 10:13
  in it. I'm I'm very, very intrigued by
• 10:16
  it. Yeah.
• 10:17
  Yeah, I think, I think it's exactly what what everything
• 10:19
  that you're saying is, is as always pretty spot on because
• 10:23
  people don't want and I remember Unilever CEO talking about this
• 10:28
  disruption based advertising that breaks the flow of how
• 10:32
  you're feeling. So if there is, you know, an
• 10:35
  emotion that you can tap into, such as comedy, such as, and a
• 10:39
  lot of them tend to be on the on the happy side, but there are I
• 10:43
  I have seen ones that are, you know, emotional, but you want
• 10:46
  that deeper connection. And I think that's what the new
• 10:48
  generation is probably more tapped into how they feel.
• 10:53
  And so therefore, I I completely agree with you that So go on.
• 10:58
  I was. Going to say it'll be
• 10:59
  interesting to see if like retailer magazines and e-mail
• 11:04
  newsletters will start then reading more in the future, like
• 11:07
  episode recap. So rather than like product
• 11:10
  roundups, I don't know, I'm taking it too far, but it'll be
• 11:14
  interesting to see if like we see that shift.
• 11:18
  I'm going to be, I mean, I'm going to be brutally honest
• 11:20
  here. I've had a lot of advertisers or
• 11:23
  sponsors say to me, do you have an e-mail list?
• 11:25
  And I say, I don't believe in e-mail list.
• 11:27
  I don't believe people want, you know, emails that come in and
• 11:32
  you know, or sub stacks that are just more text.
• 11:36
  They want things brought to life to them, right.
• 11:38
  And so I agree with you. I think people are tired of of
• 11:44
  the way that they've been given content and it's the we talk
• 11:48
  about the attention economy. And you're right, it's so funny
• 11:52
  when you said the three second hook because that's what you
• 11:54
  know, TikTok has driven people to think about what's my 3
• 11:59
  second hook as opposed to what's my story?
• 12:03
  And I love that. As always, great food for
• 12:06
  thought. Thank you for that.
• 12:07
  Well, you got any plans for the weekend?
• 12:08
  Are you going anywhere? You travelling the world.
• 12:12
  I wish I was travelling the world.
• 12:14
  I've actually got my dad here this weekend, which is nice.
• 12:16
  He's coming down to the last minute.
• 12:18
  He's going to watch Arsenal on Sunday.
• 12:21
  Sorry for any. Of the presume is an Arsenal
• 12:23
  fan. Yes, yeah.
• 12:25
  Does that make you an Arsenal fan by proxy?
• 12:27
  I'm not bothered. As you can see, my finger on the
• 12:33
  pulse with fat fashion brands like Vera Bradley isn't the same
• 12:37
  as my football, The press. I know absolutely nothing about
• 12:41
  football. But anyway, on that bombshell,
• 12:43
  Simone, thank you so much and until next week.
• 12:46
  See you later, Alex. Until next week.