Making the Mundane Interesting

In the U.K., Clarks is a footwear brand that has been broadly associated with two things: “sensible” shoes and anxious parents making sure their offspring are well-shod as they head back to school. Nothing wrong with this, apart from the fact that it runs the risk of being a little, well, dull.

Generations have in fact trooped into Clarks stores in the U.K. and found that, while they receive what they require, their hearts are unlikely to skip a beat. Recently, however, things are changing for the brand. Visit the flagship store on London’s Regent Street, and since the middle of February, instead of a window with shoes in it, what greets the onlooker is holograms.

Developed in-house, there are six of these holograms in the large window facing Regent Street, and in addition to 3-D images conjured up out of thin air, the shoes floating in front of the viewer spin and then deconstruct, before reassembling once more.

This is cutting-edge stuff, and for those who are captivated, there’s an app that’s advertised at the base of the window which allows the curious onlookers to learn more about the holographically displayed shoes.

Oxford Circus “tube” (yes, what you’d call a subway in the U.S.) station is a couple of minutes north of this store, and Clarks has taken the chance to advertise its window on the walls of its underground tunnels.   

According to newly appointed CEO Mike Shearwood, this new effort is just part of a program that will include revamped Clarks stores, a better use of social media in the U.K. and the U.S. and, of course, changes in the product as well.

You can’t teach an old dog new tricks; the leopard can’t change his spots and similar aphorisms would all have you believe that things tend to be set in stone. They are not, and what is happening at Clarks in the U.K., and more generally across its world (it has 22,000 points of sales in over 100 countries), stands as proof of this.

John Ryan is a journalist covering the retail sector, a role he has fulfilled for more than a decade. As well as being the European Editor of VMSD magazine, he writes for a broad range of publications in the U.K., the U.S. and Germany with a focus on in-store marketing, display and layout, as well as the business of store architecture and design. In a previous life, he was a buyer for C&A, based in London and then Düsseldorf, Germany. He lives and works in London.