Optical’s TECH OUTLOOK | STORE DÉCOR

Let’s Techorate!

Planning store décor to best utilize your tech selling tools

BY AMY SPIEZIO

Getting techy is the wave of the future—and optical locations are no exception. Just as customers expect what they buy to be the latest and greatest, so, too, do they expect where they buy to be up-to-the-minute and friendly to the technology that is increasingly shoppers’ lingua franca.

“We are looking at the new demographics of the patients coming in,” says EyeDesigns marketing and sales director Andrew Fader. “They live in the digital world, and if you don’t have that, you come off as unsophisticated.”

As a result, design experts are increasingly steering their clients toward store interiors that provide various points of connectivity for technical selling tools.

“In store display, interactive and mobile technologies both enhance customer service and allow retailers to learn more about the myriad twists and turns of modern shopper journeys,” report the experts at iQmetrix in the white paper “Five Steps Toward Reimagining the Physical Store.”

A tabletop iPad stand from ABS Smart Mirror

High tops and bar stools in a Presenta Nova design

A walk-up, interactive bar from Eye Designs

PLUG AND PLAY

With a world in constant motion, the adaptation of technology to the optical retail setting is a natural progression. “We’ve seen it in other retail but it hasn’t transferred into optical as fast as it has into other retail like Starbucks,” says Fader.

Nevertheless, interactive technology is coming to an optical near you. “Pressure from customers, competitors, and channels are driving almost every sales organization to invest in mobile devices,” says American Bright Sign’s Fabian Bruneau, vice president of operations for ABS Smart Mirror.

Utilizing screens and devices can help patients by adding info-tainment to the optical. On your frame wall, adding a tablet or screen creates interactivity with consumers and draws them into a purchase. “From a distance, frames look the same,” Fader notes. “Having digital media draws customers into the display. It makes it more of a viable, ever-changing opportunity for the purchase.”

An added tech tool can also be a supplemental staff member, too. “The interactive features allow the patients to discover and be busy by themselves without an immediate assistance,” says Helen Rogic, director of design firm Presenta Nova. “An interactive panel animates clients/patients to be active in the optical. When the practice is busy, patients still can be ‘entertained’ and do not have just to sit and wait in the waiting area.”

She adds, “We also like to incorporate LED screens above the displays for fashion shows or brand videos,” and cites motion as the advantage to screens and videos. “Something dynamic is moving as opposed to just a picture. Clients also like to incorporate screens in the waiting area to educate patients.”

SPOT THE TECH: PERFECT PLACEMENTS

When designing a space, there’s an increasing demand to plan tech into the footprint, especially as lens vendors and labs are getting involved in creating high-tech dispensing and measurement devices. But even if you’re not redoing your shop this year, there are places and spaces where technology can flow nicely into the design of an optical.

Kiosks offer hands-on interactivity, associate-led interactivity, and are for viewing only, largely depending on where the tech is displayed. The term “kiosk” can mean several things in an optical.

FLOOR-STANDING. Presenta Nova designed a display unit for Thema to present its iGreen frames. There is a tablet holder integrated next to the display so the tablet is also secured. “It gives the opportunity to present a unique frame collection as well. In this case the arms of the frames are interchangeable, so you can combine the frames you like via the tablet,” says Helen Rogic, director of Presenta Nova.

HAND-HELD. A common location for tech is associate-held devices that live with the employees and aren’t left sitting around unsecured. “The iPad is redefining sales and retail because it offers a potent blend of usability, utility, and innovation that yields high levels of sales adoption and sales productivity improvements not achievable with personal computers,” says ABS Smart Mirror vice president of operations, Fabian Bruneau.

WALL-MOUNTED DISPLAY. Patients can interact with wall-mounted try-on technology at eye level. They can take pictures while trying different frames and it is typically connected to social media and email. It can serve as a selection tool and an opportunity to advertise your optical, too. “Usually we always have it incorporated in a frame wall so you are tempted to try on frames and take pictures, just enjoying and having fun while sharing with others,” says Rogic.

MOUNTED DISPLAY—A frame wall topper is a screen at the top of a frame board that gives product information, fashion tips, and an eye-catching source of movement in an often stagnant area of the optical. While patients can’t interact with these screens, they provide a source of information, “so you have fixed merchandising in your displays,” Andrew Fader, Eye Designs’ director of sales and marketing.

SITTING FOR FITTING?

In addition to the integration of devices, a tech-friendlier way of dispensing is coming down the pike. Thanks, Apple. Not only have the tech company’s myriad devices changed the way we live, the geek chic firm’s retail outlets have changed the way we shop. If you go to an Apple store you’ll find a few basics…

…no carpet

…a genius bar

…high-top tables and barstools

…little seating otherwise.

That sort of design is trickling through to other segments of the market, including opticals where fitting tables are fewer, higher, and with less seating.

Eye Designs’ Fader attributes a trend for standing to the coming up of a younger generation who prefer communal shopping and quick access to buying within optical shops.

“There are more social aspects, more communal sitting, and higher tabletops. You look at how major retailers relate to their customers and bring it to optical,” he says. “There are sit-down [tables] for aging folks, but today’s designs are keeping people upright and moving, like the Apple store. Pretty much every design now has a dispensing bar or a communal table.”

However, that doesn’t mean that seating is going away. “In Europe our standing column is still big,” says Bruneau from American Bright Signs. They have a stand-up version of iPad stands, but they sell desktop stands specifically in the U.S.

He adds: “Europeans, Canadians, and Asians stand during fittings. But I think Americans like to sit more during frame sales.”