Burberry’s new flagship store seamlessly blends digital & real world engagement.
Though they’ve hit a rough patch this year, Burberry has been on a tear for most of CEO Angela Ahrendts tenure. And many have attributed a large measure of that success to Ahrendts’ embrace of digital, the latest and most tangible expression of this being the brand’s new flagship store on London’s fabled Regent Street.
As noted in coverage of the launch in the Guardian, “The store on Regent Street has been designed as a physical manifestation of the Burberry website, known as Burberry World Live … Remodelling the grand structure into a bricks-and-mortar version of a website is a clear statement to the world that, for Burberry, digital now comes first.’”
Burberry’s new flagship store on Regent Street in London was designed as a bricks-and-mortar expression of the company’s Web site.
What really excites me about this digital-first mindset at Burberry is that it’s being driven, not just by their chief executive officer, Ahrendts, but also by their chief creative officer, Christopher Bailey. And, as a consequence, digital-first has pervaded not just back-office and mar-comm functions, but every aspect of consumers’ experience with the brand.
From the aforementioned Guardian piece:
“For Bailey, the primacy of the digital experience is self-evident. ‘I find it weird that anyone would find it weird [digital-first thinking].
‘Most of us are very digital in our daily lives now. Burberry is a young team and this is instinctive to us. To the younger generation who are coming into adulthood now, this is all they know.’
‘The world is moving so fast. There is absolutely no room for laziness or for resting on your laurels,’ said Bailey.”
It’s incredibly refreshing to hear this coming, not from an upstart start-up, but from a long established brand’s creative leader. I should note too that Bailey has been active on Burberry’s social channels: Case in point, he’ll be taking over the brand’s Twitter account today in the lead up to their Spring-Summer 2013 Womenswear fashion show.
See the Guardian story referenced above for more details on the innovative digital experiences integrated into the new Regent Street store, and this piece at Creative Review for more photos from the stunning new store.