As a professional shopfitting company for more than 85 years, ARNO creates not only systems following the Shop in Shop Concept but entire shop designs as well. This means that we take on all responsibilities to do with creating effective designs for your retail furniture, creating a concept for the most efficient layout of your stores as well as manufacturing, shipping and installing the furniture according to the newly developed layout directly on-site.
As any shop designer can attest, branding is an important aspect of marketing and thus needs to be considered for all shop designs. At ARNO, we focus on conveying brand identity with any of our designs. This is a particularly important aspect for shop in shop systems, as these are typically positioned within a multi-brand environment in order to create their own separate retail space. However, when creating full shop designs which may not be infused with the branding of specific products, but rather with the identity of the store itself, the question of how to properly use branding strategies in shop designs should not be neglected either.
Any ARNO shop designer is intimately familiar with mono-brand shop designs and the demands they have to meet. Designing such a store requires a strong and coherent visual design which applies throughout the entire store. Typically, such designs are free to follow the identity of the respective brands very closely, as every piece of retail furniture in the shop should have the customer completely immersed in the values, attributes and emotions of the already established identity. As there are no other brands within such a store, there is no risk in following a single coherent design approach. The most important points here are:
We achieve this by identifying the attributes and emotions of the brands in question and applying them directly to our design decisions. For example, simple shapes and tastefully understated colour combinations can exude a feeling of professionalism and competence – which can further be underlined with digital signage elements. By saturating the retail space with design elements transporting these concepts, the entire customer journey is dominated by the associated emotions. This allows new customers to quickly gauge the identity of the brand, while brand-loyal customers are given the emotional shopping experience they expect from the brand.
When creating interior designs for stores featuring multiple brands, any good shop designer needs to identify the core elements of the store's own brand and use them in such a way as to create coherent designs. The main objective here is to have the customer associate the design with the shop itself, without the store's brand completely overpowering the brands of the actual products on display. Such a store's branding should create a shopping environment in which branded products can coexist without either identity being negatively affected by the other. ARNO can create multi-brand shop designs which transport the store's brand identity without overpowering individual product brands by resorting to more reserved branding strategies.
For example, we can use simple shapes and brand-specific colour combinations, using logos at certain hotspots such as checkout counters or information displays. Your choice of materials can also have a major impact on the designs, creating a coherent atmosphere which can serve as the vehicle for conveying your store's brand identity to the customer. When creating Multi-brand designs, ARNO takes the aspect of layouting and zoning into account from the very start, as the individual product brands need to be segregated in such a way as to make them easy to find, but without the brands affecting each other, becoming indistinguishable to the customer.
Aside from effective branding, ARNO's main objective in terms of shop designs is to create a truly unique customer experience. To this end, we guide the customer's journey through a store or shop in shop system very closely, using the insights provided by the scientific discipline of Retail Design. This means that we take a close look at parameters such as the available space and the prevailing architecture to determine the most effective placement of your retail furniture. This is important, as it actually utilises and affects customer behaviour. Some examples of strategies which are important to well-conceived shop designs include:
Using such strategies, we can create specific touchpoints along the customer journey, intended to entice a purchasing decision. For example, customers may be affected by the emotions and attributes transported by the store's design when first entering it, putting them in the right mindset from the start. We then guide them along a specific route through the store by opening up specific convenient thoroughfares. These thoroughfares then feature specific touchpoints such as digital signage elements designed with information and advertisements about specific products. These products are then displayed along the further path of the customer. Thus, we can combine Point of Sale Design and custom shop layouts to create an engaging shopping experience for the customer and entice them to make purchasing decisions at the same time.
Once the initial layout has been completed, we design and manufacture the furniture needed for shopfitting your stores. When creating full-scale shops based on our own designs and layouts, we can maximise the impact of any displays, gondolas or shelving units we manufacture by taking into account their future position in your shops. For example, when designing a particular Marketing Display specifically for the purpose of being used as a secondary placement element, we can coordinate its design with the design of any previously encountered touchpoints on the customer journey, as we have total control over what the customer experiences throughout their journey.
At ARNO, we also take great care to build all of our retail furniture to be fully modular and interchangeable with each other. This means that they can be easily adapted to be placed at a different location within the shop. Pieces which are not specifically designed to be free standing will always fit together seamlessly, forming coherent designs no matter how the individual pieces of furniture are combined.
Once produced, we can ship the furniture needed for your shop designs anywhere in the world, quickly and cost-efficiently. We ensure this thanks to our international team and our great experience in shipping to various countries across the globe. We are aware of all regulations and tariffs which might be applicable in your region and can thus ensure that your shipment will not be held up by unforeseen problems or incur additional costs. Once your shipment has arrived on-site, our trusted ARNO workforce can install the furniture according to the new shop layout. Our team knows all about the local infrastructure such as specific power outlets, as well as regional safety standards. And thanks to having access to the original designs, our workers can fit your shop quickly, safely and cost-efficiently.
Aside from the designs themselves, one particular benefit of working with ARNO is our highly efficient order picking technique. Thanks to streamlined processes, we can pick the exact composition of items you order quickly and without error.
This means that, as long as your furniture is in storage, we can send you the specific furniture and fixtures you need anywhere in the world, as quickly as possible. This way, you can keep to your deadlines, even when replacement furniture has to be procured on short notice.
As a professional shopfitting company creating, shipping and installing entire shop designs around the world, we take great care to provide high-quality products at fair prices. To this end, we are continually looking for competent resource suppliers and shipping agencies to add to our ever-increasing network.
Thus, we can be sure to use the highest-quality materials at fair prices, shipping our finished furniture with reliable shipping agencies throughout the world. We make sure that our suppliers and partners provide good work by visiting them at their facilities in-person.
Thanks to our more than eight decades of experience with designs for shops in such diverse sectors of industry as fashion, clothing, electronics and automotive parts, we know exactly which designs your shops and your brands need, we know what the customers respond to – and thanks to our highly efficient manufacturing, order picking, shipping and installation procedures, we can fit your shops quickly and cost-efficiently, even at short notice.
Feel free to contact us, either at out headquarters in Germany or via one of our international offices in the UK, Turkey, China or the US. We can either work with your briefing or create entire shop designs from scratch. One way or another, having ARNO as your shop designer will benefit your bottom line while simultaneously creating retail environments that your customers will love.
Natascha Kaupp
Business Development
natascha.kaupp@arno.group