Episode 45: Retail
Listen via Spotify:
Looking Outside is for curious people looking for a fresh take on familiar topics, in business and beyond.
Retail, shopping and lovers of physical activations, this one is for you. But perhaps it’s for all of us who look at bringing our brands to life in physical spaces. Today on Looking Outside we’re speaking with top voice in retail, Curator of Shop Drop Daily & Chief Thinker at iiiF, Tim Nash.
Tim's passion for brands led to his career specialty in shop and retail design. He fell into the fashion industry, starting in visual merchandising, and then fell in love with inspiring brands to best show up in physical spaces.
As a natural creative who was always good at art, Tim helps brands find ways to reach their consumers in ways that spark a connection through visual cues, smart use of space, and rethinking the DNA across platforms.
This is a critical part of the brief, Tim says, as activations or campaigns built for a specific channel is old fashioned thinking - it breaks apart brand cohesion and dilutes the message. Brands need to find new ways to connect the dots across platforms, to offer the consumer something that makes them feel special but also delivers on the unique brand promise, no matter where they’re shopping.
Having researched, created and curated in the retail space for over 20 years, Tim describes how the pandemic was a critical turning point for retail that not all brands saw or understood. Retail spaces designed for the city center, as the best (or only) way to buy what you need, is not how the world operates now. New brands are able to build a community without a physical space, and to shape their DNA to live across all sub-channels. A lot of older brands stuck in the middle still think retail first, with other channels ‘thrown in’.
Jo and Tim discuss other critical moments of pause that need to take place for retail to properly set it up for the future – including the one where we re-assess the environmental or ethical impact of ‘fast’ retail, shopping and fashion. Tim says retail has traditionally been painted with a negative brush, but it has the ability to wash this away if we can move past cookie-cutter, formulaic and old school ways of creating not just retail places, but brand spaces.
To look outside, Tim finds physical spaces that allow him to digest information and think through things. This can be city walk, a long train ride, or strolling through galleries and art exhibitions. It doesn’t have to be a grand experience, just something small to properly disconnect with the physical world, and connect with his thoughts.
Tim Nash is a strategic, forward-thinking creative dedicated to crafting immersive physical brand experiences that captivate the consumer.
With an extensive background spanning two decades in the retail industry, Tim has been the architect behind a variety of celebrated global brand activations and visual concepts that engage and delight customers IRL.
From a shop floor start to leadership roles within global businesses, Tim currently collaborates with a diverse portfolio of brands to curate innovative campaigns that relevantly talk to their audience.
Beyond this, he's the driving force behind Shop Drop Daily, a pivotal inspirational resource and authoritative voice on the future of the industry.
Sign up to Shop Drop Daily shopdropdaily.com & on Instagram
Checkout Pop Up Grocer mentioned on the show
