The retail sector has changed, as many stores are transitioning from traditional shopping transactions and creating more immersive, customer-centric experiences.
Online shopping is easy and convenient, so brick-and-mortar retailers must provide unique, memorable in-store experiences to improve customer engagement.
In addition to increasing footfall, it will boost sales, cultivate loyalty, and drive repeat visits.
Learn more about the rise of experiential retail and how it is changing the industry for the better.
What is Experiential Retail?
Experiential retail provides a community with engaging, tactile, immersive, and shared experiences that cannot be replicated online.
Unlike traditional shopping experiences, experiential retail will unite communities, cater to local consumer needs, and prioritize customer engagement over product sales.
For example, a retailer may attempt to stimulate the senses, provide in-store events, and even embrace an omnichannel approach to retail to increase engagement and sales.
Many young consumers crave in-store experiences they can share on social media platforms, such as Instagram and TikTok.
The more immersive, engaging, and aesthetically appealing a store is, the more likely modern consumers will visit and share their experiences online, increasing footfall and sales.
For this reason, many retail stores have taken steps to create Instagram walls or introduce unique technologies to encourage shares and visitors.
Remember, experiential retail doesn’t focus on growing sales but encourages customers to explore, participate, and connect with one or more brands.
Is Experiential Retail the Industry’s Future?
It is clear experiential retail isn’t a fleeting trend, as it will likely be crucial to brick-and-mortar shopping experiences in the future.
Retailers and real estate developers no longer create stores for product sales alone, as they are developing dynamic, engaging spaces with a customer-centric, innovative approach to retail.
For a store, mall, or shopping center to be a success, it must avoid a mundane, purely transactional environment and focus on creating shared, interactive, and social experiences that bring people together and boost enjoyment.
For example, CEO Jean Paul Wardy of CenterCal Properties has brought together innovative, in-demand retailers to many Utah projects, creating unique spaces that will unite a community in various ways.
The full-service commercial real estate company aims to provide residents with more engaging, relevant shopping experiences, offering attractive public gathering spaces, lifestyle amenities, dining venues, family events, open-air concerts, and even office spaces.
How Experiential Retail Helps Retailers Stand Out
Experiential retail could determine a store’s success, as it can help differentiate a brand in a crowded market.
Unique, interactive, and social experiences will convey more trust in products, improve brand engagement, and attract more customers to a brick-and-mortar store, helping to boost sales naturally.
Also, experiential retail could generate positive word of mouth, as the engaging experiences could earn press coverage or encourage consumers to share their distinctive shopping experiences on one or more social media platforms.
Plus, using technologies in experiential retail can help brands accumulate valuable consumer data, helping them understand preferences, behaviors, and product engagement, resulting in more effective marketing campaigns and product development.
