Trafford Center Manchester. Travel Research.

LIGHTING

 

My favorite thing about the Trafford Center was that it was extremely cosy and had a lovely atmosphere despite the hussle and bussle of Christmas time shopping. I personally think this is a very rare feeling for Christmas time, and I cherished feeling this relaxed in a shopping environment during Christmas time. 

In my opinion, the use of dull lighting in the Trafford Center was one element of the visual merchandising which made it cosy. For example in this photograph above, the use of vintage light bulbs creates a feeling of timeliness and heritage which is a nice and warm feeling to have, especially at Christmas time. Even in Zara (womanswear), where the lighting is normally bright and uncomfortable, the lighting created a warm atmosphere. 

ARCHITECTURE

As I had never visited the Trafford Center before I was intrigued to see what the architecture of the shopping mall was. It was art deco with gold patterns as you can see above. Inside there were palm-trees with Christmas lights decorated around it. I thought this was a nice twist to the traditional Christmas tree and lights we always see which is, let's be honest, starting to get a little boring!

Trafford Center Manchester. Travel Research.

CUSTOMER SERVICE

Staff interaction in the Trafford Center was brief and unhelpful. However, this was due to the fact Christmas was fast approaching and that staff had to deal with the long queues at the till. Therefore, there was very little staff on the shop floor to help with finding sizes or particular styles.

This was particularly evident in Zara, where number of sales seemed more important than valuable and thought out customer service. Customer service and staff interaction seems to go out of the window when it comes to Christmas time!

Trafford Center Manchester. Travel Research.

TRENDS

A reoccurring trend was homely heritage. Here in the shop window of this shop, you can see homely furniture such as a chest of drawers, picture frame, a fire place and a wallpaper that you might see in someones bedroom. This gives off a sensation of feeling comfortable which makes the shopper want to stay and relax which will increase the probability of the shopper to find something they like and buy it. Furthermore, they might exchange their experience of shopping in this store with friends and family which might persuade them to visit the store!

Military Man was another trend that I picked up in the Trafford Center. In Superdry's shop window they had part of an air force plane and a propeller. This trend was a reoccurring one in mostly men's shops. This trend is trying to say (in my opinion), if you come into this store, you are a 'Real Man'. Once you walked into the store, the lighting was very dull and the general atmosphere the store was hard and rugged. There was loud music playing which created even more of an atmosphere. Superdry are trying to make their brand macho and masculine, and that if you buy something from Superdry, you are manly and cool. The visual merchandising's theme in store was plane hanger. Superdry seem to be trying to move away from the surfer boy look, to fit in more with a more relevant consumer in Manchester.

 

Christmas Cut-outs of course it was Christmas. So the main theme that I noticed was Christmas cutouts of snowflakes and little cutsie girlie shapes. I noticed a very clean and contemporary theme throughout visual merchandising in many womans wear shops. With whites, beiges and blacks being a very prominent colour this season.

Black. 

BLACK.

and BLACK!

As I mentioned earlier the main colour trend I noticed were white, beige and black. With The colour black seeming to be on steroids or something.

A flack back into the past!

Over the Christmas holidays my fellow peers went to New York city to discover the fashion retail environment. For the unfortunate ones who were not able to go on the trip (i.e Me!), we had a brief to go visit a city in the UK and analyse the shopping experience!

I decided to take a visit to Manchester and visit the Trafford Centre, Manchester, one of the biggest shopping malls in the UK.

traffordcentre