"SoCal" and so innovative

"SoCal" and so innovative

Hollister pilots video windows to enhance its surf-themed environment

Sree Roy, Associate Editor

Aug 1, 2005

The new wave in retail design at sand-and-surf apparel retailer Hollister Co.'s stores is the video window, an innovative in-store technology display. Unlike some cutting-edge technologies that inadvertently intimidate customers in their intricacy of use, the Hollister video windows, provided and integrated by Redmond, Wash.-based PlayNetwork, bring in-store technology to a level Hollister's core customers can understand. Sea level, to be exact.

"Hollister wanted a solution that didn't look like produced video; it needed to integrate well with the Southern California surf shop look," says Stephen Dorsey, vice president, marketing and creative, at PlayNetwork. "The question was: how do we bring in technology, but not make it look so much like technology?"

The answer was a unique video window system, composed of up to nine 21-in. LCD screens configured into a virtual window. Each of the 50 pilot stores features two such windows, with each showcasing a 24-7 live video feed of Huntington Beach, Calif. PlayNetwork applied a bezel covering (a finished wood-based façade) to frame the LCDs in an old-style window pane, effectively creating the illusion of looking out at Surf City, U.S.A., from the vantage point of the pier.

"It was about capturing Hollister's brand essence and bringing the beach experience to the in-store experience," says Darrell Champagne, vice president, systems engineering for PlayNetwork. But he notes that capturing the brand essence wasn't an easy task. The PlayNetwork team went through many versions of in-store displays before finally earning corporate approval from parent company New Albany, Ohio-based Abercrombie & Fitch. "We prototyped a store close to Hollister's Ohio headquarters and used it to test the displays," Champagne recalls. The team tried displays such as a huge 16-in. plasma screen and a front projector on a screen, but none of the ideas really worked inside the space. "The chairman and CEO Mike Jeffries kept walking in, looking at the display and saying 'No,'" Champagne remembers. Finally, however, something clicked—multi-panel screens would convey the illusion of a seaside window. Dorsey says, "And finally Hollister did say 'Yes.'"

After the display was selected, the proper infrastructure and equipment were installed to bring the video windows to all the pilot stores. Two live video cameras are mounted under the Huntington Beach pier, with one facing north and one facing south. Steel wiring is installed on top of each to safeguard against becoming birds' nesting grounds. PlayNetwork worked with Hollister's private network service provider, MicroSpace, to work out the encoding, uplinking and decoding of camera signals to each store. The signals themselves are distributed via private satellite and landline network narrowcasts.

Huntington Beach city officials, who had to sign off on the installation, are considering it a success for the national exposure and the monthly revenue for camera and equipment placement. In addition, the cameras, which provide a direct signal to the beach's central lifeguard station, help maintain beachgoers' safety. Shoppers' positive feedback confirms success from the customers' perspective, and Hollister's plans to embark on a second phase of video wall installations suggest that the retailer is happy with the project as well.