Future Shops has appointed world buying guru Kate Hardcastle MBE as non-executive director of worldwide shopper engagement
Future Shops is proudly positioning itself as a singular hybrid retail media platform on the intersection of DOOH (digital-out-of-home) media and experiential retail.
The stellar appointment will see Hardcastle leverage her 30-years of worldwide retail expertise to drive innovation and progress for Future Shops launches each in London and around the globe.
Hardcastle’s appointment additionally bucks a development with current analysis that confirmed inside UK tech firms that 77% of director roles are stuffed by males. The stats from Tech Nation additionally recommend that solely 26percentof the workforce are girls.
Often called ‘The Buyer Whisperer’, Hardcastle is a famend knowledgeable in worldwide buying habits and brings unrivalled data of each shopper behaviour and developments and retail information use.
As one of many prime feminine retail leaders worldwide, Hardcastle was honoured with a prestigious MBE award within the 2018 Queen’s Birthday Honours Record for her companies to Enterprise and Entrepreneurship and is the founding father of retail perception company ‘Perception With Ardour’.
Hardcastle joins Future Shops because the group launches its first-ever retailer on London’s well-known Oxford Avenue this week. Opening the doorways to the general public on October 30, the distinctive house is the world’s most superior in-person retail idea and sits on the intersection of DOOH (digital-out-of-home) media and experiential retail, designed to deliver ‘retail on the velocity of tradition’ to fashionable customers.
Talking about her appointment, Hardcastle stated: “The launch of Future Shops is to retail what the launch of the iPhone was to the telecoms market. It’s a pivotal second which is able to change the way in which we purchase and promote on the excessive avenue ceaselessly – and I’m thrilled to be part of the workforce powering this tradition shift. Fashionable customers are looking for a robust personalised expertise which is actually significant to them, and I’ll assist Future Shops ship this to tens of millions of consumers worldwide.”
Hardcastle will be part of Future Shops’ globally-recognised workforce of specialists together with founder and CEO Ariel Haroush, creator of award-winning retail innovators Outform and Managing Director EMEA Engin Celikbas, the celebrated AI, design and advertising and marketing specialist.
Ariel Haroush, CEO of Future Shops, commented: “Kate Hardcastle’s appointment is a big second for Future Shops. Her data of shopper behaviour, mixed together with her expertise in driving enterprise transformation, makes her a useful addition to our workforce. Kate’s experience will be certain that Future Shops not solely continues to innovate but additionally maintains a laser give attention to the wants of our clients in each market we enter.”
Because the Future Shops idea expands globally, one in all Hardcastle’s key duties shall be to advocate for the patron in every particular person market. As an impartial voice, Hardcastle will guarantee transparency, high quality, and customer-centric enterprise practices, aiding Future Shops to stay aligned with its core mission: to redefine the retail expertise by combining technological developments with a deep understanding of shopper wants.
Hardcastle added: “The way forward for retail belongs to companies that actually perceive and anticipate the wants of their clients. By putting shopper expertise on the coronary heart of each determination, Future Shops is main this new retail revolution worldwide.
Collectively, we’ll proceed to innovate and be certain that the voice of the patron isn’t misplaced within the drive for technological development.”
The daring Future Shops idea will change what it means to buy on the most superior retail retailer on the planet, remodeling conventional retail right into a dynamic, interactive expertise – a primary for London and globally.
The house presents a customized expertise that’s as fluid as a social media feed, that includes a rotating lineup of brand name ‘showcases’ or ‘activations’ that may change each two to 6 weeks.
Upon coming into the two-floor, immersive house, that spans a complete Oxford Avenue block, consumers are met with 400m² of gorgeous high-definition Micro LED shows, monumental billboards, and cameras. Right here, customers join with manufacturers by dwell demos, tutorials, and showcases led by influencers and creators, turning every go to right into a vivid, shared expertise.
This expertise can also be complemented by wealthy perception and information, that reveals, dwell time, buyer journey in addition to site visitors each inside and out of doors the shop. Different measurements corresponding to age shall be fast to observe within the New Yr.