This goes with that at Maxwell!

Maxwell International used The Digital Show to demonstrate a new approach to in-store merchandising of photographic accessories.

The clean and ‘earthy’ Maxwell International stand was one of the more appealing at the show from a design point of view, using plenty of bare wood surfaces and open spaces. It also conveyed a new way of thinking about retailing photo gear, with ‘stations’ on the stand allocated to products on a lifestyle/application basis.

‘We wanted to challenge the way products are displayed,’ explained Brendan Lee, marketing manager, Maxwell International.

The Maxwell stand was divided up into usage categories, such as ‘Travel’, ‘Weekender’, ‘Event’, ‘Sports’ and ‘Pro’, and suitable accesories from Maxwell’s extensive accessory portfolio gathered together in those areas.

Mr Lee said that traditionally, all the tripods are gathered together in one section of a store, bags in another, etc. While this is logical from a store management point of view, for the consumer, it is not particularly helpful.

‘Why is one tripod different or more suitable for me than the other 16 on display? We wanted to present products by usage,’ he explained. ‘If I’m travelling I want to know what bag would suit the lens I need.’

Having suitable travel lenses with matching bags, lightweight tripods and other travel photography accessories, for example, helps the consumer make appropriate choices and helps the retailer maximise sales.

The concept was brought to reality with the assistance of leading store design specialists Arrowsmith & Angley. Neil Arrowsmith was involved with store design for Kodak Express stores in the 1990s and Arrowsmith & Angley currently counts among its customers JB Hi-Fi and Vodaphone.

‘The stand has been designed to be an retail example,’ he said, adding that the new usage approach had good buy-in from retailers at the show.