DDi - October 2011 - (Page 16)

16 | Visual Perspectives Ho, Ho, Ho-mogenized I t’s that time of year again. Regardless of your role in visual merchandising (aka “Retail Elves”), at some point, you become intimately engaged in the planning, preparation and implementation of the biggest event of the retail year—HOLIDAY. This is it—the Super Bowl of retail. Most likely fourth quarter for many, and what most retailers are counting on to bring them out of the red and into the black. It’s the make-it-or-break-it time of the year. Of course, it also happens to be centered around a religious holiday in which tradition involves giving and exchanging gifts on Dec. 25. The retail equation is simple: Holiday + Gift Giving = Sales. And many retailers do whatever it takes to get the shoppers into the store and get them to open their wallets. I’m not sure exactly when decorating retail stores for holiday became standard practice, but what I do know is that decorating trees with lights dates back to the Dark Ages, when Pagans were just looking for some fun in the dead of winter (perhaps they were the ﬁrst visual merchandisers?). In retail, decorating a store is basically a tactic intended to leverage the time period to sell more products. Although we love the fact that it engages the customers, helps reinforce the brand image and supports marketing messages—it also makes us feel good. But, at the end of the day, it is essentially about selling more stuff. The process of holiday decoration development, or “trim” as it is known in the trade, is a laborious, lengthy process that requires multiple layers of budgeting, planning, reviews and approvals, do and redo, prototyping, safety checks, more approvals and ﬁnal approvals. Did I mention approvals? Unfortunately, for those of us in the world of holiday knick-knackery and trim creation, political correctness has put a bit of a cramp in our holiday creative style. All due respect to the executives, human resource teams and diversity groups trying to do the right thing, but thanks to the “PC-ing” of America, holiday trim is becoming, quite frankly, Ho, Ho, Ho-mogenized. Enter the snowﬂake era. The snowﬂake has become the new international symbol of holiday retail (deemed appropriate even for warm-weather climates that haven’t seen snow in three decades). How could a snowﬂake possibly offend anyone? Clearly the safe choice. I commend the dutiful visual and creative teams (myself included) that continue to try to reinvent it each year. After all, no two are alike, right? But is this the best we can do? Where are the Santas, the reindeer, the jingle bells, the snowmen and other familiar icons of the season? Newly invented or traditional, for some reason these festive ﬁgures have fallen into the “at risk” category as potential offenders, or may possibly have secular connotations. Really, I ask? I don’t recall seeing Santa in church— ever. (However, I have seen him drinking a Coke.) I am certainly not recommending anything that might include wise men or a baby—deﬁnite cast members of a speciﬁc religious party. And I also would not suggest equal time for a menorah or dreidel, as these options clearly deﬁne holiday party lines and encroach on the separation of church and store. I realize as I stand on my proverbial gift box that I potentially risk extra time in purgatory for this, but I ask you: why can’t we take the “holy” out of holiday? And why are we so afraid to embrace this retail holiday in a nonreligious state? The religious meaning behind the holidays isn’t for sale in a retail store— the gifts are. I hope you will consider this perspective, and not judge my point of view as a lack of social conscientiousness or respect for the various religious holidays. I would state that in an effort to accommodate every desire, it is easy to lose the original intent. And, unfortunately for retail, the resulting visual can become homogeneous, overly safe and boring. In the meantime, I wish all of you Elves a smooth holiday set up with no port strikes, sinking boats or snowstorms to delay your trim arrival. And lastly, cheers to reinvention of the holiday snowﬂake for 2011—perhaps you will surprise me with something new! —Ann Fine Patterson, principal of Ann Fine Patterson LLC, is a 20-plus-year career professional in visual merchandising. She shares her insights in this bi-issue column. E-mail her at ann@annﬁnepatterson.com. | October 2011 www.ddionline.com http://www.ddionline.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of DDi - October 2011

DDi - October 2011