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SSDs power Selfridges Denim Studio display

By Retail Technology | Wednesday July 3 2013

Solid-state drive players to help launch the world’s biggest denim store at department store’s flagship Oxford Street location

Department store and online retailer Selfridges is using BrightSign solid-state drive (SSD) media players to help launch the world's biggest denim store at its flagship location in London’s Oxford Street. 

It has devoted four prime shop windows entirely to the digital signage, which features a number of different sized Samsung screens powered by the BrightSign XD230 players. 

Covering 26,000 square feet, the new Denim Studio at Selfridges London has been designed to offers thousands of styles and hundreds of exclusives, stocking 60 brands and staffed by 50 denim experts. 

Technology partnership delivers

BrightSign solid-state players are supplied to audio-visual experts Freehand by UK distributor Pixels and deliver content created by Freehand. They are being used in the ‘Denim Exclusives’ event are powering the screens in four of the most prominent windows in the Oxford Street department store. 

Its most prominent window, on the corner of Oxford Street and Orchard Street, has been converted into a photographic studio featuring eight screens driven by BrightSign players. Two further windows incorporate a mixture of portrait and landscape screens delivering a live feed from Instagram, showing customers wearing their own favourite denims. A final window has a looped time-lapse video. 

A ticker tape based on an RSS feed of Selfridges own content is also a feature of the displays. Freehand conceived and implemented all of the screen-based content for the event. Selfridges owns eight BrightSign players supplied by Pixels, which are used regularly in its windows for sales events. Additional BrightSign XD230 players were rented from Freehand.

Developing unique proposition
 
Selfridges has reported that it has seen sales in the denim category grow by more than 50% over the past four years, prompting it to launch an expansion plan two years ago. This has led to the opening of the Denim Studio following an investment well in excess of £6 million. It is now five times bigger than the previous denim department, with double the number of brands. 

Selfridges expects to sell nearly two pairs of jeans every minute during its daily trading hours,and to do that it needs to engage customers and provide them with an interactive, fun experience. Freehand’s concept of using the BrightSign players to allow users to display their own content in Oxford Street windows is a first for Selfridges, and is right in line with Selfridges strategy of engaging with its audience.
 
While the retailer itself did not comment on the decision to use its BrightSign players, Pierre Gillet, vice president in Europe at BrightSign, stated: “Engagement is key to appeal to the 21st century consumer, and we are excited that a leading UK integrator such as Freehand has selected BrightSign players for this project for Selfridges, one of the world’s landmark department stores. 

“Selfridges has been voted Best Department Store in the World in the Global Department Store Summit, two years running. They are renowned for their innovative window displays and we are proud that our solid-state players have been chosen for use in their flagship Oxford Street store.”

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