Fung Group Lab for Shopper Behavior

This was mentioned to me in a conversation recently, now the first reports from people who have visited.   Quite a bit of leading edge tech, including 3D printing and VR is also included.   Note especially the work with omnichannel interaction, which we rarely address in lab settings.  For More on related work in China, see the Hualian tag below.

In Retailwire:
" ... The shopping lab is devoted to analyzing omnichannel consumer behavior and is operated by the giant Fung Group (a mega-conglomerate with a strong presence in retailing and operators of Toys "R" Us, Circle K, and Gieves and Hawkes, to name a few, in Asia.), in partnership with IBM (a RetailWire sponsor) and brand activation firm Pico. The "lab" is actually 250,000 square feet of space at Li Fung Plaza, where select members can shop and businesses can observe how consumers interact with new tech, products and environments. There is a plethora of stores and customer behavior is analyzed by beacons and other store-monitoring devices.  ... " 

China AliBaba in US

In Retailwire: Some interesting Chinese movements into the US:  " ,,, Being China's largest e-commerce company means that Alibaba is no slouch. But that doesn't mean the company's first site in the U.S. will roll over the likes of Amazon and eBay either. .. ."   See also Hualian. 

NantMobile and Macy's

A former colleague of mine now runs NantMobile.  In the press it is reported that they are working with Macy's    Its interesting too that the company is owned by major Chinese retailer BJ Hualian.   And more on the Macy's work. ( NantMobile, A NantWorks LLC company, The Beijing Hualian Group )

" ... NantMobile’s core product, iD Browser, is a mobile recognition platform that allows people to browse the physical world around them, unlocking digital experiences, coupons, content and information from featured brands that they know, like and trust.

Today consumers are limited to browsing the web. Why should we limit them? Imagine if consumers could browse the world, any time, any place, unlocking the physical world with digital content related to your brand. Now the physical world is browsable.

With your mobile device, the iD Browser, and our patented recognition technology, we are transforming the world wide web into the web enabled world. Get your branded presence up and running on the iD Browser today.NantMobile’s core product, iD Browser, is a mobile recognition platform that allows people to browse the physical world around them, unlocking digital experiences, coupons, content and information from featured brands that they know, like and trust. ...  " 

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Innovation and Research in China

We were involved in early research done in China with retailers and universities in China. Notably with BJ Hualian, who ultimately used some our methods to develop a country-wide plan for training and innovation. So this article, detailing some of the processes used by EMC, was of interest.

BHG Innovation Center

I have not covered this topic for some time. We visited retailer Beijing Hualian in 2000 to help with the early consulting for the Chinese Retailer's innovation Center. Word is that it will be officially opened this summer. Here are some general details, some inspired by our own innovation centers.

Innovation Centers

One of my interests is how to effectively create contextual innovation spaces. These can be physical spaces, such as the ones we created at Procter & Gamble. I just discovered that the Chinese mega retailer, Hualian, has posted some of the details of their innovation center being constructed near Beijing, We consulted on that effort in 2002. Also notable is the Kimberly-Clark virtual center model. Also took a look at virtual worlds models by retailers like Sears and Circuit City.

Physical versus Virtual spaces? There are advantages to both. Physical spaces are harder to rearrange and remotely utilize. They do provide a tactile experience which can provide better engagement with participants. This is in part because they are similar to the bricks-and-mortar spaces they seek to model. So once an ideal solution is created it can be readily moved to actual store spaces for test.

Physical block models that don't attempt to model the scale of retail spaces, though less impressive, do also add a tactile engagement dimension.

Virtual spaces are easier to build and modify and once a library of spaces is created they can be retrieved and used to create experiments quickly. (example at the right is Kimberly-Clark's) They can also be readily linked to data and simulation models based on real data, further augmenting the potential engagement.