John Lewis’s visual merchandising used to be austere and repetitive, but now that is all changing as the retailer freshens up its look.

Not so long ago, to look at a John Lewis window was to stifle a yawn. There was product, but in many instances it was a single item repeated in different colours across the width of a glass-line.

The backdrop tended to be unadorned white and the overall effect was like looking at a version of Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans or Mao images.

That was fine if you happened to like what was on view or if it happened to be what you were looking for. But if, for instance, a vacuum cleaner was not the object of desire on the day in question, then there was little else that would be calling out ‘come buy’.

The outcome was that while John Lewis had its place in the hearts of Middle England, its windows were probably not contributing in large measure to that appeal.

All of that was the case until five years ago. Since then the retailer has transformed its visual merchandising from something
akin to a highly static form of pop art to something that has other retailers looking over their shoulders.

Going on a journey

John Lewis head of brand creative Paul Porral says that what has taken place has been a “journey” and “not just for the windows, but for the brand as a whole”.

He observes: “It’s about confidence, inspiration and having a point of view.” Porral is insistent however that he has no wish to “diss the Andy Warhol school of visual merchandising. I am quite a fan”.

He says the “way that shoppers interact with us has changed, and windows are part of that”.

“It’s about confidence, inspiration and having a point of view”

Paul Porral, John Lewis

Practically, that means there is a link across all of the in-store and external elements that John Lewis uses.

That is something that should be a given for a modern retailer, but is generally noteworthy because it tends not to be in most shops.

But how did this change come about? John Lewis head of visual merchandising Robb Bloomer says the starting point was a measure of internal scrutiny: “About five years ago we did a report looking at our ‘glory days’ and it was quite strange that a lot of our windows looked the same then as they did when the report was produced. You couldn’t tell yesterday from today.”

He says that the underlying intention was always that the product should be king as far as visual merchandising was concerned.

Telling stories

Look at a John Lewis window today and it puts seasonality to the fore. For spring 2015, this has meant for the first time the team used mood boards to develop the windows. That enabled them to ensure visual merchandising consistency across the windows, website, its magazine and in-store.

It is about telling merchandise stories rather than product promotion, and is a world away from how things used to be.

Previously, the windows had to “reflect the shop”, says Bloomer. They still do, but the changes in-store have been as far-reaching in terms of the way a John Lewis looks and feels as they have in the windows, and the evolution of a new look is consistent across the whole.

The other point is that windows should be recognisably ‘corporate’ - in a good way. That means that the old test of removing the name from above the door should still mean that a shopper should be able to tell what is being looked at.

In the new John Lewis visual merchandising scheme of things this is probably the case. Over the period of some years there has been time for the refurbished interiors to bed down and for shoppers to get used to novelty.

“We want the customer experience to be the same in London as in Aberdeen”

Robb Bloomer, John Lewis


Porral says the move has been from “austerity” to “uncluttered”. Yet anyone familiar with the product-packed windows of the John Lewis Oxford Street flagship or Peter Jones at Christmas will have noticed that there was little that might be termed “uncluttered” .

That said, it wasn’t really the product in those displays that was the star, it was a penguin. Monty, the penguin in question, stole the show last Christmas and as star of screen, store and shop window, this was among the most perfectly integrated campaigns of the season.

Shoppers could, naturally, buy Monty-related merchandise, but the point was that shoppers were told a story at every retail touchpoint - something many believe is the essence of modern retailing.

Where, therefore is John Lewis headed? Porral comments: “It’s [John Lewis] probably closer to where our customers are now. We’re about to move into ‘Find your summer’.”

When it comes to shopper marketing, seasonality seems to be the new touchstone at John Lewis. Porral says that John Lewis has “all this amazing stuff to help you live your life”.

And as far as tech and visual merchandising are concerned Porral says: “We’ll always try new things. I’ve seen examples in other places, mostly touchscreens, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. We would never want tech to get in the way when it comes to communicating. It’s got to be something that is useful and which has a purpose.”

His words are revealing. In the old scheme of things there was a set way of doing things.

In 2015 John Lewis is open to new approaches and equally to local initiatives. The latter point remains limited, but it is certainly a shift.

Bloomer says: “We want the customer experience to be the same in London as in Aberdeen. You have to have some flagship stuff, but the feeling should be the same.”

He relates that the normal way of proceeding involves designing up to nine window displays and then customisation is conducted locally. Porrall explains: “It’s a magazine-like approach. It’s going back to what department stores are about.”

Retailers are generally fond of ‘journeys’ at the moment but frequently that equates to not a great deal of forward movement. But the transformation at John Lewis has been substantial. For this department store retailer 2014 was about celebrating its 150th birthday. In 2015, Porral says the feeling is more about “looking out”. It does indeed sound like a journey, and one that is far from over.