we want in: immersive experience.
As communicators, it is our job to create emotional connections in unique and memorable ways. Mostly to gain and retain loyalty among defined audiences by offering meaningful conversation but also to inspire. Be it inspiring ideas, inspiring joy, inspiring curiosity or simply inspiring a purchase, we are paid to keep brands (and ourselves) top of mind. What better way to do that than by creating an immersive experience? In it’s simplest terms, an immersive experience is the perception of being surrounded by – and being a part of – a different environment than our normal day to day.
With that, as an agency that is continually learning, we have been inspired by several immersive experience activations in the worlds of fashion, fitness, beauty and lifestyle. We thought we’d share more about 5 of our favorites at the moment in hopes that you’ll share others that have inspired you too.
COACH
Luxury fashion house Coach launched “Coach Airways” last week at Freeport A’Famosa Outlet, a popular shopping destination in Malacca. Coach Airways is a fully immersive multi-sensorial pop-up shop experience that is built inside a real aircraft, where customers can explore and shop an exclusively curated collection.
Spanning 4,198 square feet, the space references the ‘70s golden era of air travel, and features elements like a cockpit and galley as key photo moments, 3 shops & a Coach Café where customers can enjoy coffee and beverages. To celebrate the new pop-up experience, Coach has also released an exclusive Coach Airways collection featuring a selection of T-shirts, a passport leather case, a wheeled carry-on luggage bag, and field tote and travel accessories such as luggage tags, pouches and small wallets, printed with a limited-edition re-imagination of the house’s iconic Signature.
LULULEMON
Earlier this year, lululemon and its brand team hosted “The Align Legging Dupe Swap” immersive experience pop-up at Century City Mall in Los Angeles. If you didn’t know, the Align leggings are a major best-seller for the brand (and if you’ve ever worn them you know why). That said, they also run $98 a pair, so needless to likely say, consumer research proved that customers were looking for similar leggings at a lower cost. In fact, the hashtag #LululemonDupe has close to 190 million views on TikTok alone.
In response, the athletic wear gurus invited guests to swap out one pair of their “dupe” purchases for a brand-new pair of Align leggings, at no cost. This “dupe swap” is the first effort from a brand to actively turn attention from the less-expensive products to the original by giving product away for free. The result of this immersive practice? A sold-out experience, hours before opening on both days.
OUAI x DEDCOOL
Celebrity hairstylist and founder of OUAI and MANE Addicts (and one of our personal heroes), Jen Atkin has partnered with Dedcool in its journey to add a line of laundry detergents dubbed “Dedtergents” to their product offerings. OUAI is on board and is bringing its beloved Melrose Place fragrance to the Dedtergent game with a limited-edition Dedtergent scent. To promote this partnership, they enlisted the genius company, Pop Up Mob to bring the collaboration to the scents namesake street, Melrose Place and “the coolest block in America” Abbot Kinney in the most amazing way possible – a “perfectly pink flower truck”. A mobile food-turned-flower truck branded in all things OUAI x Dedcool where visitors were generously gifted a bouquet of flowers, product samples, cookies, rolls of quarters (since everyone in LA knows it’s nearly impossible to find a place with a washer and dryer at home) and stickers all wrapped up a OUAI tote. We’ve asked for samples to be sent our way already.
J. CREW
To celebrate its 40th anniversary, popular clothing retailer, J. Crew has launched a virtual immersive experience with the help of e-commerce experts Obsess. The 3D, shoppable experience is hosted in an online “beach house” featuring six unique rooms as well as a separate boathouse.
The “J. Crew Virtual Beach House” is a 360-degree celebration of the brands heritage featuring the colors, patterns, textures and media that have been recognized for the last 40 years. The experience enables shoppers to discover clothing, shoes and accessories in themed rooms with contextual merchandising that allows them to learn more about the products. For example, visitors can check out the Floral Room and shop for Made-in-Spain espadrilles after learning about the 14th-century origin of the shoe’s design. The Virtual Beach House also features beautiful imagery, a Cover Pop-Up Quiz and a multi-room, interactive scavenger hunt game. Very on-brand.
MAX
In honor of the premiere of Season 2, “And Just Like That” the Sex and the City reboot, MAX (formerly HBO Max) created the ultimate in immersive experiences by launching a four-day celebration taking place at a make-do pop-up of Carrie Bradshaw’s NYC brownstone apartment.
Visitors will be able to take a photo in front of Carrie’s iconic laptop by the window, look into her enviable closet that will house some of the ridiculous fashion from the show including bags, shoes and jewelry that are actually curated by the shows costume designers.
There is also an interactive Post-It wall (thanks, Berger), a gift shop and a Cosmopolitan bar. MAX is also launching an in-app campaign so that fans of the series can enjoy a collection page with favorite episodes and in-app exclusive extras.
Jennifer Maas from Variety was able to tour the experience and did an exceptional job of sharing everything and anything you may be curious to check out.
While these examples are specific to the kinds of clients we spend our time with, there are worlds of other brilliant activations happening all over. Interested in discussing how to host your own immersive experience? Email me at abby@abbyleighstudio.com