The past two days, London hosted the In Store Marketing show. 5 years ago, I exhibited with Inspired Signage and we were clearly far too eager. At the time we were the only ones showcasing digital signage solutions, let alone having a plasma screen on the stand.
Well, it was clear from the past two days that we are definitely getting greater mind share in this sector. Firstly, there were at least 5 digital signage integrators/vendors with a direct presence. Scala had 2 Platinum partners exhibiting, Stratacache were there, as were Comqi, via their dealer MediaZest. Really interesting, was to see Saville Audio Visual there, who are historically an AV integrator, but a very big and high quality one by UK standards; and when we chatted, they said they had over the past 12 months found themselves doing more and more retail, even though their heritage has been Corporates, MOD and others. Great to see a traditional AV focused dealer embracing the challenge that digital signage brings.
Two Platinum Scala partners were showcasing some great stuff including the Beaver Group with their client solutions for Burger King, Whitbread Group and Showcase Cinemas. The highlight for me was seeing the Scala wayfinder that is being deployed throughout Canary Wharf, on display.
Pixel Inspiration had a great stand too and were showcasing recent solutions delivered for American Express and Links of London, as well as control of Scala from an iPad. My highlight though was seeing the HP AP5000 EPOS terminal integrated with Scala on its ten inch customer facing screen.
In summary it is great to see the Retail sector showing real interest and not surprisingly sharing a lot of hard luck stories about how they got it wrong first time around. The positive of that of course is that they now know it is far more expensive not to get it right the first time out! Learn from their mistakes and don’t try and cut corners if you are looking at this for the first time.
Damon Crowhurst
Senior Director, EMEA