Making a licensed brand tangible

Making your brand “touchable”, offering a branded experience, showing your whole product range, has become an important tool for manufacturers and marketers.
Mono-Brand- and Flagship-Stores have changed the retail landscape. It makes almost no difference which shopping street in the world you walk, the stores are very much alike.

Most car manufacturers have created visitors centers, are offering factory tours and some have created whole theme parks. A museum is a must already. Where would Disney be without its theme parks? Lego followed suit and many others.
An additional trend of recent years are hotels. Quite a few fashion brands have opened – mostly licensed – hotels.
 
Laura Ashley is now following that route starting its ‘brand showcase’ hotel. As a licensed brand with roots in home decor that makes perfect sense.
In hotels your customers can view, touch, experience and shop your brand.

Laura Ashley has bought a hotel in Hertfordshire, hoping to turn it into an attraction for Laura Ashley fans. The rooms will be furnished and decorated with Laura Ashley beds, sofa, wallpaper and curtains.

A location like this is an ideal setting for company meeting, licensee conferences, sales clinics and employee training. It also functions as R&D center and consumer research facility.