Telling a retail story: Will Macy’s new concept bring customers back?

As the boundaries between physical and digital retail continue to blur, retailers are either struggling or succeeding in moving to a unified shopping experience. Although there’s nothing new about the challenge of how to surprise and delight customers in-store, retailers are rethinking ways to draw customers to brick-and-mortar stores. 

Macy’s recently rolled out “the discovery-led, narrative experience of STORY”, which gives customers “a fresh reason to visit our stores” according to Macy’s CEO, Jeff Gennette. Their goal is to create a real-life version of scrolling through Instagram. The first installation, called “Colour” includes a curated products from brands like MAC Cosmetics and Crayola. 

According to Steve Dennis, strategic advisor and contributor to Forbes on retail, physical retail isn’t dead, but boring retail is. As the lines between digital and physical blur–and as consumer preferences evolve, retailers need to transform the customer experience to be more relevant and remarkable. 

In his recent Forbes article, Dennis points out: 

“Even if Story proved to be successful in its initial roll-out and gets scaled to most of the chain, it seems obvious that it will barely move the dial on financial performance or, more importantly, do much by itself to accelerate Macy’s move out of what I call the boring middle. “

Steve Dennis will be speaking at Store Conference on May 29, 2019. Find out more about STORE Conference and register to see and connect with retail industry leaders.