Ambiente 2019 To Display Interaction Between Analogue and Digital in Special Point of Experience Exhibit

Success for high street retailers – made simple with state-of-the-art technology

For quite a while now customers have been expecting more from shops than the provision and presentation of products. Good customer service requires perfect interaction between analogue and digital. Ambiente, the world's leading trade fair for the consumer goods industry, is holding a special presentation called Point of Experience for the second year running. The show will demonstrate how analogue and digital will eventually be combined in the world of shopping.

The special presentation Point of Experience has been planned by Design- und Realisierungsbüro Gruschwitz GmbH together with the consultancy firm Waketo GmbH. It will take place in Hall 4.1, where it will demonstrate a hands-on customer journey of the future. Giving a clear, practical example, the presentation will demonstrate a full-scale shop design that can be touched and tried out. It will show retailers how they can successfully adopt a multi-channel approach, how they can make the most of it and how this can help them keep up with web-based companies. The focus will be on customisation and advice for customers, but from a totally new, digital perspective. The presentation, which is set up to look like a marketplace, will demonstrate how augmented reality, barcode scanning and touch modules can enhance high street shops and inspire shoppers on the emotional level. The new Customiser personalises shopping, putting together whole product worlds for each type of customer. One highlight will be the Thinking Hub, with its workshops and presentations on the various topics.

“Our philosophy is not to digitise unless there is a real need. We only want to use digital tools and digital enhancements if they create added value for the customer – in other words, if they generate some additional benefit. The consumer of the future will still want to handle things and see what they feel like. However, they will also be interested in unlimited variety and in getting the perfect product at the right time. These are precisely the ideas we use, for instance, when we customise a product through interaction between touch and feel, on the one hand, and digital, on the other,” says Nikolai Gruschwitz, CEO of Waketo GmbH, a traditional company based in Munich. To implement these ideas, it is now the second time that the special Ambiente exhibition Point of Experience will be set up by Waketo GmbH, emphasising the interplay between online and offline. 

New and improved

The shop-in-shop idea has been further developed with the use of touch tables. Shoppers can touch and feel real products in the shop, while a tablet enables them to explore whole product worlds via NFC tagging. Scanning a barcode activates a video on the Wall of Emotions, providing the viewer with information about the selected product. If, for instance, a customer scans a bottle of wine, they will receive recommendations from a wine expert, and if they scan a frying pan, they get some fascinating cooking tips.

The Customiser makes use of RFID technology. The purpose is not to select a specific product, but to compile a combination of everything that goes on the table. Shoppers select different products which then form the basis for the entire combination of dining items. They can subsequently customise those items by selecting specific materials, patterns, colours and textures. 

The Augmented Living section of the Point of Experience, for instance, shows how a real set table can be further enhanced and decorated, using various digital utensils. In this way, a shopper can test and review products before buying them. All they need is a tablet computer in the comfort of their own home.

Ambiente will be held from 8 to 12 February 2019.