The course is designed from an overarching view of experience design for retail spaces. It therefore aims to set up processes and working methodologies that will become tools combining the different factors involved in a comprehensive process that leads to a 360º experience. From this starting point, the programme is divided in two areas, which together provide a coherent, overarching vision.

THEORETICAL AREA

Branding

Create a brand and position it in the mind of the user with solid, attractive, positive values. The brand is the principal and most important asset of any business model and its application in a retail space. Proper positioning is the basis for attracting users.

360º experience

Analysing the complete brand experience process will take us on a journey in which different tools must be organised so that the BEFORE, DURING and AFTER become one single coherent, solid driving force. To do this, the students must think beyond the formal structure of the retail space and from this understand what is happening in the BEFORE and AFTER of each experience.

Semiotics

Carrying out a semiotic analysis of the different objects studied will lead to a better ability to make the process interpretative and critical. Getting to know new mechanisms for structural analysis and communication model exercises is a key factor in interpreting the current brand scenario and the retail spaces. These days, a new challenge exists in which the need to take into account the values that make up each brand's products and services is forefront.

Design Management

Design management is the backbone of any experience in the 21st century. It explains logically and in detail the proper management of resources during all stages of the project. It is essential to understand the importance of creating clear, coherent, solid management processes. This makes it possible to meet every objective proposed in retail and industrial formalisation in an effective, viable, creative and innovative manner.

Omni-Channel Retail

The social context in which we live today is posing new challenges for brands and their part in the present-day market. Omni-presence tests the traceability of brands, from the offline world to the digital world, and every experience must be designed to have the adaptability and liquidity for each medium in which the brand idea will be publicised.

PRACTICAL AREA

Brand architecture

Each brand has a structure and a basic development that allow logical processes of expansion to be set. All the styles and ranges based on that brand can be traced back to it and at a later stage they will be reflected in all the peripheral evidence surrounding the brand experience. Within each architecture all the factors that graphically represent each brand converge. For this reason, it is essential to have the fluidity that will allow each brand to develop coherently in any format.

Peripheral evidence

Each part that makes up a brand universe exists because of the premise of its end use and its significant value to the end user. Peripheral evidence is the tangible result of the strategic development of branding and its function in the brand architecture. All peripheral evidence must fulfil a function at one of the three stages of the process (BEFORE-DURING-AFTER). The signs inside and outside the space, the business cards, the bags, the catalogues and every tangible graphical piece that may be created will be a piece of evidence that substantiates the brand values and therefore the experience.

Theatre-Stage-Actor

The brand experience is viewed from a complete 360º perspective, with a variety of formats and media being used to send a message. The particular case of a retail space must be interpreted using three fundamental concepts: theatre, stage and actor. These are the three premises that denote three variants in the space and give the experience a tangible life. During the summer, emphasis will be laid on developing these three areas, which converge in the strategic branding model as the driving force for the entire process of bringing about the desired experience in the retail space.

Service Design

In response to the challenges of the present-day market, service design is positioned as a highly effective tool for creating, developing and staging any innovative service. It includes all the tangible and intangible items that are needed to implement it, such as staff planning and management, infrastructure, communications, quality improvement, interaction between the service provider and the user of the service, and the user experience itself.

Role Playing

In order to evaluate and test the design of the experience, role playing sessions will be held, which will serve as a tool for turning the theory into practice.

Retail Tour of Barcelona

Mediterranean, warm and avant-garde. In the city of Barcelona, because of its good weather and street-oriented social life, businesses are part of the public space. The retail project starts in the street and pays attention to every detail that influences the decision to go into the business.

The retail landscape transmits the personality of the city on façades, outdoor signs and shop windows that are always in line with the latest trends, creativity and their own unique style.

The Retail Tour Experience in Barcelona will allow the students to experience the Mediterranean style in a city with a youthful, entrepreneurial spirit that opens its doors wide to show itself off.

FINAL PROJECT

During the course, all the theoretical classes, visits and workshops will be designed with a view to the completion of a final project, which may be linked with the pharmaceutical, catering or fashion sectors.

The final project will be the final test in which every participant will have to develop an experience design strategy that includes the main concepts that make up a 360º strategic environment and, therefore, the design of a brand experience in a retail space.