Rethinking your in-store experience with plainness and diversity: Milk Train, London

This famous cotton-candy ice cream store based in London banked on simplicity. Milk Train had already dabbled in pop-up stores in the past: it used to rely exclusively on these to sell its products on markets. Since it now must be seen on social media and attract more customers, the brand enlisted the help of design studio FormRoom to arrange its retail space. Their store is set in Covent Garden, London’s famous cultural and commercial neighborhood with a constant flow of tourists, 17th-century buildings and home-made products. All in all, this location is ideal given the city’s cosmopolitan and undeniable international flair.

Here, colors will be what catches your eye: both the inside and the exterior of the store are coated in plain white. The place resembles an old train station and train carriages thanks to the store’s numbered, pastel blue berths. You can also admire the split-flap display boards overhung right above the cashiers to display what is on sale. You can travel in all seasons of the year inside the store: its plain white background makes it possible for Milk Train to reinvent its visual identity on a constant basis with neon lights, inside arches decorated with flowers and fall-themed pieces that’ll please everyone and help stage unforgettable shoots. Visitors can even choose to forget filters for a while.

Milk Train indeed wants to be insta-friendly and seeks to innovate and seduce photographers by creating a dream-like space. Clouds are hanging from the ceiling and the store’s windows reflect this soft and peaceful atmosphere with the brand’s motto: “Ice cream makes you happy”. Milk Train also sells cotton-candy shaped ice creams that’ll delight foodies and bring awareness to the brand’s products. Food pictures make up 39% of all content posted on Instagram which amounts to 2 million posts yearly according to an Enov study. Conversely, only 11% of all Instagram users post pictures of the stores they visit.

Milk Train’s clients all sing the same song when they leave the store: the brand allows them to cross to another world and lends itself easily to ephemeral trends, but keeps its identity intact. Its sober and surrealist undertones generate many shares and likes. Milk Train managed to manifest a friendly, delicious and instagrammable setting starting from a minimalist look that they can play with visually. Its client experience brings in foodies, architecture aficionados and photographers on a quest for good travel pictures alike.

E-shopping boomed as new technologies emerged, but that is no cause to worry: the new public you may reach through Instagram can actually become a goldmine and help you rethink your in-store marketing strategy. Visual staging has become interactive and playful: your customers, rather than staying mere spectators or visitors in your stores, become keen and enthusiastic at the prospect of taking pictures and having them turn viral. It all starts with connected young Instagram users who neglect client experiences that are too transactional and turn to playful and unseen-before moments where they can surprise other people and be surprised themselves. It has become more important than ever before to keep tabs on visual marketing and its shift towards ephemeral and novel experiences. That is how you’ll be able to promote your brand and products to as many people as possible, both online and out there in your stores.