Giving customers the opportunity to brew their own tea in-store goes a long way towards accomplishing each of Adagio’s primary retail strategies; making tea accessible to the average consumer, and creating a sensory-rich and entertaining shopping experience. The challenge is to design a smooth process that minimizes waste and labor and maximizes the customer’s experience and satisfaction with the end product.

In Part 1 of this article I covered a few of the strategic elements that must be considered when designing a retail store. Part 2 described the objective of Adagio's move into physical retail stores. In this installment I'll share a number of tactical strategies that we've developed to create an environment so rich and compelling that all other tea shops seem boring in comparison. It's a lofty goal, but that's the point of having a dream!

In Part 1 of this three part series I covered a few of the strategic elements that must be considered when designing a retail store. In this installment I'll describe the objective of Adagio's move into physical retail stores. Our goal is to reinvent the tea shopping experience and create an environment so rich and compelling that...

For a consumer, the design of a retail store appears simple and straightforward. We quickly absorb thousands of pieces of sensory information and make a snap judgment on whether or not we "like" the store and its products. To properly understand this process and design a store that will welcome the customer, drive sales and run efficiently is anything but simple. In this article I'll attempt to describe a few of the key strategic elements to be considered when designing a retail store.

Can a store that offers great "Theater", or a tea buying experience that is incredibly rich, deliver an extra $100,000 in annual sales? Or do we just encourage the same customers to spend more time making the same number of purchases?