Once You Pop, You Can't Stop

Temporary stores are popping-up in cities around the country, then disappearing before they can become too passé. They’re called “pop-up stores”, in fact, and according to The Economist’s business page, they thrive on shock value:

Pop-ups arrive unannounced in empty storefronts or public spaces and leave just as quickly. Their aim, says Eduardo Braniff of Imagination USA, which does “experiential” marketing, is to “intervene in a consumer’s life” and take people by surprise.

For example, Target held a 3-day pop-up “Bullseye Bazaar” in a former museum in Chicago. Writer Brian Quinton describes the event on the Big Fat Marketing Blog. He says the sale took up two floors of the Tribune Tower Building, attracting foot traffic with a wide range of Target products spread-out at booths, like an old-timey marketplace.

But it sounds like pop-up stores can take various shapes. The Economist has other examples:

Daffy’s, a discount retailer not usually known for its choice zip code, opened a pop-up in Manhattan’s chic West Village this week on the ground floor of an apartment building that had been tenantless. Hermes, Gucci and Brooks Brothers, all luxury retailers, have opened temporary shops in East Hampton this summer. Their leases are only a few months long, just enough to ride out the peak season.

Even though marketers have been experimenting with pop-up stores for the past half-decade or so, current low rent prices are fueling the trend. And, of course, the free media attention that these things generate can be better than advertising.

(Photo by yuan2003 via Flickr/Creative Commons)