11 minute read
SUPPLIER NEWS
Italian fashion label Gucci has built a new digital destination called Gucci Town on Roblox, an online game platform and game creation system, to help visitors discover more about the House and its heritage. It will also feature the Gucci Shop—a boutique where visitors can purchase digital Gucci items to collect or to dress up their Roblox avatars.
The Town takes on the form of a piazza—an open-air square that for centuries has been a spot for people to meet and express themselves. Surrounding the central area is a series of spaces including Mini Game Heights, Vault Plaza, Creative Corner, Craftsmanship Court, Selfi e Way and Power-up Place, apart from the Gucci Shop.
Gucci Town will allow visitors to connect with like-minded individuals from all over the world, the company said on its website.
Brands like Gucci, Nike and Ralph Lauren have all released digital collections and limited-edition items through platforms like Roblox, a children’s gaming site that had 49.5 million daily active users spanning 180 countries in Q4 of 2021. During play, customizable avatars can now sport Polo beanies, carry Gucci Dionysus purses or wear the newest Nike sneakers. continued strength in sales of luxury goods. Our omni-channel ecosystem, which spans the value spectrum, has supported our ability to fl ex our wide assortment of categories, products and brands to capture consumer demand despite the volatile environment,” said Jeff Gennette, chairman and chief executive offi cer of Macy’s, Inc.
US retailer Macy’s comparable sales up 10.7% in Q1 FY22
US-based retailer Macy’s comparable sales were up 10.7 per cent in the fi rst quarter (Q1) of fi scal 2022 (FY22). Approximately 44.4 million active customers shopped the Macy’s brand, on a trailing twelve-month basis, which was a 14 per cent increase compared to the prior year.
“Our company delivered solid results in the fi rst quarter despite a challenging operating environment. We delivered strong earnings, beating our estimates, and sales that were in line with our expectations. While macroeconomic pressures on consumer spending increased during the quarter, our Emblemtek_Imprint_May-June-2022.pdf 1 05-03-2022 2:08 PMcustomers continued to shop. We saw a notable shift back to occasion-based apparel and in-store shopping, as well as
Gap’s sales fall 13 per cent to US$3.5 billion in Q1 FY22, Online sales drop 17 per cent
Net sales for American clothing retailer Gap in the fi rst quarter of 2022 were US$3.5 billion, down 13 per cent compared to last year. In the fi rst quarter, online sales declined 17 per cent compared to last year and represented 39 per cent of total net sales. Store sales declined 10 per cent compared to last year. “Our Q1 results and updated fi scal 2022 outlook primarily refl ect industry-wide headwinds as well as challenges at Old Navy that are impacting our near-term performance. While we are disappointed to deliver results below expectations, we are confi dent in our ability to navigate the headwinds and re-stabilise the Old Navy business in order to deliver continued progress on our long-term strategy,” said Sonia Syngal, CEO, Gap Inc. “We believe that we can navigate this period of acute disruption and build an even more resilient and agile company. We remain anchored by our belief in our iconic purpose-led brands – Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic, and Athleta – and are focused on making continued progress against our Power Plan strategy and getting back on track toward delivering growth, margin expansion, and value for our shareholders over the long term.” “We are revising our fi scal 2022 outlook to refl ect the impact of certain factors impacting our near-term performance, including execution challenges at Old Navy, an uncertain macro consumer environment, infl ationary cost headwinds, and a slowdown in China that is impacting Gap Brand,” said Katrina O’Connell, executive vice president and chief fi nancial offi cer, Gap Inc.
NEWS
1
HOW T-SHIRTS CAN WIN MORE CUSTOMERS CONTʼDPG 12
1
OLD THINKING WONʼT LEAD TO NEW IDEAS CONTʼD PG 6
4 8
SUPPLIER NEWS BOOSTING YOUR BUSINESS IN A SLOW ECONOMY 14 10 THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT CLOUD COMPUTING 18 BUSINESS PROFILE: ASD PROMO ADVERTISING
NEW PRODUCT SPOTLIGHTS
22 WEARABLES SHOWCASE 26 ADVERTISING SPECIALTY SHOWCASE 28 SUPPLIES & EQUIPMENT SHOWCASE
PUBLISHER
Tony Muccilli : tony@imprintcanada.com
PRODUCTION MANAGEMENT
Adriano Aldini : news@imprintcanada.com
CONTRIBUTORS
Adriano Aldini, Suzanne Tedrick, Susan Robertson, Je Mowatt,
MARKETING COORDINATOR
Steve Silva : feedback@imprintcanada.com
ADVERTISING SALES
Tony Muccilli (Toronto) Tel: (905) 856-2600 Fax: (905) 856-2667
Imprint Canada is published six times per year by Tristan Communications Ltd. e contents of this publication may not be reproduced either in part or in whole without the consent of the copyright owner. e views expressed in this publication are not necessarily those of the publisher. Request for missing issues are not accepted a er three months from the date of publication.
TRISTAN COMMUNICATIONS LTD. Publications mail agreement no. 40025740
Return undeliverable mail to: 190 Marycro Avenue, Unit 16, Woodbridge, Ontario, L4L 5Y2 Email: shows@imprintcanada.com
ISSN: 1480-1884 GST Registration #: RT892913294
The way you see the world should be the way the world sees you. That’s why Softstyle™ was made to not only elevate any design, regardless of printing technique — from DTG to screen printing to embroidery — but also be the softest, most comfortable collection we have to offer. Because we believe you should never sacrifice style for comfort. mygildan.ca
New Thinking, continued from Page 1
If you can’t physically get out of the o ce, then nd a way to get out metaphorically. Ask people to imagine how they would solve the problem-at-hand if they lived in Antarctica, or if viewed from the perspective of a submarine captain.
2. Bring outsiders in
Overtly invite other perspectives into your discovery and idea generation processes.
For example, for a project on new promotional ideas for a beverage company, invite a boat designer, a rain-water management expert, a sculptor, and a water-park designer (among others). Your project team will be amazed at the range and diversity of new ideas that come when they are exposed to new perspectives on their challenge. ey’ll think of ideas they’ll agree they never would have arrived at on their own, due to their own embedded assumptions about the topic.
3. Truly engage with your customers.
Don’t rely solely on second-hand data to understand your customers’ needs. You need to actually talk to them. Go to their o ces to see the problems they need solutions for.
Too o en, teams looking for an idea generation project will say, “We don’t need to do any discovery in advance because we already have ‘lots of data.’” is should always make you wary, because it usually means they have numerous reports with reams of statistics about customers. Unfortunately, it rarely means they have discovered any real new insight into customer needs.
It is unfortunately all too easy to simply approach every new challenge using our typical day to day thinking.
If you’re expecting your team to understand the customer by reading a deck or attending a Power Point presentation, challenge yourself to nd a more engaging and interactive process. It will be far more e ective to immerse your team in real customer understanding.
4. Question everything
Do some speci c exercises that force people to confront and challenge their subconscious assumptions about the topic. An easy way to do this is to rst ask for ideas that the team thinks would solve the problem, but they probably couldn’t implement for some reason. en, ask them to reframe each idea by saying “We might be able to implement this idea IF...” What comes behind the “if’s” will help surface a lot of assumptions people have that may or may not actually be barriers. Of course, some of the barriers will turn out to be real, in which case, don’t spend more time on those ideas. But in every case that I’ve ever done this with client teams, they also discover many supposed barriers that they could actually solve for.
5. Let some crazy in the room
e academic de nition of creative thinking is “the process of coming up with new and useful ideas”. e only way to get new ideas is to start with seemingly crazy ideas. Every truly innovative idea seems a little crazy at rst. If you only start with ideas that are comfortable or clearly easy to implement, they’re probably not very new.
So, encourage people to throw in extremely wild ideas. en, play a game called “If We Could.” Instruct the team to temporarily let go of the problems in the idea and ask “If we could implement this idea, what would be the bene t(s)?”
Once you have identi ed the bene ts of each crazy idea, narrow down to the most promising few and ask the team to look for possible solutions to the barriers.
A team was on the verge of killing a truly original idea for a new kids’ cereal, because they didn’t know how to create the critical component. However, a er “If We Could”, they agreed the idea was so interesting and unique that they needed to explore it. e R&D team made a few calls to other experts, and within a few weeks, they had solved it. is idea resulted in the most successful new product launch in the brand’s history!
It is unfortunately all too easy to simply approach every new challenge using our typical day to day thinking. It feels familiar, it’s easy to access that type of thinking, and it works on most daily challenges. So, you subconsciously assume it will work on any challenge. But it’s incredibly helpful to do some meta-analysis on your thinking (i.e. think about how you’re thinking).
Not every problem will bene t from the same type of thinking. Once you recognize that this new situation needs new thinking, it’s fairly easy to do some things to shi to a more productive mode for this particular challenge. en shi back to the more familiar day-to-day thinking for your daily tasks.
About the Author:
Susan Robertson empowers individuals, teams, and organizations to more nimbly adapt to change, by transforming thinking from “why we can’t” to “how might we?” She is a creative thinking expert with over 20 years of experience speaking and coaching in Fortune 500 companies. As an instructor on applied creativity at Harvard, Susan brings a scienti c foundation to enhancing human creativity. To learn more, please go to: https://susanrobertson.co/
One stop shop for your CUSTOM socks!
SPORT
CYCLING CLASSIC KNITTED SUBLIMATION
DTG 360 PACKAGING
Call us now for details or write to us for your FREE design. Your SOCKS... our PASSION! 800-350-4383 macaron@macaron.ca promomacaron.ca
