2016 Retail Design Expo

Retail Design Expo, Europe’s leading annual event for innovation and inspiration in retail design, visual merchandising and shop fitting returned to London on 9th and 10th March, with a huge boost in attendance from 12,000 last year to 15,452 visitors including retailers and brands. The event was held at London’s Olympia, co-located with RBTE and Retail Digital Signage Expo.

The event, which doubled in size for 2016, showcased 225 market-leading suppliers from global players to innovative smaller suppliers covering every aspect of the in-store journey.
Business leaders including Guy Smith, Head of Design, Arcadia; Andy Turnbull, Global Creative Principle, New Look; Alan Taylor, Head of Retail Design, B&Q; Tony Holdway, Creative and Marketing Director, BHS; Liz Silvester, Head of Visual Identity, Liberty and Stephen Dempsey, VM Concept Manager, John Lewis discussed a broad range of topics at the conference sessions run alongside the event covering the wide spectrum of retail design, branding and visual merchandising.

In addition to the extensive blue chip conference programmer and exhibitors there were a lot of new features on offer, including the Innovation Trail and Awards, sponsored by design agency 20.20, which helped visitors navigate the most cutting edge exhibitors; the Retail Design Student Awards, the inaugural VM Student Awards, the Designer Pavilion and the Retail Design and VM networking lounges. If that was not enough, trends expert Stylus were on hand, providing design and marketing insights to businesses looking for inspiration, innovation and best  practice case studies.