What is it?

Ted Baker has launched a new advertising campaign for its spring 2017 range called Keeping Up with the Bakers, based around a fictional family living in a 1950s-styled suburbia.

The campaign has various elements, including its centerpiece 360 degree shoppable advert created with the help of Happy Finish, available for desktop, smartphone and tablet.

Alongside this, the retailer has introduced interactive window displays at its flagship London store in Regent Street, congruent with the Baker family theme and offering shoppers the opportunity to “nose around” their lives.

A “sitcom” was also introduced, running for eight episodes on Instagram, which introduces customers to the family and their scandalous life in the form of a stylised retro American TV show.

How does it work?

360 degree shoppable advert

Customers are presented with various digital scenes which they can interact with in various ways, as well as using their device to look and move around.

In each scene there are moving images which could be the milkman popping his head out of the bedroom cupboard, or one of the Bakers’ children running past.

Alongside this there are various icons which allow customers to zoom in on characters far away, interact with certain items in the scene like turning on the TV, purchase the outfit a character is wearing, or move to a different scene.

On desktop, the mouse is used to drag the view around the 360 degree spaces, but on devices this is done by simply moving around, allowing for the Google Cardboard compatability.

Interactive Window displays

The flagship store‘s main window presents a scene from the Bakers’ life, with two window-shaped digital screens in the background.

If a passerby places their hands in the correct place and peers through the shop window, a photo is taken of their face which then pops up in the digital windows, shooting green beams out of their eyes.

The window display in Ted Baker Regent Street

How well does it work?

360 degree shoppable advert

The application runs at varying degrees of success. On desktop it wasn‘t especially intuitive to the mouse, and if you are viewing the video on Youtube, the mouse often pauses the video when you‘re trying to move around. Our experience was slow and jumpy, but this is likely to change depending on your system and internet connection.

Despite this, it really comes into its own when used with a mobile device. Having the ability to seamlessly look around the scene without having to drag the mouse made the experience much more enjoyable and immersive. Although there were a few speed issues, this did not dettract from the ability to navigate scenes and shop items with ease.

Although it is keeping with the retro sitcom feel, the theme song soon became tiresome and is played on a loop, but it can be muted.

Glitches like this were common, but short lived if you move around

Interactive Window displays

The webcam was incredibly intuitive, although people were hanging around the shop front and sometimes leaning on the window display, it never once took an accidental picture.

The photos are clear and the images don‘t look out of place when they appear on the window.

After your photo is taken, it will appear in the window and shoot green beams from your eyes  

Should I try it?

Both of these experiences are immersive and generally work well. Any shopper passing Regent Street will find brief but satisfying fun in the interactive window displays.

As for the shoppable advert, it succeeds in displaying the brand’s latest range in an interesting and adventurous fashion, even if it still suffers from a few technical bugs.

Anyone interested in Ted Baker, virtual reality or the future of retail marketing should definitely try it for themselves.

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