Selfridges turns to BrightSign™ players for Denim Studio launch
Cambridge, UK, 2 July 2013. Selfridges, one of the world’s best-known department stores, is using BrightSign solid state players to help launch the world's biggest denim store at its flagship location in London’s Oxford Street. It has devoted four prime shop windows entirely to the digital signage, which features a number of different size Samsung screens powered by BrightSign XD230 players. BrightSign products are supplied to Freehand by UK distributor Pixels and deliver content created by Freehand.
The new Denim Studio at Selfridges London is the ultimate destination for denim lovers covering 26,000 sq. feet, stocking 60 brands and staffed by 50 denim experts. It offers thousands of styles and hundreds of exclusives from £11 to £11,000, from Paige's' diamond-encrusted skinnies to J Brand's' Little Black Jeans. Denim Exclusives is an event to mark the launch of the studio, and includes displays in four of the store’s renowned Oxford Street windows.
BrightSign solid state players used in the Denim Exclusives event are powering the screens in four of the most prominent windows in the Oxford Street’s best known department store. Its most prominent window, on the corner of Oxford Street and Orchard Street, has been converted into a photographic studio featuring eight screens driven by BrightSign players. Two further windows incorporate a mixture of portrait and landscape screens delivering a live feed from Instagram showing customers wearing their own favourite denims. A final window has a looped time-lapse video. A ticker tape based on an RSS feed of Selfridges own content is also a feature of the displays. Freehand conceived and implemented all of the screen-based content for the event. Selfridges owns eight BrightSign players supplied by Pixels which are used regularly in its windows for sales events. Additional BrightSign XD230 players were rented from Freehand.
Selfridges has reported that it has seen sales in the denim category grow by more than 50% over the past four years, prompting it to launch an expansion plan two years ago. This has led to the opening of the Denim Studio following an investment well in excess of £6M. It is now five times bigger than the previous denim department, with double the number of brands. Selfridges expects to sell nearly two pairs of jeans every minute during its daily trading hours, and to do that it needs to engage customers and provide them with an interactive, fun experience. Freehand’s concept of using the BrightSign players to allow users to display their own content in Oxford Street windows is a first for Selfridges, and is right in line with Selfridges strategy of engaging with its audience.
Commenting on their decision to use BrightSign players, Mike Fabian of Freehand said, “Selfridges Oxford Street store front is one of the best known in London. For this application, BrightSign players are the obvious choice, delivering crisp Full HD playback, reliably and daily, for years on end without fail. BrightAuthor and the BrightSign Network make it easy to generate new content for the players, schedule playback and update as required. BrightSign players provide a flexible and utterly reliable solution that is low cost and easy to work with. Pixels, our UK distributor, is a long term partner for Freehand, and their support is outstanding.”
Pierre Gillet, VP Europe at BrightSign added, “Engagement is key to appeal to the 21st century consumer, and we are excited that a leading UK integrator such as Freehand has selected BrightSign players for this project for Selfridges, one of the world’s landmark department stores. Selfridges has been voted Best Department Store in the World in the Global Department Store Summit, two years running. They are renowned for their innovative window displays and we are proud that our solid state players have been chosen for use in their flagship Oxford Street store. We congratulate Freehand and Pixels on their outstanding work.”
About Freehand
Freehand Limited was established in 1986 by Chris Wright providing high-end "computer-graphic based solutions for graphic design. Over the past 26 years our product range and focus has changed dramatically as Freehand is always at the "bleeding" edge of technology. The company has gone from strength to strength, driven by technical insight and the desire to deliver high-value solutions which achieve optimum results for our clients. For more information, please visit: http://www.freehand.co.uk/
About Pixels
Pixels specialises in supplying HD and standard definition digital media players and visual display technology for the digital signage, professional AV, presentation, broadcast and information display markets. Pixels is an authorised distributor for BrightSign and has been supplying and supporting BrightSign’s products to the UK and European markets since 2009. www.pixels.uk.com Call +44-1582-515253 Contact: Norman Garland: ngarland@pixels.uk.com
About BrightSign
BrightSign, LLC, is the market leader in digital signage players. Based in Los Gatos, California, the company develops products, software and networking solutions for digital signage. BrightSign solid-state digital sign controllers set new standards for both stand-alone and networked digital signage applications with their superior video quality, reliability, affordability, ease of use and interactivity. Online information about BrightSign units is available at www.brightsign.biz.
For US sales inquiries, please contact sales@brightsign.biz or call +1-408-852-9263. For European sales inquiries, please email Pierre Gillet: pgillet@brightsign.biz or call +44-1223-911842. Follow BrightSign at http://twitter.com/brightsign and https://www.facebook.com/BrightSignLLC.
BrightSign and the BrightSign logo are registered trademarks of BrightSign, LLC in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. Specifications subject to change without notice.
Press Contact:
Elaine Hodson
Neesham Public Relations
Tel: +44 (0) 1296 628180
Email: elaineh@neesham.co.uk
Photo captions:
Image 1: Selfridges, one of the world’s best-known department stores, is using BrightSign solid state players to help launch the world's biggest denim store at its flagship location in London’s Oxford Street
Image 2: Freehand’s concept of using the BrightSign players to allow users to display their own content in Oxford Street windows is a first for Selfridges, and is right in line with Selfridges strategy of engaging with its audience
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