Kimberly Mui is excited about the future. A visual merchandising student at the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (LIM) in New York, Mui is in the midst of a five-month internship at Bulgari USA’s corporate offices. The senior, who will graduate in May, has been learning the retail business – especially how visual merchandising and other design disciplines support the retailers’ objectives.
“It has been eye-opening and encouraging,” says Mui, who has also had internships with Bottega Veneta (fashion accessories) and Fishs Eddy (tabletop) in New York and the House of Fraser department store in London, “to see the artistry – how we create the feelings that drive the shoppers’ buying decisions.”
But as much as she admires the artistry, she feels her generation’s big contribution to the profession will be technological. “We grew up comfortable with the computer,” she says. “At some of my internships, the visual managers were not as familiar with the production programs, like Photoshop, Illustrator and Quark. They turned to me to mock up the ideas they were presenting to vendors, merchandisers and other executives.”
Mui is hoping her skills will someday place her among the industry’s next rising stars. The current reigning one is Victor Johnson, director of visual presentation at Ann Taylor Stores and Ann Taylor Loft. He was recently named Rising Star of 2007 by The Planning and Visual Education Partnership (PAVE), an organization devoted to developing design and visual talent. Johnson acknowledges that the increasingly promotional aspect of apparel retailing – particularly the use of graphics – is changing visual merchandising. And he agrees with Mui that the critical new skill is computer graphics and drafting, skills Johnson admits he didn’t have when he got into the profession, after an education in interior design. By contrast, his staff has graphics training in abundance. And that’s what he looks for in filling new positions. “I spent six months interviewing for an assistant designer,” he says. “I needed a person who could do the computer work and help with the windows. It was difficult to find a person with both proficiencies.” He ended up hiring someone with the computer skills. “I decided it’s easier to train someone to do a vinyl rubdown than to teach Adobe Illustrator.”
They can be compatible skills, too. One assistant’s sole job had been to create “store sets” (the company’s term for planograms) on the computer, “until I needed her help with a window installation. She was able to look at the window as a computer screen in three dimensions.”
“I think that’s the biggest change for young people getting into this field,” says Eric Feigenbaum, a founding member of PAVE and vp and chairman of the education committee. “They need computer literacy for styling, drafting, rendering, logo design, typography. When I was at WalkerGroup more than 10 years ago, there were 50 drawing tables scattered around the studio. Today, they’re all computer stations.”
Young designers are learning those skills at specialized college programs. Previous generations often fell into the profession accidentally, perhaps because the local department stores needed part-time help for Christmas. But Mui and her peers come out of schools – like LIM, the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) in New York and FIDM/The Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in Los Angeles – having dressed mannequins, put window displays together, created merchandising campaigns and studied space planning.
“We have gone from an experience-based industry to a skills-based industry,” says Feigenbaum, a career retail designer who has taught at FIT and is now LIM’s program chair in visual merchandising. “It’s no longer ‘Where have you worked?’ but rather ‘What skills do you have?’ ”
Feigenbaum feels this next generation of designers will be prepared to create the new retail. “They’ll use what they know about space planning to implement open-format floor plans,” he says, “what they know about technology to produce cutting-edge, interactive selling environments; what they know about marketing to design customer-friendly stores that are easy to navigate; and what they’ve learned about computer graphics to generate those visual cues that communicate the allure and benefits of the merchandise.”
Today’s best curriculae also have internship programs for students. Mui got her opportunities through LIM. FIDM – with California campuses in Los Angeles, Irvine, San Francisco and San Diego – has helped students find part-time jobs, internships and real jobs with the likes of Nordstrom, Coach, Gucci, Forever 21 and Saks Fifth Ave. “There are paid summer internships and unpaid academic credit internships throughout the year,” says Cindy Patino, FIDM’s assistant department chair, visual communications, and advisor in the school’s career development center. “They learn the business of retail in the store.”
They also learn it in the classroom. LIM calls itself “the college for the business of fashion.” “At LIM, every student, regardless of major, takes Introduction to Visual Merchandising,” Feigenbaum says. “We want them to understand how visual is part of marketing and branding, how it helps a retailer define its message.”
Edward Sajovic, a recent LIM graduate, first completed the two-year display and exhibition design program at FIT. After studying drafting, computer graphics and space-planning – and doing a six-month internship at Bloomingdale’s – he went across town to LIM because it offered business classes. “You can be a great artist,” he says, “but you’ll never go as far as you want if you don’t understand the business side – marketing, consumer behavior, shopping habits, sourcing, budgeting, measuring the return on investment.”
Sajovic, who won an international reality TV competition on Canada’s “Making it Big” in 2006 by creating the best window display for a hypothetical Holt Renfrew fashion campaign, feels visual merchandising has advanced way beyond “art for art’s sake.” Budgets are leaner, stakes are higher, expectations are greater and retailers need results. “We need to create stores and presentations that make the customer want to stay in our space and become interested in our merchandise,” he says. “We’re solving problems for her, not simply propping a set piece.”
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