4 Shopping Capitals with Unique Holiday Pop-Ups
New York City, Berlin, London and Paris – These shopping meccas are offering unique and temporary holiday storefronts, making way for the new way of retail – the Pop-up.
Pop-up shops, agile retail, and flash sales, these keywords are being echoed globally in every retail corner. This new direction of retail is not exclusively tied down to any one location and is taking off in all major cities – and small towns alike! In the spirit of giving – comes gifts, and with gifts there has always been a significant sales strategy in the ‘Holidays’ for retailers. Temporary retail locations are the perfect way to capitalise on the holiday shopping foot traffic. Enter – the Holiday pop-up.
Some of the world’s shopping capitals are each in their own, the mecca of Holiday pop-ups. Whether holiday themed in nature, or simply making the most of the season for their non-seasonal product – these cities are taking the modern retail experience very seriously. New York City, Paris, London, and Berlin just to focus on a few, are already bursting with new and exciting pop-up shops, featuring unique and exclusive products, and enchanting experiences.
New York City
Radio City, The Rockettes, Rockefeller Skating, Fifth Avenue holiday window displays – this city is just a sparkling Christmas ornament by itself, offering experiences and wonders galore to locals and visitors throughout the holiday season. Being in New York during the holidays is like being in your own Hallmark Christmas Special, a surreal, magical place where wonderful things can happen. With this excitement, tradition and popularity come the people.
New York is all about the ‘experience’, and this year in NYC you can expect to see a variety of pop-up styles throughout the holidays. From the classic storefronts with consumer goods to experiential restaurants and bars sprinkled throughout the city, get ready for an exciting season ahead!
So who is on top of the NYC pop-up game?
Google Hardware Store – 131 Greene Street, NYC
Open in NYC and Chicago, Google popped-up a Hardware shop just in time for the holiday shopping rush. With the retail launch of several new Google products this internet giant has managed to take their business from digital to physical retail. Offering a unique user experience, workshops, and product displays this pop-up is really making the most of the temporary space.
Jingle Holiday Pop-up – Chelsea Market, 75 9th Avenue, NYC
In a 6,000 sq ft space inside Chelsea Market, New York accessory designer Jill Schwartz pieced together an all-that-is-christmas shop within 4 walls. From stocking stuffers to unique gifts, shoppers can enjoy the eclectic mix of offerings littering the Christmas themed pop-up location – all while listening to some carolers and enjoying a hot drink.
Berlin
Germany is all things Christmas around the Holidays, and German Christmas traditions have carried on all over the world – the advent calendar, mulled wine, the decorated Christmas tree, and of course Christmas markets.
Dating back to the 14th century, the German Christmas Market (Christkindlmarkt) is the original holiday pop-up location. Attracting small business owners, artisans, bakers, and more to an open air market (generally located in a town square), these retailers all capitalise on the holiday foot traffic. Fast forward 7 centuries and these markets are found all over Germany, Switzerland, Austria and many other countries, as this concept has been contagious. Opening their doors in the month of November, Christmas markets are the one stop shop for all things ‘Holiday’. Gift buying, experience, seasonal food and drink, and traditional music and dance, what better way to attract businesses and people for the biggest retail time frame of the year. Well today, we see more and more pop-up shop locations for the holidays, even stretching beyond the confines of the Christmas market itself and into the city streets.
Beyond the Christkindlmarkt
Amazon – The Home of Christmas – Kurfürstendamm, Berlin
Aligned with the beginning of advent and the opening of the Christmas markets, opens a brick-and-mortar shop front for the internet’s biggest retailer- Amazon. Tagging itself “Berlin’s Home of Christmas”, this shop aims to offer a one-stop-shop parallel to the traditional Christmas market, offering nearly 500 gifts including Amazon’s modern, tech savvy, household, and unique gift ideas. Hosting workshops with local influencers, this pop-up shop is a great example of agile omni-channel retailing, as it’s forward thinking and experiential.
ABURY x B Corp – Budapester Straße, Berlin
Fairtrade lifestyle brand Abury has a large online presence and offers a diverse selection of gifts for the ethical consumer. Living by their Christmas motto to ‘Use business as a force of good’ Abury is opening a Christmas Pop-up shop from November 1st to December 31st. This shop serves all, with gifts to suit every taste and style, while tapping into the trendy Scandinavian lifestyles like Hygge and Lagom, their products will make you look good, live good, and feel good doing it – a perfect gift to give.
London
Whether it’s hip Camden Market, delicious Borough Market, beautiful Covent Garden Market, trendy Greenwich Market, lively Brick Lane Market, or the dozens of Victorian Arcades city-wide – London has a long history with it’s marketplaces. Additionally with the likes of famous holiday window displays at Harrods, Selfridges, and Fortnum & Mason, Christmas shopping by foot is a long standing British holiday tradition.
The markets and arcades are home to hundreds of shops, coming together under one roof, protected from the dreary winter London rain. The pop-up scene all over London’s shopping districts is continuously growing and expanding, and with the classic Victorian Christmas ‘feels’ stemming from the iconic classic ‘A Christmas Carol’, London is simply buzzing with shoppers around the holidays – all hoping to experience a real Victorian Christmas.
This holiday season you will see London pop-ups from Carnaby to Camden, all serving a different consumer and audience, turning that old ‘Victorian Christmas’ into an unique and diverse shopping experience – bringing the world to London’s stoop in Christmas wrapping.
Proper London Pop-Ups
Choose Love – Carnaby Street, London
Choose Love coins itself as ‘The world’s first store that sells real products for refugees’. This shop aims to focus on the spirit of giving that comes hand in hand with Christmas. Uniquely allowing their consumers to buy a positive feeling, Choose Love strategically placed themselves amongst a heavy holiday shopping traffic area. This pop-up is selling products specifically for refugees, with every product purchased going to someone in need. The products range from sleeping bags, hot food, children’s coats, tents, school supplies and even rent. The perfect gift for your loved ones and someone in need, truly embodying what Christmas is all about.
Notonthehighstreet – Westfield London | Waterloo Station, London
Previously the envy of traditional brick-and-mortar shops, online-only retailers were skillfully avoiding the cost of a shop-front, while still making a profit from the holiday season. This mindset changes as a physical shops can make up for the shortcomings of e-commerce when it comes to customer feedback, customer service and handling returns. Notonthehighstreet is an exclusive gift shopping center, known for their offering of customized and thoughtful gift selection for every member of the family. And this holiday season, this online retailer is temporarily offering a buy-and-go experience, allowing their loyal fans and new customers to browse and buy their thoughtful gifts and take them home right away.
Paris
Paris is always known as a spectacular and beautiful sight to see, but during Christmas, this ‘City of Light’ shines brighter in celebration of the holiday season. Illuminated from Sacre Coeur to the famous Avenue des Champs-Élysées. Paris, no matter the season is known for quite a few things: the romance, the lifestyle, the food, the fashion, and of course the joie-de-vivre, but the holidays remain something special in this glittering city.
By maintaining its classic architecture, this city’s storefronts can make any display appear magical, no matter the season. But with additional lights to an already mysterious and glowing city, the magic of Christmas and the holiday shopping scene in this picturesque metropolis is certainly something to write about. On the topic of holiday magic, it’s important to note that Paris’s pop-up shops are nothing short of spectacular. For young and old alike, these Parisian holiday spectacles will leave you feeling like a child on Christmas morning. With a vibrant pop-up scene unlike any other, we are continuously impressed with the magic Paris endlessly brings to it’s streets – especially for Christmas.
La magie de Noël!
Mary Poppins Returns – 52 rue Rivoli, Paris
54 years later, and she’s back! The Disney Classic makes it’s return for new generations to experience and older ones to walk down memory lane. The magic Mary Poppins instills in all is entirely appropriate for a Holiday release date, and to promote the new flick, Disney has opened a Poppin’s themed Pop-up in Paris – now there is a mouthful. Filled with magical gifts like the famous ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’ shirts, and mischievous toys, it is the perfect place to find a unique and magical gift – while enjoying the shopping time as well!
Harry Potter Pop-Up – Galeries Lafayette
Let magic roam the streets of Paris this holiday season, as the Galeries Lafayette is fitted with yet another magical pop-up – the Harry Potter Pop-up Shop. Filled with all of your classic HP favourites, this shop takes the magic of Paris, and the wizardry of London into one shop. Find magical goodies for everyone on your list, and enjoy all the classic Christmas gifts one is seeking such as: Chocolates (well.. Frogs, covered in chocolate), Christmas trees (well.. whittled into wands), Jelly beans (although they may be ear wax flavoured) and obviously a winter scarf (from Gryffindor of course). Ok.. we’ll admit these might not be for everyone on your list – but if you know a ‘Potter-head’ (and we all do) then this is the perfect magical shopping experience for you.