I’m convinced that whoever wrote the song about the lazy days of summer was not in the wholesale or retail gift business. Not in the United States, at least. The summer gift shows are in full swing and keeping the buyers and showroom staff and reps quite busy. I’ll be at the Orlando Gift Show on Sat., 8/6 and then off to New York for the NYIGF show that begins the following weekend. Watch for my Retail Details press badge and I hope you’ll stop me to say Hi. Scroll down for some fun news at the end of this blog post.
Summer Displays:
Oars are used as hang rails in this summer display at Periwinkle of Potomac Greens in Alexandria, VA. Suspended with boat rope, the oars are the right diameter for hangers and make a clever display in their swimwear area.
Porter Square Books is an independent bookstore in Cambridge, MA. They always do a nice job of creating displays around holidays and various themes, like gardening, movies or events like poetry month or graduation. They have several summer displays, one that features books about traveling around New England, which became a store event in June. Their “book it to the beach” display is complete with a sand castle and books for all ages.
Rice is a Danish homewares and accessories company, known best for their colorful melamine and storage solutions that are fun and functional. They sponsor store display contests for their retail customers worldwide. This company REALLY encourages creative retail visual merchandising and I will be featuring more of their stores in the future. This summer display is from the Rice Ting Bergen store in Norway. The mini-fridge is just the right size for the kids summer snack containers. It catches the eye by being painted bright green, inside and out.
This display at Hollies on the Avenue has a sophisticated, natural, beachy feel. Hollies is a specialty shop for gifts, home accents, and “surprises” in Barrington, RI, and caters to residents and visitors.
This scarf display is in the Lindsay Phillips area of the OneCoast showrooms. A rope ladder display can be a versatile piece for presenting merchandise. Neutral in color, it shows up well against a color wall, as shown here, but is not distracting. Another version are the rope ladders that are available at boat stores and bring a nautical theme to a summer display.
Some displays use props and some are products on traditional fixtures. At the Greenleaf Gifts showrooms in Atlanta and Dallas, they built some props out of their product.
They used sachet packets for the scent Velvet Woods, adding feathers to construct these colorful peacocks in their showroom windows. They turned out great and caused quite a buzz around the marts.
Stay display inspired!Becky Tyre is a Florida-based journalist, visual merchandising consultant and display designer. She writes about retail topics, blogging and visual merchandising for national and trade publications. You can read her most current articles in Gift Shop Magazine. She is the owner and writer of the Retail Details blog at www.SwirlMarketing.com You can reach Becky via email at SwirlMarketing@comcast.net
The floor of the store window at 
Father’s Day is not in June in Sweden, but we stumbled upon this menswear display window. The frames were filled with scrunched white fabric for a very interesting effect.
At the entrance to each store, a pedestal was placed with signage promoting the dandy theme. Atop each pedestal was a glass dome and each store created a vignette display featuring items from their store.
At their Brookhaven store in Georgia, 
This CUP OF TEA display is courtesy of 
The coincidence, you may ask? This display is from the 
This is the display mentioned in the letter. Thanks to Carolyne from 
Lisa and Danielle Kupsc wanted to have a boutique that mothers and daughters could both shop in and find things that are age appropriate. In 2009, they opened 
In October of 2010, Leah Papp and her mom opened a children’s consignment boutique in Martinsville, NJ. They decided to call their shop 
“It’s my mom! She’s totally cool, hilarious and just a blast to be around”, claims Corey DeRoo, the daughter part of the mother-daughter team who have owned 
In March of 2008, Diane and Meghan Ludwig opened 
Though the store is not open yet, Jessica Escalante is opening a women’s clothing and accessories boutique with her mother and aunt. They made the decision to start J. Luxe Boutique last November and immediately began a business plan, signed up for trade shows and started researching locations and product lines. Jessica always dreamed of owning a boutique. These pictures are taken before they started to renovate the space and Jessica and her Aunt Alma are seen holding the key on the day their retail journey really started. I thought it might be fun to follow their efforts as the store takes shape between now and their planned opening in July 2011.
I hope you had a nice Mother’s Day. Here’s one last Mother’s Day display to share. It comes from Ellen at 
