DIEGO ASSIS
LOCAL REPORTER
Sao Paulo, Brasil

What is crucial for a store to sell its products? Advertising? Planned arrangement, so that shirts lead you to ties, which lead you to belts, which lead you to shoes, which lead you to socks…?
Ron Pompei, 57, American architect who has recently worked for store chains such as Levi’s, Urban Outfitters, and Anthropologie (a sophisticated furniture and female apparel store), does not agree with either statement. He believes the secret is giving consumers some freedom.
Combining psychology, anthropology, arts, architecture, and design, Pompei has been attacking current marketing commandments for treating consumers like “homogeneous dumb people.” He believes in a more "visceral" space arrangement, so that consumers can relate and identify themselves with the place.
For example, a woman who walks into the Anthropologie store in SoHo, New York, won’t only browse through tens of dresses, furniture items, and gadgets that have been randomly arranged throughout the store. According to Pompei’s view, she will smell, touch, and create different stories for each object —whether or not they are for sale. In a nutshell, she’ll experience the store as a whole.
Besides being Pompei’s personal belief, this proposal is aligned with a phenomenon described in the book The Cultural Creatives, by sociologist Paul H. Ray. Represented by 50 million people in the United States alone, this group is composed of 40-something-year-olds whose main concerns include the environment, foreign cultures, idealism, and authenticity. "In general, ‘cultural creatives' are the third political force, because ‘right’ or ‘left’ are not enough to describe them,” he explains.
Composed of elements from ancestral cultures (Mayans, Greeks, aborigines) or objects from the last century, the spaces designed by Pompei try to give women in this age group a “sense of adventure and exploration.”
And it really works. In the last five years, Anthropologie grew 40% per year. The chain was founded in 1992 and today there are 35 stores throughout the United States, all of them designed according to the specific characteristics of its local community. “It’s like an oasis in the urban area, a place people like to go in and walk around. The more time they have to interact with the place, the more possibilities there are for them to take something home and make it part of their lives,” the architect says. He has been asked by different clients to promote similar “transformations,” including Discovery Channel, California Academy of Sciences, and Fortune magazine, for which he created the Fortune 500 environment that brings together the hottest companies in the world.
This Thursday, Pompei will attend the “Architecture and Globalization” conference in Campinas. He was invited by psychoanalyst Jorge Forbes. Before proceeding to the transcript of his interview by phone with Folha, here’s one more highlight of his career: after being transformed by his agency, Pompei A.D., the youth clothing chain Urban Outfitters grew 313% in the first quarter of 2002 when compared to the same term in the previous year. The store didn’t spend one single cent in advertising.
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Folha – What was your inspiration to work with Anthropologie stores?

Ron Pompei – I’ve always been interested in sociology, anthropology, and archeology. I’ve traveled a lot to learn about different cultures, including Sri Lanka temples, Cambodia, the Yucatán peninsula, and Greece. What I felt when I visited these places is that the experience I was going through was what really mattered. I was experiencing a specific place that had a visceral immediate history I could touch. It wasn’t abstract, something designed and planned. A story was being told while I was walking around the place. That’s when I realized I had to create very meaningful spaces, like a sculpture, but that would also be classified as architecture. Architecture embraces you. It is important to see how a space can change your mood with elements that excite your imagination.

Folha – How do you contrast this trend as opposed to currently popular space designs?

Pompei – What happens in many stores is that aisles are arranged in straight lines, like a Cartesian grid. I never do that. You don’t have to walk through a predicted path within a space. You can find your own path. The reason why people like Anthropologie is that it stimulates your imagination in a way that they feel connected to different elements in their own way. Despite the variety of textures, everything is consistent, like tapestry. People connect the dots according to their own interests. They apply their imagination to the space and become the authors of their own experience.
Folha – Experience is a common expression being used in marketing nowadays…

Pompei – It is the hottest word right now! It’s really a shame, because these words end up losing their meaning. The only way to keep your feet on the ground is making your visitor’s experience a priority over your own message. If you create an authentic experience that is relevant for somebody, you’re doing your job. In the end, this is more powerful than hammering messages like “Hey, this is a true experience!” McDonald’s is trying to tell you that they food is good for you, but that guy on ‘Super Size-Me’ gained 25 pounds in a month! When they talk about experience, they’re only using it as another marketing word. You have to walk in your customers shoes, try to make them relate to you before you try to find out their motivation. Most people in the business world are analytical, gathering numbers and creating spreadsheets, instead of wondering what real experience they want to offer. Everything is logistical and operational.
Some places are great for the merchandise, but horrible for consumers. There’s not enough space to embrace humanity, but there's always some space to stock up. If you go to an American grocery store, you’ll find 40 different brands of toothpaste. I don’t need 40 different brands! Please tell me what are the best 12 and I’ll choose one.

Folha – How important is it to know the local culture and learn what consumers want?

Pompei – The concepts of corporate identity and brand recognition are very limited. We can see 10,000 different shades of green, but we can still identify a tree. Companies believe their brands must keep the same color scheme wherever they do business, otherwise their brand won’t be recognized. They are saying basically consumers are stupid, as if you wouldn‘t recognize me if I wore a black jacket today and a different jacket tomorrow. We like nuances, subtleties, things that make life interesting. If you’re in Seattle, you’ll feel different from someone living in South Beach, Florida. Marketing people think about the market as something beyond themselves. They’re always wondering what consumers want as if they were not consumers themselves. People always ask me what the next new trend will be and I say, “What do YOU like? Maybe that will be the next hot trend.” People should do things for themselves, so others who share the same values could jump in the same bandwagon.

Folha – And, in your opinion, what are these values?

Pompei – I appreciate culture, but other people may like sciences, history, I don’t know. Times changed a lot since mass communications first appeared. There are many things to approach, people demanding more corporate transparency. California lost 9 billion with Enron. Since September 11, human blood became more valuable. People don’t want something abstract and cold. They want something warm, safe, realistic. Their families are more valuable to them now.

QUOTE

“In many stores aisles are arranged in straight lines. I never do that. You don’t have to walk through a predicted path within a space. You can find your own path.”

Ron Pompei