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Should Disney Use Pop-Up Stores?

We saw Disney Stores rise, expand rapidly, shrink, be sold off, and then reacquired by the Walt Disney Company, and recently it was announced that the stores would get a major overhaul. And bargain hunters have been happy to frequent “permanent” Disney discount outlet stores in their local shopping centers. But now there is something else happening out there, aided by the glut of empty store spaces in shopping centers – the intentionally temporary “pop-up” store. Here is a Los Angeles Times article by Andrea Chang discussing this trend.

Temporary Halloween stores have been using this tactic for years. But is it time for Disney to use it? Regular Disney Stores would be permanent in high-use markets, but Disney could use pop-up stores to augment the company’s reach.

I’m thinking it could be used to promote major film releases, and sell associated merchandise. It could also be used if a company tour of some sort comes to town – a concert by a Disney singer, for example. The big stumbling block I see is staffing – making sure any cast members would be good representatives of Disney.

What do you think?

(John here: A couple companies that specialize in moving clearance Disney theme park merchandise also do the pop-up store thing. It’s worked pretty well for them.)

5 thoughts on “Should Disney Use Pop-Up Stores?”

  1. I think people that did not know this would see Disney opening a store then closing it. Getting people’s hopes up and then crushing them when they close the store. They have already done enough hurting when they closed all those stores. They also ruined the buying in the theme park feeling now that anyone can get the stuff online. So in my opinion leave everything the way it is.

  2. I wonder if Disney could do it via a large tour bus sort of thing. It could be done up really nice and move from place to place. It would probably be easier for crowd flow and liability reasons to not let the guests onto the bus, but rather to have attachements to the bus/tents that create a walk-up display/selling area.

  3. Not a bus, but an 18-wheel tractor trailer, just like they use in NASCAR and it could be themed like Cars with some Living Character Initiative interactive participatory activities. If nothing else make a good experiential marketing road show and retail event for the next Cars movie.

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