Jaguar Land Rover has become the latest car brand to join Rockar’s pioneering approach to automotive sales, opening a new digital showroom designed by us. Launching today at Westfield, Stratford City, this is the third Rockar store we’ve developed, and the first for Jaguar Land Rover. It follows successful retail experiences launched for Hyundai in Bluewater and Westfield Stratford in 2014/2015.

Rockar’s customer-first concept – which demystifies car buying through seamless multichannel retail, placing ‘showrooms’ in central shopping hubs and digital click-to-buy websites – has been evolved and elevated to fit the luxury positioning of Jaguar Land Rover, while accommodating and differentiating the two unique brands side-by-side. Our designers worked with existing Jaguar Land Rover global guidelines – colour palette, design values and visual merchandising – and incorporated these with Rockar’s signature experience: intimate, easy, engaging and accessible. The strategy is set to attract a wider brand and technology-focused customer base, introducing these brands to busy shopping centres alongside some of the best-known fashion brands in Europe.

The store’s design is inspired by its setting, with the store window serving as a dynamic point-of-sale akin to a fashion brand, with constantly changing displays and content to create engagement with Westfield visitors. Open and welcoming, the storefront features grey alucobond cladding and utilises the full height available, while the front window bed is covered by a lifting digital screen offering 24/7 retail theatre to the façade.

The store is defined by four zones, tailored to different stages of the customer journey. The first acts as a gallery-style ‘white box’, displaying a regular rotation of cars to attract passers-by. The next phase, entered through a walnut wood archway, is the ‘create’ space, which has a more intimate feel geared towards browsing and consultation. Lighting focuses on colour and material samples that line the tables and walls, helping to simplify the selection of bespoke finishes. At the rear is an open, minimal space designed to ‘educate’ and inform’, where digital screens play information-led content on car benefits and specifications. There are also discreet consultation lounges, enabling customers to discuss their purchases in comfort.

The layout helps manage multiple customer needs – catering to both fast and slow journeys, and creating opportunities to leverage the ownership experience. Inherently flexible, the space has sliding walls that open up behind-the-scenes areas in the perimeter and mezzanine, designed as blank canvases ideal for hosting large events, such as private viewings and VIP launches.

With a total of 40 screens around the store, all communications are digital, conveying individual model stories and benefits as well as the unique Rockar proposition. As with the Hyundai stores, a team of Rockar Angels is on hand to offer relaxed advice and guidance to shoppers without the pressure to make a purchase. Reflecting this role of helping, rather than selling, the Angels are paid a salary rather than commission.

The Rockar Jaguar Land Rover experience is completed by a test drive and handover centre in the nearby car park, in keeping with the main store’s aesthetic and the full Rockar web proposition – making this the first luxury automotive brand to offer complete online purchasing.