Intergalactic flagship anybody?

There seems to be something of an arms race when it comes to naming a store at the moment. For a while we were happy with flagships. There was usually just one of these for each chain. Then, a few years back, New Look came up with the idea of “Brand Flags”. The translation for this was a big store - one that would act as a standard bearer for a retailer within a given regional market and meaning that multiple ‘flagships’ could be excused.

Not a bad idea really, but insufficient it would appear. Nowadays the notion of the “global flagship” seems to have gained currency. These are rare beasts and tend to be found in ‘world’ cities - so it is little surprise that New York’s Fifth Avenue has at least two of them, courtesy of Uniqlo and, since last week, Zara. These really are impressive structures - bigger, better ranged and with keynote architectural features of the kind that mark them out as being different from the rest of the common or garden flagship herd. There is an argument that global flagships act as aspirational stores for visitors from around the world and that they will be an automatic retail choice when visiting a particular location.

Nothing wrong with this, in theory at least, except that there are still relatively few who regard hopping from one world city to the next as a matter of course. It also serves to degrade the notion of what a flagship represents. Will there come a point when global flagships become as commonplace as brand flags or flagships? Where next and what superlative will top the ‘global’ word?

Bigger and fewer does seem to be the mantra for many retailers in the current climate. There is just one mild problem with size however. Wander into some of the big chains’ largest stores and it becomes apparent that increased size may equate to endless SKU repetition. Apple is a case in point - a relatively limited product range, although the sheer numbers packing its stores means this is not an issue. For others big may mean boring instead of better. We are set to see more ‘global flagships’ as retailers focus on the major destinations, and the new Zara store is certainly very good, but the term does serve to devalue all of the other stores in a portfolio.

There’s still a lot to be said for having stores, bigger stores, regional stores and a flagship. Should time be called after that?