June In Store Inspo
Welcome to another post featuring a flavour of what our independent retailers and stockists have been doing across the month; key products that are selling through; merchandising tips and some news from us at Talking Tables too.
Cold Weather
For many, June has been a tough month in retail and has seen relatively slow trading conditions due to mixed weather. The cold and wet weather has played a major role in reducing foot traffic to physical stores, leading to slower trading levels. This decline was especially felt after a comparably stable May.
As we gear up for a general election in the UK, the month's political instability may well also be playing into a decline in consumer confidence, with the ongoing cost of living crisis contributing to reduced spending on non-essential items, including home decor and giftware.
We did a How to Throw a Taylor Swift Party shoot, which was lovely, but perhaps could have done with a little sunshine throwing its way to make the colours pop!
But towards the end of the month, the weather gods were finally kind and the nation saw a mini heatwave. But will that be enough to set SS24 back on track after the weeks of slow trade? As one of our stockists remarked to us: "It's like we've skipped a whole season."
Indeed, here at Talking Tables we were shooting our brand new Christmas Folklore collection for AW24 on the hottest day of the year so far! Sometimes you just can't plan for these things...
Here's a snapshot below - what do you think of the results? This collection is inspired by Eastern folklore and fairytales, and plays into a very traditional Christmas look, which we think customers will love this autumn and winter. We'd love to know your thoughts too!
Our Folklore collection is available for pre-order now.
Trends
Citrus - fruit inspired trends are leading the way this summer unabated.
We saw some beautiful products and tablescapes at our stockist Graham & Green in Bayswater:
If you like these themes you should consider stocking our Citrus Choice and Souk collections, as well as our bestselling new Citrus Candles, which have already sold out once this season.
Al Fresco - summer typically is the season for alfresco dining and we've seen both our retailers and our influencers focussing more on this trend.
Garsons in Esher, Surrey merchandised the Souk Collection and our disposable wooden cutlery to brilliant effect as part of their picnic displays.
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Etcetera in Hitchin, Hertfordshire also made use of a lovely table display to inspire their customers to take the plunge and have some faith in the great British summer time...
Influencers have also used their outside spaces to incredible effect - and there are some great merchandising tips to be had from the likes of weeny_victorian_house_in_ware and baliol.house, who used our Frida Kahlo collection and Mellow Gingham products respectively:
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Birthday - while out on visits this month we've seen some beautiful walls of birthday merchandising with some stockists taking a large sample of our birthday collection. This makes for a wonderfully cohesive look on a wall, and is a more enticing display for customers.
See the fantastic examples from l-r: Garsons in Esher, Indian Summer in Fulham, and Paper Art in Hampstead...
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Meanwhile, online we've been tagged in some beautiful posts this month ranging from the Bridgerton trend, now the series has returned, alfresco dining; and birthday!
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Lovely imagery and inspiration from our small stores l-r: Marram Home & Gifts in W. Sussex, Bon & Co Studio in Canada Manta Gifts in France and Willow Boutique in Edinburgh.
As always, thank you so much for tagging us. We love seeing our products out in the wild and getting inspiration - and sharing- how you style and merchandise our collections!
Happy summer - now that it's finally here!!
