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Creating a Retail Experience Your Customers Will Love – and Why it Matters

We love helping brands with ample opportunity to redesign and upgrade the way their consumers interact with their retail spaces. Men’s Warehouse reached out to us at Space Plus, A division of The Sliding Door Company, to amplify a handful of their retail interiors. With people returning to their passions of shopping in person and getting out of the house, having an attractive retail space is a must. Men’s Warehouse, one of the top men’s suits retailers by Tailored Brands, was an exciting client to work with, as they are widely known for tailoring the finest suits across America. Because of that, we knew how crucial it was to uphold their elegant reputation. Preserving the company’s status and endorsing the high quality of their suit’s aesthetic largely related to their brand’s visual representations.

Glass Wall Partitions for Retail

Our project for Men’s Warehouse made use of sleek black aluminum frames and clear glass office wall partitions for their chic Men’s Warehouse in NY. The idea behind this custom design was to provide more of an interactive and inclusive experience for the tailor to enjoy while in the retail shop – while also being able to maintain necessary working production. The occupant can now easily look out onto the sales floor and see other associates while having a defined space to work in. This not only offers a much more attractive alternative to boxed-in walls or a cubicle sort of feel, but it also creates a working environment that is a pleasure to exist in, increasing efficiency and allowing for natural light to enter the working space.

sliding barn door

Free-flowing and open retail spaces are dominating the market because consumers like to feel included. We want visibility and when we have the ability to visually connect with everyone in our space we feel more connected, uplifted, safer and overall – happier.

Additional Partition Features for Retail

This was one of a few projects done for Men’s Warehouse locations. The others included fitting room enclosures with fully opaque glass. The artistic flourish of clear, frosted or fully opaque glass does wonders for any retail space. With a touch of sophistication and an undeniably modern feel, these Glass Wall Partitions and glass doors instantly update and transform a space – elevating it toward contemporary luxe.

When a retail space is thoughtfully considered and luxurious, it lends an enhanced and viscerally appealing shopping experience for the customer. They need to feel that their time and financial investment is well worth it. Especially when selling luxury goods, designer clothing, footwear, you name it – the store’s aesthetic must match the status of what goods are being sold.

Retail Customer Experience

The interior layout, furnishings, and overall design will make or break a sale. Customers want to feel that they are entering into and enjoying an opulent experience. A recent survey conducted found that 32 percent of customers say that they would stop doing business with a brand they loved after a single bad experience. That bad experience could most definitely come from visiting a retail store and being turned off by an unsavory environment. Feeling overwhelmed by the lack of organization within the store, too many clothes being fit into too small space, no place to sit, etc. will all leave a negative effect on the client. Ample floor space, neatly organized racks and tables, helpful but not pushy sales associates will all garner major points from your clients and result in sales and long-standing customer relationships and brand loyalty for years to come.

We at Space Plus have a genuine care for each and every client and their project-specific needs. We ensure that our clients are delighted with the final outcome of a project and feel proud when that is accomplished. We provide spatial solutions to upgrade any environment, regardless of size or industry. We are here and happy to address your spatial needs to enhance your interiors, and improve your business. Visit Space Plus, A Division of the Sliding Door Company, for ideas and inspiration on how to transform your retail atmosphere. Get a free quote from one of our professionals to get started today!

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Office Environments, Layouts, Standards and Guidelines

As a contractor or architect, it’s up to you to design a space for your clients that is well suited to the client’s needs and improves the quality of their experience existing in the space. Getting contracted to design office spaces is not always easy, especially today with a rapidly evolving definition of what an office environment could be. Nowadays, most new offices are multidimensional and act as a home away from home- with kitchens, games, and lounge areas that simulate the essence of a living room.

These workspaces are meant to cater to the worker’s needs, boost morale, enhance production, and increase continuity and communication amongst coworkers or “team members”. By designing a thoughtful and considered layout, and installing the right framework, you’ll be able to craft an innovative working environment that your client and their employees will love. Below, we’ve outlined some things to keep in mind during the design process. Much needed rooms, spatial separation, and exciting elements to employ may help inspire your blueprints.

Office Open Floor Plans

Today, open floor plans have become the new staple or standard in office design. More and more companies are recognizing that allowing their employees to freely communicate, work together and experience closeness actually increases productivity and team morale. Open floor plans also increase visibility, natural light, and breathability throughout the office environment. By starting off your design with an open plan, you make room for a lot of inventive spatial solutions and targeted rooms that will add intrigue and excitement to the space.

bright workplace with many glass divided rooms

Office Phone Booths/Call Rooms

A good way to allow for some spatial separation and privacy is to introduce phone booths or “tiny rooms” into the open swath of expansive office space. While these glass barriers are not specifically soundproof, they do provide a spatial barrier that lessens noise and provides increased privacy. This way, when a team member has a long call (or a loud voice) they can quickly step into these quiet spaces and not feel guilty about distracting nearby workers. A new poll by Udemy and Toluna showed that 80% of workers admit to being sonically distracted while at work.

 “Office noise is the second most cited workplace disturbance, with seven out of ten respondents citing noise as a top bother in their day-to-day workflow” (statista.com).

Outside influences on employees’ working environment take a toll on productivity and cause employees a cumbersome mental reset every few minutes. A great solution to introduce with these call booths is to install sliding door room dividers for the call booth so as to save space in an already tiny enclosure, while creating a stylish design that increases the office aesthetic. Our solutions divide the space, curtail foot traffic and provide visual privacy.

 

Bonus Yoga / Stretching / Meditation Room

A new trend amongst trendy office spaces is offering a yoga or meditation room. People become seriously fatigued while sitting for too long a time in uncomfortable office chairs day in and day out. Not only is a desk job physically grueling on a person’s body, but it also takes a mental toll. By designing workers space for some healthy breaks to stretch, breathe, recenter and improve their physical health, you effectively boost productivity, increase mental capacity and increase contentment amongst a workforce. Consider installing sliding glass barn doors for this room – it will enhance the overall look of the room and offer an artistic flourish your client will love. What’s more, you can choose from six different glass opacities to best suit your client’s needs. For the yoga room, perhaps a more opaque glass finish would be the ideal choice, so workers can stretch and meditate while enjoying a bit of privacy. 

conference room with sliding glass door wall, some panels opaque

Think Tank / Conference Room

While open floor plans are a great way to achieve integration, cohesion, and an overall team mentality, any office environment should come equipped with a full-size conference room for important/private meetings and presentations. Some like to think of these rooms as productive think tanks. Not providing one would be a big detriment to any business. People need to be able to gather around a table, bounce ideas off each other, check-in on progress, etc. To engineer a stylistic balance of privacy with visibility, use glass sliding door room dividers to integrate a conference room amongst the rest of the open floor plan. This way, you’ll provide a “separate yet together” feel that your clients will thoroughly enjoy.

Private Offices

Of course, you’ll want to design your office space with at least one to three private offices to provide distinction for the company CEO, manager or owner from the general workforce. By using floor-to-ceiling glass wall partitions and interior sliding doors, you’ll provide enough spatial separation and privacy while assimilating the rooms into the vast open space. An office with four solid walls on each side doesn’t exactly say “teamwork” the way it should. Rather, it segregates the people below and can make employees feel detached from their bosses or those higher up than them. As the designer, take it upon yourself to create a positive, integrative working environment that will improve the working conditions of employees and drive the business in the right direction.

Our glass and aluminum partitions are recyclable and perfect for green construction projects. They also assist architects with earning LEED points which is another selling point when contracting clients. Taking into consideration general layout, office partitions, the use of glass, and introducing inventive spaces, you’ll successfully craft a product that your clients will celebrate each day they come into work. An office should be a productive home away from home. Consult the experts in space optimization and check out Space Plus, a division of the Sliding Door Company.

Have a look at our products gallery for inspiration and product images. Schedule a call with one of our knowledgeable professionals to get a free quote and other information on our many available solutions. Simply find a location near you and ensure your office design a success!

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Solutions for Social Distancing During early Stages of Re-openings

Restaurant Industry Greatly Affected by COVID 19.

While expected, it appears as though most Americans are still grappling with digesting the new normal, being that many public establishments, restaurants included, are beginning to open their doors at alarming rates. Beaches, parks and other recreational, or “non-essential” businesses are also slowly reopening to the public. Though most are uncertain whether this is a wise gamble, others are overjoyed with the recent developments. Over the course of the last two and a half months, the food and beverage industry (including restaurants) has seen an unprecedented rollercoaster of highs and lows, of prejudices and judgments, of swift evolutions and unfortunate pitfalls and foreclosures. Of course, there is really no telling at this point, how successfully the industry will be able to regain its footing and return to “business as usual”. Likely, things won’t look or feel the same for months, perhaps even years. Though,  if there is one certainty, it is that during the coming weeks and months, health, safety, and comfort will be taken more seriously than ever before. As a restaurant owner, it will become imperative to not only provide a safe and sanitized setting for your valued patrons, but your future success will hinge on your ability to convince the public that your establishment has taken serious measures to safeguard your visitors. There are a number of ways that you can ensure a clean, healthy restaurant coming out of this pandemic, so perhaps the ideal restaurant is one which utilizes all of the solutions simultaneously. Below are the top health and safety solutions to implement coming out of COVID 19.

 

Limit Your Available Capacity

Many restaurants are choosing to reopen as safely as possible, to guard both their working staff, as well as their customers. One sure way to reduce the risk of person-to-person spreading, is to significantly reduce the number of available seats in the restaurant. Additionally, outside seating is encouraged, as fresh air is said to help reduce the risk of air transmission from those in close proximity to one another. By halving your normal capacity, you can effectively create distance and space between your patrons, allowing them the peace of mind of a non-crowded atmosphere, while ensuring a no-contact dining experience.

Indoor Social Distancing

Similar to limiting the establishment’s overall capacity, the main idea is to encourage indoor social distancing within public spaces that are normally overflowing with people. In regards to reopened businesses and restaurants alike, it will be very important to discern which tables should be seated depending on how much space they allow from the next occupied table. People want to know that they can remain a safe six feet apart, so it is the restaurant’s responsibility to grant that. The host or hostess must be aware of the current circumstances, the social distancing recommendations, and be able to plan accordingly when seating guests. 

Wall Partitions and Room Dividers

Another solution that businesses, educational institutions, and restaurants are starting to utilize, are wall partitions and room dividers. Easy to install partitions can effectively create additional spatial separation and enhanced safety within indoor environments. No restaurant wants to see their customers feeling uncomfortable or worried about their health while out for their much anticipated, long awaited dining experience. As the owner of a food establishment, make use of the available spatial solutions and integrate easy to clean glass room dividers or breezy sliding room partitions throughout your business to create enhanced separation from table to table, or to limit the restaurants available seating. Some restaurants are now even using glass wall dividers to create see-through waiting zones where customers can wait to be seated in a safe, risk-free enclosure, apart from foot traffic and potential contact. Glass walls are not only antimicrobial, but they are also exceptionally easy to clean and disinfect within seconds. Additionally, glass walls are resistant to damage and water, and conveniently offered in a wide range of glass opacities, from completely opaque, to see-through transparent. They require no construction, and take less than 24 hours to be installed by our team of professional installers.

Continue Encouraging Customers to Take Out

Without a doubt, the surest way to continue providing a safe dining experience for your patrons, is to continue encouraging take-away food, deliveries, and made-to-order items that passersby can easily walk home with. By reducing the number of people dining inside the restaurant, you can maintain maximum health and safety for everyone involved.

Spatial separation will be the most crucial element through this reintegration process to safeguard patrons, restaurant staff, and delivery workers against this deadly virus. Ensure your establishment is as safe as possible for everyone involved! Stop the spread of COVID 19 by integrating glass wall partitions and increased patient separation. Visit Space Plus, A Division of the Sliding Door Company online to view our online catalog, and Get a quote from one of our professionals today.

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The Exciting Move Toward Co-Working Spaces

In the past two decades, there has been a great metamorphosis in the way that we as Americans understand and exist in shared spaces. The entire culture surrounding what a workday looks like has dramatically shifted. The architects and space designers of today have reared a significant undertaking in spatial optimization for the modern worker. They understand that there is a certain strategic benefit in crafting inspired and artful shared workspaces for the professional.

This is (thankfully) a grand step away from the lackluster and boxed-in days of the past. It’s a re-write of about a hundred years of depressive office buildings and the classic cubicle existence. This has been a welcomed shift- one that we have only arrived at thanks to the concerted effort of spatial pioneers, builders, and environment visionaries. Top companies such as Google, Facebook, Zappos, and Stance have all transitioned their offices to provide an inspiring setting that caters towards creation, invention and the encouragement of shared thought.

The why and how in scaling up with a shared workspace. There are now over 35,000 flexible workspaces in the world today. If you haven’t jumped on board already, it’s about time. This article will inform you of how to update your workplace and offer a fresh hub for social inclusion and accelerated growth by your employees and ultimately, your business.

First, the why.

workplace

 

Why are so many businesses turning to shared work environments? It’s simple- because their workers are happy. Employee retention rates and productivity have never been better. Craft an artistically thoughtful workspace, allow for shared thought and cohesion, and you have invested workers. People who enjoy shared workspaces experience feelings of self-motivation, individuality, inspiration, and pride. They feel proud to go into a beautiful working environment, meaning they are inherently happier going into the office. Not only do co-work offices promote individuality, but they also foster a sense of community. A lot of European co-work spaces offer open floor plans with couches, comfortable chairs amid low height desks. They pay attention to lighting and the fluidity of the space. Sometimes there are even ping pong and pool tables set up amongst the work zones to encourage healthy breaks- increasing stamina and freshness throughout the long workday and providing team building activities.

These novel office designs have a coffee shop appeal to them, which generates a lot of comfort and relatability for workers. Businesses are starting to see higher retention numbers of their employees who work in shared spaces, as well as growing productivity. Statistics have proven that these shared workplaces have become the standard, not the exception. These spaces have implemented a more humanistic approach to design, not the other way around. We no longer design working environments with sterile columns and rows, with tiny hallways and fluorescent lights detracting from our quality of life. The archaic way of laying out office spaces is now being rejected, with so many people noticing how unproductive it was for the everyday employee. This shift has garnered a lot of attention and support and will continue to show up in a myriad of ways.

Now, for the how. 

How are businesses crafting these shared spaces? There are many different ways in which to jump on board this growing coworking industry. Designing and building novel environments is one way. Updating and redesigning an existing space is another. Utilizing everyday spaces in public has also become a movement.

Designing entirely new buildings for shared workspaces is something that takes time, capital and vision. Many architects are now seeing the value in these flexible environments and are coming up with innovative approaches every day. If it’s the inspiration you crave, take a look at this list of The 50 Best Co-working Spots in Europe for some visual ingenuity.

On the other hand, a faster, more economical approach to spatial redesign, is to use what already exists and update it. For example, take your vast and uniform office space. By clearing everything out (all of the furniture, cubicles and excess materials) and creating a clean slate, you can begin the process of redesign and integration.

A few key factors to consider during the redesign are:

  • spatial barriers
  • doors, walls, and partitions
  • lighting and aesthetics
  • shared rooms
  • amenities

When crafting a shared office environment, something to carefully consider are the materials used to separate spaces and offices. The updated solution to the outdated cubicle is glass wall partitions. While still offering necessary privacy and healthy space amidst hundreds of other employees, the glass lends a separate but equal feel to the workplace. This allows for the individual to enjoy their own space while still being able to see into the open floor.

The design of doors and walls in the office is also a crucial tool in creating harmony and integration in the workplace. Sliding glass doors offer equal flexibility and privacy in any office. With available locking accessories, the choice for separation is readily available. Glass walls are also a must-have in any shared office environment, encouraging office synergy and inspiration amongst co-workers. In addition, the glass offers beautiful light to enter and spread throughout the space, which adds to the overall experience of the workplace and how the employee exists in his or her environment. Without ample light in a building, space can begin to feel exceptionally closed in and uninspired.

Lastly, offering needed amenities into co-working environments can be a deciding factor for a potential employee. If they have access to coffee, tea, a kitchen, filtered drinking water, complimentary snacks, etc. this will add to the overall experience for the professional and make coming into work that much more enjoyable and viable.

As we approach 2020, we will start to see more and more of these thoughtful workspaces and creative environments pop up all around the States. These shared spaces are quickly entering into the public territory as well- in train stations, coffee bars, subway stations, airports, and hotels. It’s time to jump onboard and rediscover what’s possible in the workplace.

Make the move towards crafting a desirable coworking space, and visit Space Plus, A Division of the Sliding Door Company for ideas and inspiration. Get a quote from one of our professionals to begin the transformation today.