Customers absolutely adore retail pop-up shops. They’re exciting, fun, and unexpected. All of a sudden, you get access to your favorite online-only or international brands right in your neighborhood. The social media buzz around these events tempts even casual fans to stop by for a selfie. A pop-up shop isn’t just a shopping opportunity—it’s an event. 

Companies love the pop-up shop model for many of the same reasons. They have the potential to tap a whole new population of customers in locations where they don’t have a brick-and-mortar presence. The success of the venture can inform future expansion decisions. And the sales from a pop-up shop are often a huge boost to a company’s annual budget, with very low costs relating to overhead and inventory. 

This exciting concept can also be applied to employees in a large corporation. Some of the best corporate employee recognition programs incorporate spontaneous pop-up shops in addition to their regularly-scheduled rewards, and they’re seeing incredible results. If you can manage to put together a really fantastic pop-up shop, both you and your employees will reap the rewards. 

With a pop-up shop, everybody wins. 

Advantages of Pop-Up Shops for Employers

Pop-up shops come with a huge list of benefits for employers. Here are just the top three: 

Culture

If company culture is something your company is currently working to improve, a pop-up shop might just be that out-of-the-box idea you’ve been looking for. Pop-up shops are unique events that make your company feel more fun, spontaneous, and youthful. They’re perfect for attracting and retaining millennial employees who might need a little coaxing to stay with one company for a while. 

Participation

A pop-up shop is also a fantastic way to drum up participation for your employee incentive program. Link your shop opening with your biggest reward day. Offer greater discounts at the shop for employees who participate in the program or who’ve met their initial goals for the year. And, for a taste of what’s to come, display super high-value items in the background of your shop that are only available to those who complete the program or reach a certain level. You’ll immediately get people talking and interested in participating in the other employee incentive activities at your firm.

Engagement

Pop-up shops, like any well-designed employee incentive program, show their biggest dividends in employee engagement. By offering moments of excitement with well-organized pop-up shops, you’re presenting your company as a really cool place to work. Employees will feel valued and appreciated and understood. As a result, they’ll start to enjoy coming in to work more each day. They’ll talk more about your company with their friends. They’ll post more positive reviews of your company online. And they’ll want to work harder to reach their individual and company goals. This is the power of non-monetary incentives at work. 

6 Tips For Pulling Off a Company Pop-Up Shop

Many employee incentive companies offer pop-up shops in their portfolio of services—so if you’re interested in trying the system on for size, that’s definitely the easiest way to go. Still, you could put together a pretty exciting pop-up shop for your employees all on your own. 

Here are a few tips that will help:

1. Schedule the pop-up shop at a strategic time. The holidays are the perfect time to throw up a spontaneous company pop-up shop. You could also coordinate your pop-up shop with other major company events like the annual retreat or summer picnic. 
2. Differentiate your shop swag. If you’ve already got a company store set up as part of an incentive program, make sure the items you offer at the pop-up shop are separate and unique.
3. Prioritize gift items over apparel. You can offer branded apparel at a pop-up shop, but those items aren’t going to be as exciting for employees in this context. Choose high-value gift items instead, and offer apparel for free or at a steep discount.
4. Stock a limited amount of inventory. You’ll want to secure a very limited number of gift items for sale at the pop-up shop, with the exact number depending of course on the size of your company. You want these items to feel limited-edition and special.
5. Hand out coupons beforehand. This is key: leading up to the pop-up shop, “secretly” hand out coupons for superior productivity, excellent teamwork, or some other metric that matters to both your business and your employees. The day before the shop opens, announce that employees can use these coupons for items or discounts on the most valuable rewards.