standing-up the wayfair store

about the project

I joined Wayfair to advance the physical manifestation of the digitally native brand from concept to reality. This was a huge project that spanned multiple years and I had the incredibly unique opportunity to develop the Visual Presentation strategy for the flagship brand's Frequency categories. I know that “Frequency” isn’t an industry term, so I always describe it as product the customer leaves the store with in-hand (versus Furniture categories, for example, which the customer orders and has delivered to their home). The Frequency product mix ranges from Decor and Housewares to Textiles and Lighting, representing over 6,000 items across 15 departments.

Because we built this store from a blank page, I not only designed the departments and product adjacencies, but the actual fixtures themselves. Here is an overview of the phases of work that brought this project from concept to reality:

Concept (2022): I made a lot of maps and drew countless illustrations during this phase! This was the “what if…” portion of the project - my team was ideating in-store experiences while partnering with our Merchant team to source product, curate assortments, and right-size product categories for the store.
Build (2023): This is when we started to physically build-out and test our concepts to operationalize a real presentation plan for the real store. We built mock departments in a warehouse south of Boston dubbed the Retail Lab. Our lab space was 1/3 the size of what our first store was going to be, so we built presentations in cohorts: we would build select departments (with a mix of first article fixtures, plywood stand-in fixtures, and foam board mock-up fixtures), review them with the larger cross-functional team, get sign-off from leadership, document them, then tear them down to build the next cohort of departments. This process went on for a better part of a year while the real 150,000 square foot store was under construction in the Chicagoland region.
Set (2024): The store construction was complete, the fixtures were produced, and the product assortment arrived - it was time to (finally) put it all together! We spent over six weeks on-location - training, trouble-shooting, and pivoting - before Wayfair 1 opened its doors to customers on May 23, 2004.
Repeat (2024-Forward): The Concept-Build-Set Phases of Work now repeats (in much more condensed timelines) to (1) operationalize seasonal floor-sets, (2) evolve assortments & presentations, & (3) scale stores across the country (each with different footprints and in-store experiences).

This project was the most exhaustive and most rewarding work of my career - I hope you enjoy perusing the highlights of my contributions to this project: