The Inside Store – Thankyou’s (first-ever) pop-up shop.
An exhibition-like space designed by innovators and disruptors in the retail world, showcasing our product collections and giving you the opportunity to go as deep as you wanted into the Thankyou story and impact we are making, together.
11 weeks.
The amount of time it took us from ideation to execution. Mind-blowing.
In March 2023, we reached out to a team of epic creatives, think unparalleled innovation mixed with disruptive design and, most importantly, an attitude that aligns with one of our values, we find possible, coming together for a vision that was bigger than themselves – a force to be reckoned with.
Without them, this thing wouldn’t work. To the teams at PerCapitaStudio, Boom Studios and Marx Design who worked tirelessly across long (looong) hours to bring this vision to life, as well as the incredible team at Vicinity Centres who supported Thankyou in bringing our vision to life – thank you.
A store designed not to be seen, but found.
Traditional retail design convention says a brand should project its message outside. No logo on the outside, but some big ideas on the inside. We called this ‘The Inside Store’ because we believe it’s what’s on the inside that counts
Light > Darkness
The ethos of our store was light > darkness. Have you ever noticed how our logo is white, with a dark background? Light always wins. Even the smallest speck cannot be drowned out by the darkest night. Extreme poverty is dark, as is extreme consumerism, and the deeper you look into it, the darker it gets.
But there is light. There is hope. There is a way forward.
To us, light isn’t a soft concept; neither is hope. Both are undefeated. We believe hope is the antidote to uncertainty. We believe hope is the fuel that will see this vision realised.
So, we go all in on it (yep, we even based our entire store on it). Because we aren’t afraid to step into the darkness because together, we carry light.
When others go right, we always go left.
When you walked through the store entrance, you’d find a ‘portal’ - a nod to our brand mark - the imperfect circle - and you were invited to turn left. According to convention, retailers design for the ‘invariable right’, assuming most people turn right. But at Thankyou, when others go right, we always go left. You were met with a series of flat lay imperfect circles that sat like an amphitheatre, transforming this retail store into an event space for hosting gatherings for supporters. This was the home to our 35 new products across personal care and cleaning that we’d reimagined as part of our plan to expand globally, as well as our limited edition brand merch – The Inside Collection.
At this point, many people would be thinking nice products (thanks, friends!). But if you wander further into the change room, it’s unlikely you’ve seen any change room like this before. This change room showed you the change that we wish to make in the world.
Our vision – to see a world where not one person lives in extreme poverty.
From here, you’re able to go as deep as you like on the Thankyou story, from a list of all the people (over 600!) who have helped to build Thankyou, or our answer to Obama’s question of when will Thankyou start to expand globally (very soon, Mr President).
Chapter Two
Once inside, if you decided to help share Thankyou’s message ‘outside’ to the world around us that needs to change, that’s in your hands.
At Thankyou, we’d spent the last few years getting the inside right, from the way we ran the organisation to how we made the products and the way we planned to build the future. The store was an invitation inside Thankyou as we launch this next Chapter of Thankyou to the world.
Some people walked past this store as if it didn’t even exist, but for those who found it found themselves inside an idea we believe could change the course of history.
Explore The Inside Collection
For those who didn’t get the chance to visit the Inside Store, you can browse our Inside Collection online, for a limited time only. This Outland Denim x Thankyou collaboration brings a t-shirt design that breaks the convention of finding a Thankyou logo or design at the front of the t-shirts. Our Inside Collection tees aren’t designed for everyone on the outside, we designed them on the inside — for you and for an idea more important than just another branding opportunity.
What’s the future got ‘in-store’?
Over the 14 weeks, we met so many Thankyou supporters, found some new ones, and tested a lot of ideas for the future of Thankyou. Will we pop up with stores in other countries as we launch? Will we bring back the pop-up for epic new launches in Australia? We are excited by all the possibilities this space and time showed us. While we don’t exactly know the future of in-store at Thankyou, we do know there’s a big future in-store.
Thanks so much for joining us on the inside.
