Billions of people know Google for search and software. But no one, relatively speaking, knew much about Google Hardware – physical things, like the Google Home family, Pixel Phone, Pixel Slate, Chromecast, Google Wi-Fi and suite of Nest devices.

To support the launch of the 3rd generation of Made By Google hardware devices, we were tasked with creating a 3-month pop up retail experience in Chicago and New York. The space needed to be a robust retail environment, but equally as important, perform a marketing function; building awareness and consideration through great product experiences.

In a clever (and memorable) play on metaphor, we created the "Google Hardware Store” – a space for discovering helpful tools of a different kind.

Hear us out. In America, hardware stores are classically helpful places where you go for supplies, how-to’s, and general advice for projects. This is also exactly what Google had in mind when developing its hardware products – somewhere to turn to for a little help.

Our audience are creative, curious, and optimistic people looking to take on problems big and small themselves. While we wouldn’t sell them drill bits or 2x4s, we could offer up the helpfulness of Google Hardware.

We wanted to build a space combining retail with experiential demos in a way that felt as effortless & human as the products themselves. The design reinforced Google’s belief that tech should serve people, not the other way around. No sleek shrines to technology with LEDs and pushy tech-xperts. We were tactile first, techy later.

Our palette was soft vs sharp. Wayfinding signs were hand-painted locally. Custom paint cans in Google Hardware colors and murals decorated the space. In a voice-activated treehouse guests could try smart home demos; in a perfectly-to-scale tiny kitchen, the Google Hub. Hand illustrated ‘project’ cards shared everyday use cases, while drawers underneath each product revealed sketches and artifacts from the design process, celebrating their craft.

To make 1:1 trial more comfortable, we created ‘toolboxes’–beautiful kits with a single product and project cards to be used anywhere in the space.

Over 3 months, our 2 pop up stores welcomed 80,000 visitors with an average dwell time in store of 12 minutes. We saw double digit increases in customer awareness, consideration, purchase intent, and retail NPS. Google’s retail experience scores (overall experience, display experience, demo experience, and sales associate experience) were positive and significantly outpaced competitors.

We hosted a total of 55 events, got 88 press hits with 38,000 shares, had 97,000 Google Hardware Store views on YouTube, and reached 15MM earned social impressions.

Ultimately, the Google Hardware store helped our audience better understand that Google builds and sells beautiful, helpful hardware: Google tools of a different kind.