JOSEPH BANH, MA Design Strategy + Research + Human-Centred Innovation + CX Program Design    
Toronto, CA   |   josephbanh@gmail.com  |  
+1.416.706.7663  |    https://www.linkedin.com/in/josephbanh/




















xlab


Innovating the brick-and-mortar retail experience

 

“People don’t buy products and services per se, they buy relationships, happiness, wellbeing and other psychologically oriented needs and wants. Make emotion central to your retail strategy.” - Doug Stephens, Retail Futurist


The Senses and Embodied Innovation
xlab was Avida’s dedicated innovation space located in downtown Toronto. Part research lab, part design studio, and part exhibition gallery, it was a space for experimentation and innovating the brick-and-mortar retail experience.  

Embodiment, the senses, perception, affect, emotion, storytelling, and meaning-making. These concepts anchored our research & development program at xlab. Why? Because as behavioral scientists have pointed out, “we humans are actually emotional & impulsive”. By better understanding how emotion and context shapes behaviour - our goal at was to develop a sensory experience design practice, novel user research methods, experience prototypes, and customer experience programs for our clients that impact on customer satisfaction, retention, and loyalty. 

I developed the concept and functional requirements for the space and managed a team of architects, environmental graphic and digital designers, technologists, and construction contractors to custom retrofit a space where our clients could workshop and envision the future of digitally integrated brick-and-mortar retail.

The demo video presented here showcases the range of experience prototypes we built at xlab. 


Project Credits
Joseph Banh / Project lead and managing director, vision, concept, program design, functional requirements, project management, operations management

dbdbdb (Dan Briker) / Architectural design, FFE

Jacqueline Tang / Environmental Graphics

Boszko & Verity / General Contractors

Avida Team / Technology procurement and integration

Special thanks to David Reale for believing in me and the work and giving me the opportunity to bring it to life. 


Legend

  1. Interior view of xlab’s device & research library
  2. xlab exhibitioin gallery - a space for user testing and display of prototypes and experiments
  3. xlab office space
  4. The grim reality of xlab before it was transformed
  5. Dimensional xlab logo
  6. Exterior view of neon sign with text: Experience is a moving force - John Dewey’s words and xlab’s unofficial mantra