Minneapolis, MN — September 30, 2020 — FRCH NELSON, a global brand experience firm delivering strategy, design, and architecture services for the retail industry, is now NELSON Worldwide—a multifaceted brand helping to create and deliver compelling retail experiences across the globe. The rebrand will serve to culturally connect and unite all brands under a single banner and provide clients with a holistic approach to design that is unrivaled in the industry.

“Today’s consumers are engaging with brands in a much more fluid manner, moving through experiences with no delineation in mind about format, location, or category,” says Robyn Novak, Vice President at FRCH NELSON. “This exciting transition will provide us with ample resources to continue to transform environments where people shop, dine, and play.”

FRCH NELSON has been creating innovative brand experiences for consumer-facing environments for over 50 years and has an impressive roster of clients including Macy’s, Saks Fifth Avenue, Tiffany & Co., Hershey’s, Kroger, Target, T-Mobile, Dick’s Sporting Goods, American Girl, Subway, YUM! Brands, and more. Officially merged in 2018, both NELSON and FRCH NELSON (formerly FRCH Design Worldwide) have forged a strong partnership that allowed them to holistically serve a diverse client base consisting of both long-standing relationships with Fortune 500 category leaders in multiple market segments, as well as boutique clients.

The universal identity, coupled with the firm’s dedication to design excellence, will allow for the free-flowing exchange of new ideas to deliver projects that boldly achieve client goals and uplift their surroundings. The traditional sectors of retail, hospitality, workplace, industrial, and even healthcare have blurred—and their influence signifies a shift in function and utilization of spaces. Consumer behaviors and preferences will continue to evolve, and this transition to one NELSON brand will provide clients with an unmatched, holistic approach.

“One-use destinations of the past have now become a mosaic of activities and engagement, a reflection of wavering consumer preferences and a desire to unify experiences. This rebrand demonstrates our continued commitment to bring more value to our clients. We look forward to continuing to build upon trusted partnerships as well as forging new ones along the way,” said Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of NELSON Worldwide, John “Ozzie” Nelson Jr.

Under the NELSON Worldwide name, the firm comes together with more than 1,100 teammates spread across 25 offices, combining decades of invaluable industry experience, service expertise, and geographic reach to deliver projects—not just across the country, but around the world. As the firm continues to strengthen its practices, one thing remains clear: NELSON is committed to innovative, boundary-pushing designs that transform and touch all dimensions of the human experience while seeking to learn, grow, and experiment through architecture and design to fuel the future.

About NELSON Worldwide

NELSON Worldwide is an award-winning firm delivering architecture, interior design, graphic design, and brand strategy services that transform all dimensions of the human experience, providing our clients with strategic and creative solutions that positively impact their lives and the environments where they work, serve, play, and thrive. Our collective network includes more than 1,100 teammates in 25 offices, combining industry experience, service expertise, and geographic reach to deliver projects across the country and around the world. Client partnerships across the NELSON network include: Hilton, Macy’s, Comcast, Simon Property Group, Prologis, Yum! Brands, Boston Consulting Group, T-Mobile, Emory Healthcare, SAP Fieldglass, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Kroger, Hyatt, Bayer, Target, and many more. 

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In a recent work study with The Business Of Furniture, teammates Kristen Cerutti and Anne Gibson discussed how employers should shift their mindset from activity-based work to behavioral-based work to empower employees to choose how to work to perform at their best.

“There are no two people that think the same, that work the same, that utilize space in the same way. For me it’s less about labeling how many different people there are, it’s about getting employees and employers to understand no two people are going to function in their best capacity in the same way,” said Kristin Cerutti. “So, how can we provide space knowing that?” Cerutti describes neurodiversity a celebration and acceptance of the fact that no two brains think the same. There are groups of people that have enough in common neurologically to able placed into neurodivergent and neurotypical categories.

This leads to a concept designers at Nelson Worldwide have been exploring more lately— how employees are physically reacting to what they are doing. Anne Gibson, workplace leader at Nelson Worldwide explains activity-based working is focusing on supporting the task, which is important throughout the day, whether it’s concentrating on an individual assignment, collaborating with someone, or learning something in a large group setting. Behavior-based work adds a dimension of emotional support someone gets within the environment created. Read the full article here.

Forbes discusses how offices can prepare for a safe return post-pandemic. With some employees hesitant, Forbes recommends NELSON Worldwide’s Scalable Workplace Solutions as a guide to help mitigate germs and ease workers’ concerns when going back to the workplace. Read more here.

“What will bring employees back to the office?” is one of the most common questions we as architects and designers are asked on a daily basis. While there is no one-size-fits-all secret recipe when it comes to designing the best back-to-office experience, there is one thing that definitely won’t have employees crawling back to the workplace…

During a meeting with a client about the importance of listening to employees, the value of acknowledging their concerns, and involving them in deciding when to make changes, I was shocked when the CEO commented, “I don’t get it, no one came to the office today, and we ordered cake.”

The response sparked a greater question and conversation: What’s the magic “thing” that will bring life back into our office spaces? What will convince people to commute two hours, pay for childcare and wait until Sunday to do the laundry? That CEO isn’t alone in their thinking: When employees were in the office five days a week, having free food was considered a perk. They were already there and only had to get up and walk to the café to grab a slice of cake, pizza, etc. It was a nice break in your day, a chance to chat with your colleagues. However, things have changed, and we need to adjust our expectations on what the true draw is. Hint: It’s not cake.

We’ve known the answer for years: the only thing your office space has, that nowhere else does, is your people. When employees were surveyed in the wake of the pandemic, the number one thing they all said they missed about the office was the people. Even science tells us we need in-person interaction. Studies have shown that in-person interaction helps drop blood pressure and reduce anxiety. The elderly live longer and more fulfilled lives when they have regular interactions with others. Blue Zone studies, which explore regions of the world where people live significantly longer and healthier lives, are showing us how important a connection to our community is to our longevity. So, if we know that we miss each other and that being around others will improve our lives, why isn’t that enough to get people together in offices?

It’s going to take work both from employers and employees to implement the changes required. Let’s dive into what we can do to promote and support in-office work by focusing on three necessary steps to build and sustain in-office culture in a flexible work environment:

The First Step: Listen
This seems simple but it’s more nuanced than you may think. You need to have a deep understanding of not just the organization, but the specific office culture and local teammates. Engaging the end users to understand, when they do come in, what it is that is bringing them in. What tasks and activities are they completing? This understanding helps your team identify the tasks that bring them in, ensuring you support them in both policy and physical space. In turn, this approach demonstrates that you’re listening and encourages continued engagement.

The Second Step: Create Rituals
Rituals have been proven to help build social networks, psychological safety, performance and purpose by giving people a sense of ownership and empowerment. Humans find comfort in predictability. Take a common ritual like going to the gym as an example: Once it becomes embedded in your routine, it becomes something you count on, you look forward to it, you see and interact with the same people, you build personal relationships, you feel part of something bigger than you and you miss it when you don’t go.

Rituals don’t need to be complicated. They can be as simple as a 15-minute stand up discussion to talk about your weekend plans. They can be as involved as an all office outing. The key is they need to happen regularly and at a consistent day and time that people can begin to count on.

The Third Step: Build Place Attachment
If you build reliability through listening and creating rituals, you will inevitably begin to foster place attachment. Place attachment is the emotional link formed by an individual to a setting that has been given meaning through interaction. Building workplace attachment has been shown to improve job satisfaction, performance, organizational commitment, employee retention, and office culture. Things that any company would be interested in.

There is no slice of cake or magic pill that is going to solve all our workplace woes. It’s going to take effort, patience and determination by both employers and employees. Some companies find it easiest to begin deploying these ideas at the same time as an office renovation, when teammates are already primed for change. However, these are all things that can be implemented at any time in any company for little to no capital.

Q: Who are you as a designer? Tell us more.

As a designer, I am practical and balanced. I appreciate the visuals and aesthetics that can be accomplished by the use and manipulation of products and materials, but I am always conscious of cost, function, and longevity. This is not only important to me but the client which is why I always ask What is this going to look like day two? Is this easy to maintain? Is the design too specific to current trends that it will tire quickly?

Q: 6 words that describe what it’s like to be a designer in NYC. Go!

Challenging
Interactive
Exciting
Forward-thinking
Engaging
Passionate

Q: What are some architecture and interior design trends in NYC you’re seeing at the moment?

At the moment, I am seeing the use of materials, lighting, and furniture that are multi-functional and allow plenty of flexibility within a space. We are designing interiors with the ability to be re-purposed so that users can easily adapt to changes with less movement and lower construction costs.

Q: How has the design landscape in NYC changed over time?

Over the years, design has become more open and accepting of the original structures and layouts of spaces. The brick and steel you find behind drywall is now the accent wall of a space. The rough beat up ceiling slab we use to conceal is now “perfect”. We are finding that the imperfect nature of these materials is now the finished look clients enjoy.

Q: What is the biggest challenge for design/designers in NYC?

A challenge for New York City designers and architects are is working with structural constraints within a project space. This City has a vast but unique range of architecture passed down from each era. Working around older methods and materials is always a challenge. For example, some buildings have wide column footprints used to fireproof them at the time. Our solution? We strip them down to the exposed steel and paint them. While finding these solutions may be challenging, they are also the things that make being a designer in NYC so special and exciting.

Q: What’s it like to work at NELSON NYC?

At NELSON every day is different! Being in the Tenant Landlord studio, the heart of our work is in NYC so we see it all and move very quickly. On an average day we could be in the office designing, working with brokers around the city, or standing on top of a 50-story building for review. All very exciting things that challenge my team and I to be creative and think on our feet.

California is experiencing an affordable-housing crisis in which 97% of cities are not keeping pace with its population growth in creating housing. Only about 10% of the number of units to support inbound workers has been produced each year for nearly a decade. Cities across the state are struggling to find solutions. The challenges range from aggressive NIMBYism, Planning Commissions paralyzed by political opposition by an array of constituents, and dramatically rising wages in places like San Francisco and New York, where affluent tech workers are gobbling up every variety of housing. The urgency of the challenges has prompted the formation of a “YIMBY Coalition”, lobbying for relaxed restrictions on new development.

One solution gaining significant traction is producing modular housing. “If we don’t build housing differently, then no one has any housing,” says Rick Holliday, a Bay Area developer who has built a modular housing fabrication factory near San Francisco.

The technologies vary but generally involve simplifying construction through prefabricated apartment units or freestanding “tiny homes”, deployed in different ways for different uses.  The “Factory Built” modular methodology has a multitude of benefits. While modules are assembled at the factory, site work can begin concurrently, such as laying the foundation or prepping utility connections. This greatly decreases the time needed for total construction. Modular buildings are often completed 25-30% faster than conventional structures. Once the modules are ready, they are shipped to the site and fastened together. The final construction stage includes completing exterior systems such as cladding and roofing components and internal spaces like lobbies, stairwells, and elevator shafts. The finished building can take any form, from exposed industrial shipping containers to finished housing that’s indistinguishable from any site-built product. In general, this methodology has been shown to allow the completed product from a shovel in the ground to full completion in about 6 months. With actual all-in construction cost savings only in the +/- 10% range, time is the highest value to the developer or city.

The basic concept isn’t new. In 1624, Massachusetts settlers built homes out of prefabricated materials shipped from England. The pattern was repeated in Australia, Africa, and India as the British Empire shipped colonists and structures wide across the globe, according to “Prefab Architecture,” by Ryan E. Smith, a professor at the University of Utah.

The challenge is both political and functional. Housing across the entire spectrum of affordability must be produced through a variety of modes. Political will must shift to support streamlining approvals based on existing zoning and design guidelines, removing the option of neighborhood objection if the building is designed “as of right”. Additionally, cities must shift their focus toward housing, mostly at the lower end of the spectrum, where for-profit developers are few. The homelessness in most major cities is also a by-product of this dramatic housing shortage, as well as supportive services that are lacking. Many of these problems will take many years to overcome, but modular housing can offer more expedient ways to solve some of them.

1-San Jose Mercury News. “Housing shortage: New report shows how California cities and counties stack up”.   February 1st , 2018