We're either doom-scrolling or turning off all media and burying our heads in the sand, streaming tv, or food shows. When we do read the news, it's scary shit. So, as retailers you have the opportunity to give your customers an "awwww" moment of sweetness. Sweet isn't cool, edgy, or dark. It's funny, soft, entertaining, delightful, and gives people an immediate jolt of joy. Not huge "I just got engaged" joy but a moment of sweetness.
We all need that!
There were a lot of musicals made during WW2 to give people an hour and a half of movie bliss. Your display window can give them a few seconds of that same bliss but people will remember it and appreciate your efforts!
I used to teach at Parsons School of Design in NYC. All my students wore black to every class. That's very NY and very fashion oriented. But, I felt I was looking out onto a sea of crows. I offered a half-grade higher for any student to wear color. Very few took me up on it. Often, their visual merchandising assignments looked punk-like and angry. It was timely but not very appealing to customers other than people exactly like them.
Good and effective visual presentations rely on appealing to a broader range of potential customers - unless the shop caters to a niche market.
In this case the niche market are readers with a sense of humor :-).
Dark, depressing, and edgy is great for some products but not the majority. A sense of humor goes way further in attracting new customers.
The humor has to be in keeping with the energy of that particular community. What you'd install in the window of a shop in Greenwich Village is different from a similar shop on upper Madison Avenue - both in NYC but in very different neighborhoods.
A cute, sweet, humorous window display brings a bit of joy to people. Consider installing one soon.
Please let me know if you get compliments!
