Year in Review 2023: Bernd Albl | Umdasch

Bernd Albl from Umdasch The Store Makers explains in the invidis annual commentary how Umdasch wants to expand in 2024 and why the topic of green signage is becoming increasingly important. Umdasch is one of Europe’s leading shopfitter and one of the few with a dedicated digital signage business unit.

The start of 2023 was significantly influenced by the extensive preparations for the trade fair highlight of the entire retail industry: Euroshop 2023 in Düsseldorf. Under the motto “Sustainably Together”, we as Umdasch Store Makers have not only focused on sustainable solutions when implementing stores, but also on sustainable, personal encounters, which unfortunately have been neglected over the past three years. (invidis report)The sustainable solutions at our trade fair stand ranged from store design and sustainable materials to modular shelving systems and green signage.

More Year in Review 2023

Ongoing inquiries about sustainability

Because sustainability is increasingly finding its way into digital solutions. The time is ripe, the market is ready and we are constantly receiving relevant inquiries. Driven strongly by the developments of the past year, such as around the topic of energy saving, the need and interest in sustainable products and solutions became ever greater. We will therefore continue to work intensively on green signage in particular beyond 2023.

A special project highlight last year from Umdasch Digital Solutions’ perspective: After a project phase of around two years, we were able to reach the impressive mark of more than 7,000 digital signage installations in gas station shops across Germany this year for the multi-energy company Total Energies.

We were able to celebrate another major project success together with Doka (invidis report), which also belongs to Umdasch Group AG, and Umdasch Group Ventures: Sitelight, our jointly developed digital out-of-home concept for construction sites and high-rise projects in metropolitan regions around the world, was launched at installed in an initial pilot project in Izmir, Turkey. LED screens together with the so-called Doka protective shield, a hydraulic climbing safety system for the construction site personnel, rises step by step during the construction phase and literally take outdoor advertising to a whole new level. Together with our colleagues from Doka and Umdasch Group Ventures, we are taking a pioneering role and are working together to bring DooH to construction sites.

DooH meets Climbing Formwork - Doka Umdasch Sitelight (Photo: Umdasch) — DooH meets Climbing Formwork – Doka Umdasch Sitelight (Photo: Umdasch)

Retail Media and Digital

The creation of digital advertising spaces for marketing will continue to be high on our list in the future. Retail media is currently on everyone’s lips and also offers great potential for us as one of the leading digital signage integrators in the DACH region. Also our content creation team will likely benefit from the growing demand for retail media. In addition, access to new, attractive marketing venues, such as construction sites, offers exciting opportunities for the conception and creation of impressive content, which in turn becomes accessible to a larger audience.

Digital applications are also a field that we are continuing to delve into. For Total Energies, for example, we have already implemented the so-called Dealer App, an application for controlling and managing digital signage content. We have also implemented this for our DIY-markets customer Hagebau in a slightly adapted form and now in use in version 2.0.

With the expansion of the ecosystem of our Umdasch Experience Platform, a web-based interface for integrating different digital POS touchpoints and cash register and merchandise management systems, we will also continue to push the (further) development of our own software solution for the point of sale. The planned integration of checkout solutions such as self-service cash register terminals is intended to expand our range of services to include an exciting and innovative area.

Overall, our focus in 2024 will also be on developing new geographical markets. We not only want to strengthen our position, but also expand it even further.