Place Branding and Story-Doing:  A Holistic Approach to Improving Experiential Marketing

By Winfield Salyards, Marketing Coordinator at Heinz Marketing
For a few years now placemaking has been “all the rage” in office design.  It has become somewhat common for hip companies to have beer taps in their kitchens, an area for naps, or gaming consoles in a lounge area.  These types of things create culture, spaces for breaks away from desks and opportunities for conversation and innovation of spur of the moment ideas.
This holistic planning is what placemaking is about.  Placemaking as a philosophy originated in the urban design and architecture space, where it is applied as a way of creating impactful and useful public spaces.  In business it is most often applied as an office design tool.  However, placemaking is also a marketing tool.  Let’s get into it.
MIT’s Department of Urban Studies and Planning defines placemaking as “The deliberate shaping of an environment to facilitate social interaction and improve a community’s