Retail innovation focus of new Saint Mary’s University partnership

Vince Kennedy and Ryan Jackson, co-founders of BluShll

Innovation and the future of the retail sector were the focus of an event at the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market. 

“Encouraging innovation is fundamental to the change our province needs,” said Labi Kousoulis, Minister of Labour and Advanced Education. “It is important for our entrepreneurs to have the supports in place to help take their ideas to the next level, and that we celebrate these successes.”

The event, held during National Retail Week, celebrates some of the early results of a Memorandum of Understanding signed between Saint Mary’s University and the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market. The agreement established a retail space at the market called The Shelf, representing the first outpost of the David Sobey Centre for Innovation in Retailing and Services’ Retail Imagination Lab.

“We established The Shelf to support our local producers and artisans,” said Julie Chaisson, executive director of the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market. “This partnership will allow us to extend our support into new areas of innovation and technology that may not otherwise have been possible.”

Retail innovations range widely, from data-informed store layouts to video shelf talkers and robot sales associates, to virtual reality online and interactive digital environments. The Shelf will provide a setting to carry out pilot projects in a controlled space, with researchers there to observe, record and analyze the results.

“Studying consumer behavior in a real retail setting is a daunting task, but our professors and students embrace this challenge,” said Saint Mary’s University president Robert Summerby-Murray. “Through our partnership with the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market, we combine exceptional researchers with experts on local businesses in the retail sector to create an environment where innovation can take shape.”

BluShll, a student-led business from Saint Mary’s that helps shoppers quickly and easily learn more about the products they buy, recently tested their product at The Shelf.  BluShll helps to satisfy the desire of the socially-conscious consumer for more information about where products are sourced and to learn more about the company that sells them.

“The Shelf was an amazing venue for us to test our product and hear directly from consumers,” said Ryan Jackson, co-founder of BluShll. “We received some great feedback from people visiting the market that will be instrumental in taking our product to the next level as we prepare to develop it to enter the market.”

Saint Mary’s launches new Innovative, Creative and Entrepreneurial Mindsets Fund, calls for proposals

Saint Mary’s University invites faculty, students and staff to develop activities, events, research and teaching to enhance creative, innovative and entrepreneurial thinking.

Successful proposals will be supported through the new Innovative, Creative and Entrepreneurial Mindsets Fund.

The learning outcomes that we aspire to have all students graduate with and that this fund will help develop are:

1. Development of critical thinking skills and good judgement/discernment
2. Ability to identify problems and seek opportunities through discovery and design thinking
3. Capacity to cultivate new ideas and solve problems
4. Courage to take a risk and resilience to deal with failure
5. Aptitude to move to action and take advantage of opportunities/create social and economic value
6. Self-reflection and ability to learn from both mistakes and successes
7. Understanding of alternative ways of organizing (e.g. cooperatives, collectives, nonprofits, social enterprises, for-profits, start-ups)

Call for Proposals

Proposals are invited from individual Saint Mary's faculty, students and staff as well as from Departments, Programs, Societies and groups of individuals. The primary applicant must be a member of the Saint Mary’s University community. Applicants will provide a detailed plan including a budget (normally expected to be in the range of $1,000 to $5,000 to a maximum of $10,000/per application) with expected outcomes and agree to share what they learned in a seminar, published article and/or workshop. Applicants are encouraged to be creative in their approach and to wisely use the money they apply for. The budget is not to be used for course releases or for curriculum development activities that are a normal part of faculty teaching responsibilities.

Possible projects include everything from design thinking workshops for staff and students across the university to pitch competitions for IP that can be commercialized or a community of practice using critical thinking to address wicked problems. Note that this not funding for a start-up.

Submission of Applications for Funding and Deadline

Applications for funding are to be submitted electronically to donna.filek@smu.ca and must be received by 4 p.m. on October 31, 2017.

More information and application form (PDF)

New Sobey School program helps entrepreneurs and companies expand to international markets

See the original story at http://www.smu.ca/academics/sobey/sell-beyond-borders-launches.html.

Retail Innovation Centre and Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market look to the future

Sobey School of Business student Drew Blair at The Shelf in the Halifax Seaport Farmers' Market

What will retail look like in 25 years?

By this fall, a new partnership aims to have a retail space in the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market offer a glimpse into that innovative future.

“Saint Mary’s University is committed to lifelong learning, supporting innovation and engaging with community, and this project, I am pleased to say, reflects all these commitments.”

— Dr. Malcolm Butler, Vice President Academic and Research, Saint Mary’s University

This morning, representatives of the Market and Saint Mary’s University signed an MoU establishing the Seaport Market’s retail space called The Shelf as the first outpost of the David Sobey Centre for Innovation in Retailing and Services’ Retail Imagination Lab.

Overlooking the harbour from the Galley on the second floor of the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market, Executive Director Julie Chaisson pointed out that this event was steeped in history: Canada’s oldest continuously operating farmers’ market partnering with one of the country’s oldest universities, along with a research centre and business school named for one of Canada’s outstanding historic retail families, the Sobeys. “But this is not about the past—today, we look to the future.”

Retail innovations range widely, from data-informed store layouts, to video shelf talkers and robot sales associates, to virtual reality online and interactive digital environments. Which technology innovation should a retailer invest in? And how can the ROI be measured?

“This partnership will allow us to extend our support into new areas of innovation and technology that may not otherwise have been possible.”

— Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market Executive Director Julie Chaisson

These are the kind of questions that fires the imagination of researchers and retail analysts alike, and the Retail Imagination Lab will provide a setting to carry out pilot projects in a controlled space, with researchers there to observe, record and analyse results.

The David Sobey Centre will provide the experiments and innovation, and the Halifax Seaport Farmers Market will provide space, data access and other support through The Shelf. Students from Saint Mary’s University’s Sobey School of Business have been hired to establish the first set of innovations later this summer.

Julie Chaisson, Executive Director of the Halifax Seaport Farmers’ Market, Executive Director and Dr. Malcolm Butler, Vice President Academic and Research, Saint Mary’s University