COOL SPACES A focused marketing campaign is just the first step in IDEO’s customized approach. Through its extensive demographic studies, IDEO developed five prototypes of the urban dweller and now uses these profiles to create spaces and places that renters really want. Among these prototypes: City Samplers, renters who are new to dense urban settings and want to dip their toes into cosmopolitan life without abandoning their favorite aspects of suburban living. Forest City designed 100, a luxury high-rise that’s part of University Park at MIT, specifically for this group. The urban project offers several suburban comforts such as on-site covered parking and plenty of green space.
Forest City also is offering more customer-focused leasing centers. Instead of the typical leasing area with a desk and a couple of chairs, many of its new urban projects feature “welcome centers.” These warm, inviting spaces resemble fine retail stores with comfortable seating areas, as well as lots of things to see and touch, such as a lighted “555” wall map highlighting nearby restaurants, shops, and entertainment venues that are five blocks, five minutes, and five miles from the property. (Take-home maps also are available.) “You can interact with the product and the environment before a salesperson even comes up to you,” says Siegal.
And the staff’s outfits even match the personality of the apartment building. For example, at Metro 417, a glamorous Los Angeles adaptive reuse project, employees wear formal uniforms while at the trendy MetLofts, also in L.A., workers wear hip clothes with Bluetooth earpieces.
Forest City’s customized approach is paying off. Rents are either on target or ahead of pro forma levels at projects where IDEO has lent its expertise. And at many of its projects, such as MetLofts, Metro 417, and 100, the company has leased up with no concessions—not even free iPods.
Resident Files Great Wall of Postcards Prospects create their own rental brochures.
Prospective renters often leave a leasing office clutching a big folder stuffed with brochures and property flyers. Most apartment owners may not admit it, but these folders all too often end up in the trash. Developer Forest City Residential and IDEO, however, devised a clever way to give prospects the information they want and need, without overloading them with stacks of unwanted papers.
The leasing centers feature eye-popping displays of 25 to 40 4×6 informational postcards on everything from a list of local coffee shops to pet-friendly amenities. Prospects can pick and choose which cards to take home, creating their own customized sales brochures. Or, the leasing agent can choose a set of postcards for the prospect based on areas of interest. “We’re creating a new way of thinking about the market literature,” says Fred Dust, a principal at IDEO, a San Francisco-based design and innovation company
The postcards don’t just help residents; they also serve as a great tracking tool for leasing agents. They can watch and see which postcards—and information—most interest prospects. If the stack of cards highlighting the property’s pet-friendly amenities quickly disappears, it’s time to start organizing a four-legged Halloween party!