Farmers, like most of New Zealand’s big retailers puts out a catalogue of specials to the wider public, by letter drop, a couple of times a month. A lot of work goes into producing and designing these catalogues (not including distribution!) and the experience you have as a “user” is one of being able to pick up something very versatile where you can flick through and find the information you need quickly and easily. As well as that you have this very tactile catalogue which can be kept for easy future reference (“how much was that breadmaker again?”).
Catalogues work as a marketing tool for these companies and are useful (even if we don’t always want to admit it) for us as consumers. Ask anyone who has moved into an apartment and no longer receives coupon books or catalogues.
It’s also something the web can help deliver on. While the web isn’t as good as paper for versatility, it does perform better as a reference and can be accessed from multiple points (including at the office :S ).
Traditionally, New Zealand’s companies have been slow to move in taking their marketing catalogues online in a usable form. If you were lucky you’d have access to a 5MB PDF file that excluded almost anyone on dialup and would’ve amounted to 1-3% of early Jetstream plans traffic allowance. Sometimes you’d have access to giant Jpegs that would be almost unusable for most computer users.
So what do you do? Well a little over a week ago, we[Intergen] helped Farmers go live with a Flash-based catalogue for their website that lets users literally flip through the pages of the catalogue. It helps to present the catalogue in a format that users are familiar with as well as using the web’s strengths for a better experience (zooming, one-click page turning, etc).
Go and give it a spin yourself »
Need a comparison? Try Briscoes.
Comments
There are 4 responses to Flipping through the catalogue
Monday, 6th November 2006 12:02 am
Mr Lewis,
Much as I love your Farmers eulogy – and as a big fan of all things john lewis, I would love to: I feel it’s my designer duty to say a few things about ya flash example (no pun intended).
Long, long ago back in the day – well ok the early days of the web, how often did clients ask me for websites that looked like books? How (!) they exclaimed, pages were (and still are) a great convention that right-brained civillisation had really mastered. They’d really got that whole sequential turning thing down. How often? Well, all the time, actually.
But, pages are, well – sequential. And websites? Well they’re not.
So I’m left wondering why would Farmers choose to use a turning page metaphor?
Ok I get that that a turning page metaphor will be intuitive to people who have very little exposure to the web.
But will people with very little exposure to the web be downloading flash 9?
And will they be downloading it so that they can turn the interactive pages of a catalogue that they could either pick up at a store or have shoved through their letter box?
I’m just not sure.
And just to keep on keeping on, well, if you are gonna use that kind of feature, then why not make it serve a use? For example, by making the corner reveal some of the content of the next page, so that you get a preview of what’s coming up. (I thought that was what it was going to do – and got a bit frustrated when the corner didn’t pull back any further).
Anyhoo, Lewis that’s quite enough of me.
your 2nd favourite fan and flash critic.
Monday, 6th November 2006 2:44 pm
Interesting points,
Just a note I guess in rebuttal:
The flash player runs on 6+ for the catalogue and even though you are completely right about the fact websites should never be books, catalogues are just that .. catalogues.
The page by page flip is exactly how users interact with catalogues offline. And given the content type, it is the most intuitive way people understand looking at catalogue material.
Take : http://www.magwerk.com/mag.php?magazine=encore&language=en
Could you imagine this works as a plain website?
Another point to note, is the flash is a whole lot smaller in size than the alternative.
Farmers full catalogues are MB’s in size. Presenting through flash it is now KB’s. Unless you like downloading huge PDF files, then this is a very plausible alternative.
And Farmers arent the only company to put their catalogues online. If this option is cheap, easy to implement and creates a better & faster way for users to access information, isnt it better?
And hey, Farmers has been really smart in allowing users to have both options. Flash enabled great. Flash not, no worries, you have an alternative.
Oh .. I dont want to harp on, but if you do pull back the page, it does reveal the next pages content, unless the content is still loading in.
Please let me know if there are any other thoughts around this ..
I see the ultimate benefit, but maybe I am missing something.
Monday, 6th November 2006 3:47 pm
Thanks for the comments guys.
Sally Coe! I’m pleased to announce you are the proud owner of the 100th comment on my blog. Hoorah!
Monday, 6th November 2006 9:11 pm
Thanks for the enligtenement Sam! I feel suitably filled in on all the assumptions I’d made. (I still can’t get the corner reveal-content thing to work – but maybe I’m just not patient enough/skilled with a mouse enough).
On the magwerk stuff, well I personally love a designery designery site, but still, I remain unconvinced about the turning page metaphor. Just don’t see the value-add meself. But that’s coming from a designer who’s spent years developing interfaces for complex sites that can’t rely on linear metaphors.
I love that the flash file is smaller than the image version: a milestone indeed for all things flash!
s’laters