Every year, a select group of TRADE students, accompanied by some of the course teaching staff members, participate in the Retail Symposium organised by “Technological University Dublin” di Dublino (TUD) as part of the Retail Symposium Lab activities, one of the many innovative teaching workshops offered by the TRADE Second-cycle degree course.
The TUD, with 30,000 students, is the third largest university in Ireland, and the largest for Retail studies. It offers a Master's degree in Retail, which is similar in content to the Second-cycle degree in Trade and Consumer Marketing and, within this framework, organises a week of seminars each year on a specific Retail Marketing topic. The seminars are held by managers from leading international companies, academics and retail experts. This year, the theme of the Symposium was innovation in distribution formats: "Thinking Outside the Box: Retail Formats for 21st Century Retailing'.
For the fourth year running, the TRADE Second-cycle degree course offered its students the international 'Retail Symposium' workshop to develop their ability to analyse, communicate and present in English on retail topics in front of a highly qualified, native-speaking audience.
The students selected to participate in the Workshop, after a careful and in-depth analysis of the major trends in the international distribution context, of the main Italian success stories in format innovation (Fico, ExtraCoop, Starbucks Roastery Reserve, Gucci Garden) and the drafting of a report in English, presented their proposal of an innovative store format during the Symposium confronting the TUD audience under the careful judgement of university professors as judges.
"This experience was a reason for personal growth and allowed us to get a taste of a different retail environment from the Italian one while giving us the opportunity to test ourselves and help us practice for future work. During these days we were also able to appreciate Ireland, a country whose growth and ability to innovate is increasingly evident and from which we have much to learn" some participants told us.
The workshop, which concluded with a week-long stay in Dublin, gave students the opportunity not only to critically discuss contemporary retail issues relevant to business, but also to participate in the 'Checkout Conference 2019: Rising to the Challenges'. This was a major event for the consumer goods industry and retail world, organised by international consultancy Dunnhumby where top managers from Tesco Ireland, Waitrose, Mondelez and Heineken discussed the latest developments in the retail market.
Finally, the TRADE students took part in organised tours of the Fujitsu companies - visiting the technology centre for Retail Innovation here - and Java Republic. On this occasion, they were able to meet with store managers and marketing directors and ask them questions related to specific company strategies.
The collaboration with the TUD does not stop: in 2021 we participated online in the new Symposium!
