Fresh

Leading up to the holidays last year I was keeping an eye on what West Elm was doing with their email designs. They were aggressively marketing to me and I was impressed with all of the emails I received! The clean design and photography is really first class and they used a number of devices to keep them interesting day-to-day.

West elm has a slew of what look to be templates that are super clean in their design. They rely on the great product photography for the most part and always have a grid as the foundation. There is care taken with the typography and this helps the designs sing. The photography is very high quality with beautiful staging.

Note that the text footers were longer than what I’m showing here. My screenshots only show the first part to make sure the images aren’t too long. But you can get an idea of how they are formatted.

The emails are generally monochromatic and always complement the colors in the product photography (which are usually neutrals, so this is easy). West Elm has the freedom as a brand to use their logo in different colors which is great to tie the entire email together in one primary color.

The email above is just about as over-the-top holiday-themed as I saw from West Elm. One thing that I appreciated was that West Elm didn’t only stick to the typical red and green color scheme for this time of year. They weren’t afraid to use yellows, interesting shades of green, or just gray.

Another technique for keeping the emails interesting is the different layouts that are seen in the main area. Some of the emails here rely on one image, the email above has a three column layout and you’ll see the last one in my list has a nice rectangle message area followed by a grid of products.

These emails and products are obviously geared toward an audience who appreciates aesthetics so it does make sense that they are so image heavy. Although, after having said that, the emails fare well if you have your images turned off, too (the offer is stated in the pre-header).

The email above is an example of how they handle an email that is mostly typography-based. West Elm is not afraid to keep it simple (as evinced by their product line as well.) This email was refreshing to see admist some of the more hectic things going on in my inbox.

Another element that I like that West Elm added for the holidays, is an added “ship it in time” area at the top of the functional footer. It isn’t intrusive but gives an overview of the key dates you need to purchase by to send gifts by Christmas and Hanukkah for different types of shipping options. This is a really smart idea!

I’m just about always happy to see an email from West Elm, and if nothing else, it is to check out what they are doing design-wise. Their subtle changes day to day and overall aesthetic are really successful in this medium. Nice work West Elm!

What retailers have you seen that have consistently good design in their emails?