Augmented reality helps Office Depot beat the back-to-school blues

Stephen Whiteside

This event report demonstrates how Office Depot has utilised augmented reality to differentiate itself during the back-to-school season, an intensely competitive period on the retail calendar.

Augmented reality helps Office Depot beat the back-to-school blues

Stephen WhitesideWarc

The back-to-school shopping season has become an object lesson in how price cuts and promotions encourage a race to the bottom at the expense of building brands.

In each of the last two years, however, Office Depot has successfully altered – or, more accurately, augmented – its marketing strategy to stand out during this crucial period on the retail calendar.

"A couple of back-to-school seasons ago, we really wanted to do something interesting and differentiating," Emery Skolfield, Office Depot's senior director/digital marketing, told delegates at South By Soutwest...

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