Connected Retail London competition winner

As one of London’s largest landowners we’re proud to support a vibrant range of businesses 🛒.

With over 31 million passenger journeys everyday, our network is a unique opportunity for many retailers 🛍️.

As the needs of customers change, physical retailers continue to adapt and rethink their offerings – often becoming destinations in themselves! 🤳

Our first ever retail innovation competition

Following an exciting launch in May, we challenged businesses to come up with an innovative and technological concept. We asked that it reimagines physical retail space that not only meets the needs of our customers, but pushes the boundaries of retail as well 🤯.

Following 29 entries and 10 incredible shortlisted concepts, we’re excited to announce Sook as the winner! 🏆

The most adaptive retail space in the world

Sook’s technology allows businesses and individuals to have a physical space as and when they need it. With time slots as short as one hour, Sook enables tailored retail space and encourages retailers to create their own digital interior. 🤩

Sook also embodies our competition’s ethos. They will now be able to pilot their concept in London with free retail space on our estate for twelve months.

This hugely successful competition enables us to use our estate in an innovative way that supports even more young and small businesses to thrive and grow in London.

Shortlisted concepts

Following stiff competition, we chose our winner from our shortlisted concepts. Find out more about each of them below. 👇

MakersCAFE

A place where people can ‘make’ things by using innovative state-of-the-art technologies. This includes 3D printing and laser-cutting, while also being in a social interactive cafe environment ☕

Nayad

Gives customers the chance to purchase mineral water exactly to their tastes. This is done by offering it as either still or sparkling, at a range of temperatures and with optional healthy additions, while getting rid of the need for disposable bottles ♻️

Petit Pil

An experiential shop, working research lab and interactive exhibition for their company. They design clothes that grow through seven different sizes, fitting children between 9 months and 4 years 👶

Popertee

Go-London powered by Popertee will enable international brands to create an experiential retail presence for the first time in the UK across TfL’s estate. The permanent “pop-up” space will be powered by data, enabling smarter measurement of the campaign 📣

PopSquare

An AI-enabled marketplace which offers mobile, automated pop-up stores. These stores support the launch of new products or brands in a more automated and cost-effective way by combining online and offline experiences and using big data 📈

Pop & Rest

Offers people in large cities the chance to book a single occupancy sleep and meditation pod. Booked by the hour via app, users can personalise their experience through music, lighting and aroma 😴

Vastari

Matches content with venues for experiences worldwide. The company’s proposal is to manage a rolling schedule of temporary, ticketed exhibitions at the retail location, imported from around the world 🖼️

Sensei

Offers to make retail autonomous and checkout-free. This will be done by using an integrated system of cameras and AI algorithms so that all products picked by each customer are registered automatically for further billing when they leave the store 🛒

Texel

Uses computer vision and state-of-the-art machine learning algorithms to provide shoppers with digital avatars and personal recommendations. These are used to try out different outfits, so they have confidence when shopping for clothes online 🛍️

How we’re working with these companies

We are seeking to engage with many of these shortlisted companies, which also showed exceptional creativity with their concepts, so that they can realise the potential that our retail estate can offer them and their business as they look to grow.

For more information about the competition, please read our Applicant kit and Competition Guidelines.