try somewhere a little more appealing.  As the shop owner, this sucks because a tonne of time, effort and cash went into that shop, only for it to stumble at the final step. The shop window is the front line in the battle for customers’ attention and education.  In the cut and thrust of marketing comms, that window is your advertising.  Advertising has the power to make or break brands. Why else would retailers invest so much in it? Cutting the window budget needs to be done carefully. If not, the ramifications can be huge.  Cutting straight to the case, if cuts need to be made, it’s imperative to discuss the flow-on effects with your production partners early. This opens dialogue about what needs to stay, what can be given up and what the desired end result can be. Every marketer worth their salt knows the marketing funnel – awareness leads to consideration, conversion, loyalty then advocacy. The top bit is where a lot of the window dressing happens – broad reach awareness designed to drive the rest of the funnel. Familiarity that breeds some kind of trust and assurance your brand might be the one to do the job when the need arises. It pays to invest at the top of the funnel. Good marketers know this. But even good marketers get squeezed. That money’s got to come from somewhere and a fair chunk of marketers start by pulling it straight out of the window. Some logic might suggest it makes sense because it’s at the end of the chain, when all the good, operational, strategic money has been spent. Chronologically it’s the last cost out the door. Seems to make sense in the marketing department, too. First, there’s media spend, agency and supplier fees and all the ancillary bits and pieces. Another reason to cut the production budget is that it can be hard to quantify where the money goes. It’s a variable cost in the most pure sense. Pulling out 10-30 per cent from production just forces the agency and production partners to get more creative in their concepts and execution – you’ll get pretty much the same result for less money right? Not necessarily. I’ve worked for clients who understand the importance of a beautiful shop window. And they’re willing to pay for it – but they demand every dollar is there for all to see. It pays off. Their brands are seen to care about quality and how they present. I’ve also seen many smart clients push for high-quality windows for less money.  As an agency, it’s our job to fight harder to make every production dollar work, but the dance can be a delicate one. Having a more integrated solution helps – creative, production and media all singing the same tune can reap all sorts of benefits, particularly when slicing up the production pie across a variety of media. However you cut it, it should always be monitored closely and worked through intimately with your partners. It might seem like a little cut here and there won’t matter too much but it could mean the difference between establishing a quality lasting brand and one that’s merely a cheap flash in the pan.  We work in an industry that will work with just about any budget handed to us to deliver an outsized return. And we understand cuts to production costs are always going to happen.  But repeatedly and indiscriminately doing so is a huge detriment to your window.  Further reading: Why retailers must rethink their Meta and Google ad strategies in 2025