How Starbucks Uses BIM and VR to Bring Local Spirit to its Japan Locations

It’s been 20 years since Starbucks opened its first store in Japan , creating a new paradigm in the country’s coffee culture and bringing the alluring “third place” option between home and work or school to consumers.  

Most of the company’s 1,245 stores in Japan are aimed directly at the parent company. As such, they are planned by Starbucks designers who, rather than developing standardized designs for all countries, have worked to incorporate features that express regional and historical contexts and reflect the local lifestyles. In this case, Starbucks stores specifically appeal to the Japanese market .

This approach, however, hasn’t been used from the beginning. In 1996, the first Starbucks outside of North America opened its doors in Ginza, Tokyo. Its design used a design template provided by Starbucks headquarters in Seattle, adapted only to meet Japanese building codes and space requirements. 

As Starbucks grew globally, this “one size fits all” approach fell by the wayside, and designers began experimenting with regional accents and more creative interpretations.

Changing the design process to BIM

It wasn’t until 2009 that Starbucks replaced conventional CAD software with Autodesk’s Revit, a tool already in use in Seattle. Mayu Takashima, head of the design team, recalls how her designers got started with the new software: ” We had no preparation or training; we just jumped right into it. Each designer started working in their own way.”

There came a time when it became clear that implementing BIM processes required organization and collaboration , as it was not simply about using a different tool, but rather a wholesale change in the way of working.

During the process of adopting these new processes, confusion and misunderstandings arose that forced the teams to review and establish new workflows : “We held meetings with each designer to narrow down the features we could use and the minimum requirements for each store’s design plans.” 

Eric Takao, a member of the design planning team, explained that they used feedback they received from across the team to build a foundation that ensured all their work was aligned to the same basic level.

When remodeling an existing store, the design team recreated the original 2D plans as a 3D model to perform additional design work. With access to this data, it became much easier to show the company’s business operations colleagues (such as sales managers and district directors) how each store would change. As a result, the team could significantly accelerate the pace of the design process, saving time and money .

A virtual reality studio: Ark Hills Shop

Since the summer of 2016, Starbucks in Japan began creating virtual reality (VR) content for its stores using BIM data distributed through  Autodesk Revit Live software . Revit files are easily converted into VR content, which can then be used for presentations and other information sharing.

Considering this platform, the designers gathered colleagues from other divisions to experience a visualization of the newly modeled Ark Hills store, using an HTC Vive head-mounted display: “A barista who worked at Ark Hills happened to be at Starbucks Japan headquarters before our test began,” Takao explains. 

“We had him try out the VR experience before anyone else. Even though he knew the BIM data being visualized during the actual construction process, I was surprised by his reaction. He told me how he made coffee every day in that exact location. Aspects like the height and width of the counters, and the views of the customer seating area, were exactly the same as in the real store,” Takao explains, surprised.

“Until then, in discussions with constructors, operating staff, and other divisions that needed to understand our designs, we had to explain certain parts with only a mental image as a reference,” Takashima adds, “Now we can use VR to share ideas in real time, which I hope will help us build consensus throughout our work.”

Source: https://redshift.autodesk.com/starbucks-japan-pursues-a-local-flair-through-design-in-bim-and-vr/