Designing Moments That Matter: Edie Gelardi’s Story

Justin Levinson (00:10)‍

Hey everybody, welcome to the Agency Side Podcast. I'm your host, Justin Levinson. And today I'm here with Edie Jelardi, a powerhouse with 20 years in printing and visual communications. As division president at Dugall Visual Solutions, she's helped major retail and beauty brands turn ideas into standout visual and experiential moments. Edie, it is great to be with you today. Great.

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Edie Gelardi (00:30)

to

be with you too, Justin. Thank you for having me. Yep.

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Justin Levinson (00:33)

So as I like to do with all of our guests on the show, I'm interested in your origin story and how you got into the advertising services space.

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Edie Gelardi (00:41)

Yeah, sure. I actually started on the client side of things. I was in marketing, but I felt like I always wanted something a bit more creative. Every time I got closer to the idea, I got more excited about the work. So that led me to a small agency where I got heavily involved in helping our clients with their tradeship work. And what I really liked about that is I got to see how brands show up in real life, which was quite different than how they showed up in 2D on paper. I was collaborating.

to build these trade shows with a local fabrication house and a printer. And they ended up recruiting me to the vendor side of things. I loved it there. I thought it was very fast paced and exciting work. And I managed a lot of great salespeople and worked with a lot of great clients. Then my life took a turn. I got pregnant with twins and I realized I probably needed a bit more flexibility in my world. So I went into full-time sales and that

did give me the flexibility I needed. And that also opened up this great world of open-cell beauty. I started doing work for the likes of Sephora and Macy's Impulse stores and Dillard's Edge stores. And what I realized quickly is that in these stores, there isn't an associate behind a case line to Spillay helping the consumer navigate the beauty world. But if I could

create that environment with a display, a fixture, a graphic, and actually get people to stop in their tracks, pay attention to the marketing message, discern which product was best for them. Then I was going to help both the retailer meet their goals and the brands meet their goals. And that's what I ended up doing. And I've really loved it ever since. It's really been my passion to understand that a graphic and a display wasn't just decoration.

but a vehicle for persuasion.

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Justin Levinson (02:37)

Yeah, I love that. Maybe just for folks who ⁓ might not be familiar with what visual solutions are and what Dugald does at such a high level, maybe you could explain to us a little bit about that.

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Edie Gelardi (02:49)

Yeah,

at Dugall, have over 500 people whose specialty is bringing brands, vision or ideas to life in physical environments. So that can be anything from a print to a display, to a 3D sculpted moment, to a digital signage. And this can happen in, you know, a flagship store or global rollout or in a cafe or at a small pop-up.

doesn't matter where, museums, offices, we bring brands visions to life ⁓ anywhere. I like to say that we cover the entire scope of space, meat, work. wherever the space is and wherever the brand is, we're going to be there and we'll help them with everything from concept through global rollout. I think what makes Dugall unique is that we have a very boutique style service level.

but a very industrial sized firing power. So we operate at a very large scale, as you mentioned, and that allows us to have everything that we need under one roof. So we have supply chains and fabrication and printers, and I mentioned 3D printing and CGI artists and digital signage teams and logistical teams all in-house. Then that I think allows us to execute.

and scale with precision.

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Justin Levinson (04:18)

Yeah, I'm interested in how lot of this work happens from the work as soon as you get it to how it's completed, what's the process within the agency?

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Edie Gelardi (04:32)

Yeah, interesting. It happens different with each job. I say we start with a blank page every day and we literally do. Some brands come to us and have, you know, full decks from their agencies, from their global headquarters already, you know, vetted out down to materiality that they want to use. And our job then is to find the best way of executing that. Other brands come to us with napkin sketches or ideas.

Or not even that. We know we want to promote, you know, a sun-kissed but we have no idea how to get there. What are your ideas? So oftentimes we're involved in the conceptualization, in the research that goes into what other brands are doing, how this brand or this product stands out from others. And we're putting together full ideations and decks with

various options and avenues to get there. And other times, you know, we're just, we're just doing the execution.

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Justin Levinson (05:32)

Are brands seeing this type of marketing differently than they did when you were earlier on in your career?

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Edie Gelardi (05:38)

Yeah, I think, you know, pop-ups are really changing the way that brands are showing up. I think they used to be, you know, a, what I want to say, like a novelty, a one-off marketing moment. And now they're legitimate avenues for connecting brands to customers in a really meaningful way. And brands are building out full calendar, experienced calendars and,

putting a high level budget behind it. And I think that, you know, I think we can agree that modern consumers want more meaning when they spend money, when they buy something. And I think the pop-up is the perfect answer to that, right? It's about community and connection and discovery. And those are not things that you can easily get online, right? But it's also, ⁓ consumers also love it because they are

experiencing something and it becomes social currency for them. People don't necessarily like to post what they buy, but they love to post what they experience. So again, that's a perfect, perfect answer for that. You know, I think a well executed pop-up experience makes you feel like you belong to something special. Like you're an insider, like you've been given an invitation to something.

And I really think the magic of pop-ups is that, you know, entertainment is really education. And a sense of belonging naturally evolves into a purchase. So it's more organic and interesting that way.

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Justin Levinson (07:15)

Do you have a favorite pop-up that you've been part of?

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Edie Gelardi (07:19)

Yeah, I think, well, there's so many, think the only one that comes to mind, because I did it recently and it is still on the move. It is a mobile pop-up. It's something we did for Dolce & Gabbana. We literally took an Airstream and we gutted the inside of it and recreated furniture that would fit inside of it, complete with sampling stations and makeup areas and lush foliage lemon walls.

and custom lounge chairs with branded umbrellas. You can see it was like this Mediterranean paradise on wheels that we created. And it was to promote their light blue fragrance, which totally tied in to their national advertising, worldwide advertising. And it was, we had two months to produce it. So that might've been the challenging part behind it.

And because it was mobile, because it was moving, it had lots of layers of engineering involved with it. So we had to figure out how to secure the furniture to the vehicle without piercing the vehicle, because we didn't want any rain or other unwanted things to come into it. And how we were going to fit everything in the vehicle once the door was closed, because the experience extended beyond the vehicle itself. There was, yeah, we needed electricity in there because we had a ⁓

freezer for lemon popsicles and, you know, how are we going to manage the, you know, the condensation and the water and the all of that. So there were lots of on the fly marketing meetings and changes and a lots of pivoting in the moment. But it reminded me that, you know, creativity isn't really about control. It's more about flexibility. And I think we can all agree that the best ideas come when you have no choice.

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Justin Levinson (09:14)

Totally. Who on your team is handling all of these logistics in terms of like, you know, all the things you mentioned, it seems like you need a real expert. know, what type of roles are within your team are handling that. Thanks for tuning in folks. This episode is brought to you by Coming Up Creative, a relationship first boutique creative recruitment agency.

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Edie Gelardi (10:02)

Yeah, well, we've got brand managers who deal with the brand themselves and who become quite expert in that brand. So they really get in the minds and mindset and understand the objectives of the brand. And then we got project managers who are internal facing, who take the information from the brand managers and make sure that it's communicated correctly to the myriad of production teams that we use for any particular build.

And then of course we've got the, you know, the logistics. we've got a whole internal, as I mentioned before, logistics department. they manage things like installations and, you know, tear, tear downs and rebuilds and all of that. And so, you know, it's people from all those departments coming together to create something special.

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Justin Levinson (10:56)

How do you form collaboration within a team? What's the secret sauce on that front?

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Edie Gelardi (11:02)

Interesting. ⁓ I think it's, you know, evolving all the time. I think it's about personal and close relationships. And sometimes that takes time together, right? It takes knowing people and communication is one of the, you know, hardest things that I think we do as a team and making sure that we're understood. So the more that you know somebody and the more time you spend together, the more likely you are to, ⁓ you know, have that connection.

and finish each other's sentences and understand what somebody's looking for.

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Justin Levinson (11:34)

⁓

It's a lot of folks work in office, correct? Is there any remote people as well?

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Edie Gelardi (11:41)

We do. know, Dugall has offices in a number of different places. Main headquarters is New York, but my office is based out of Burbank, California. We have offices in Seattle and offices in Manhattan as well, and then West Hampton also. So it is important, like I said, that we get together, that we come together often, that we exchange ideas in person. And as beautiful as Zoom and the other tools are, I don't think you

get what you get from those the same way that you do when you're together.

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Justin Levinson (12:14)

Totally. There's a sense of collaboration. know most of the clients that we have, there was a period during COVID where everybody really worked remotely and that was the big thing. And then now it's either hybrid or in-office and most agencies sort of, they seem like they like the in-person collaboration that's important. How do you see, I guess, how do you personally view success after one of the projects has been done? Like, how do you, do you see that like, I guess...

It's partially, I'm sure it has to do with the client and how they're feeling, but just kind of curious how you, how you feel success is.

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Edie Gelardi (12:47)

Yeah, I mean, obviously if the client's happy, we're happy, right? But I always want to make sure that we're delivering extra as well. So I want to make sure that, you know, we work with a lot of younger brands sometimes that, that maybe don't have as much experience as some of the bigger brands that we've worked with. So for them, I want to make sure that I'm helping them think like a big brand and I'm making sure that the, the why, that the story.

as well as the execution, you know, the how, are coming together in an integrated, seamless way. And sometimes they forget about the story and they forget about the fact that if it has meaning, the whatever it is that we're doing has extra meaning and ties back to the product, it's going to be that much more effective. So I think when I can deliver a little something extra like that.

It also feels like a win. And of course there's a lot of time constraints in what we do. I can't explain why, but it always seems like things happen at the last minute. We might be the last person in the line. So we get called when there's no time left. So when we execute something that is complex or should have taken an extra week, but we do it in record time. I always feel like that's a big win too, because at the end of the day, the client.

needs this message in the store for a variety of reasons. In the store or on the streets or in a cafe or whatever it is, right? In a museum.

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Justin Levinson (14:16)

Yeah. Do you, is the brand usually very helpful in helping you tell the story? Is it a lot of collaboration on that front as well?

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Edie Gelardi (14:24)

think it happens best that way. Absolutely. When they come with their own ideas and what they like and what they don't, what they've tried and hasn't worked, what they have tried and has worked. I like to ask those questions a lot. I also ask, ask what they've seen from other competitors that they are thought was effective. That gets me more into their mindset. The more that I can adopt their mindset, the more that I can understand about their

mission, their values, their voice, the better that we are at creating the end result for sure.

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Justin Levinson (15:00)

Yeah. Do you find that there is a difference in some the smaller brands to the bigger brands in terms of their way of thinking? Do feel like there is a lot more handholding for the smaller companies or do you feel like sometimes the smaller brands come in and they're knocking it out of the park too?

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Edie Gelardi (15:16)

Yeah, for sure. Some of them do, you know, and some startups have, you know, great minds behind them, right? That they came from big companies, so they bring all of that expertise with them. You know, I think a lot depends on if they've ever done anything like this before, right? So if, if they're entering, you know, the world of Alta and they've never done open sell before.

There's a lot of logistics behind that and we may need to help them with all of those logistics. know, if it's the first pop-up they've ever done, there are things that they're not even gonna know to think about that we can help them through. So it depends on the project and if they have experience doing it.

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Justin Levinson (15:51)

Yeah. And if they're thinking about doing a pop-up, how are they usually coming to you? Are you reaching out to different brands sharing your capabilities or is a lot of it just inbound or how does that usually come to your desk?

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Edie Gelardi (16:04)

Yeah, I think, you know, we do a fair amount of promoting our work and I think that's really important. But I do find as I do this for more and more years that, that, you people find you, ⁓ both they're, you know, they've either worked with us before and they're coming back around or they did see something that they did that we really liked and they want to execute something like that. So yeah.

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Justin Levinson (16:30)

Yeah, great work usually leads to more clients. So I see how that works. Well, what's your favorite part of your job personally? What do you like doing the most?

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Edie Gelardi (16:38)

Gosh, you know, I love being out there with clients. I love hearing what is on their mind and the struggles that they're facing. And I like coming back with ideas and figuring out how we can help solve those, solve those problems or add to a great idea that they have. I think that's really fun and meaningful to me. It feels like I don't just have one job, but a hundred jobs, right? Cause I'm little, have a little bit of a, in each of these companies. Yeah.

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Justin Levinson (17:06)

Great. That's cool. What do you look for like when you're hiring people? What kind of, what kind of personalities are you attracted to in terms of bringing them onto your team?

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Edie Gelardi (17:15)

the

hardest thing in the world, isn't it? I don't know. You probably know better than anybody, right? But it's, it's, it's tough. You think you know what you want and everybody comes together and is, is excited and then it doesn't work out. And you're like, why didn't that work out? It was perfect. And then, then the strangest, you know, uh, meeting will happen and you're like, well, that doesn't seem like that's going to be a good fit. And all of a sudden it's like the best fit.

boggles my mind, I will say. I do find it the hardest thing to do. But, you know, in general, we look for, you know, people who aren't afraid to get their hands dirty, because this is a very hands-on business. We're workers, right? Yeah. That's the difference, I think, between the vendor side, perhaps, and the client side of things. Yeah. We're looking for somebody who, you know, thrives in ideas. And they don't have to have come from, you know,

the same kind of clientele that we're looking for, just somebody who's excited about ideas, somebody who creates in their own life, somebody who, you know, is an artist at heart. Those sorts of people. And then of course they have to be, you know, well organized, articulate and all the other things, right?

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Justin Levinson (18:21)

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, it's an interesting industry and it's to find those conceptual thinkers. It's funny that you can find ⁓ really talented people from different walks of life, ⁓ different agency backgrounds. Yeah, is funny how sometimes you can meet somebody that you think is going to be the perfect fit. It doesn't necessarily work out, but then somebody maybe a little left of center comes in and just brings something to the table that you've never experienced before.

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Edie Gelardi (18:53)

love it when that happens actually.

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Justin Levinson (18:56)

Yeah,

is pretty exciting when that does happen. what's been like, you know, just out of curiosity, what are usually like the hardest people to find? Like what roles are usually like the trickiest to fit?

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Edie Gelardi (19:07)

If there's one that stands out as trickier than any others. You know, when we're hiring a brand manager, somebody who we know we have a need for a particular client, maybe that becomes a little trickier because now I have the client needs in mind and I'm hiring somebody that's going to work well with them. And so that becomes a very specific requirement, right? As opposed to more broad. And maybe that takes a bit more time and a bit more research to...

work out.

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Justin Levinson (19:37)

Yeah, totally. As a recruiter, I'm always interested as you know, finding out what are the tricky roles to fill in different sectors in terms of like just, you know, yourself in terms of like things you enjoy to do outside of work. What kind of hobbies and things do you enjoy doing?

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Edie Gelardi (19:51)

You know, I would say bar none, travel is my favorite thing to do outside of work. And, I honestly find so much inspiration in travel, right? You're stepping outside of your comfort zone often, or least the way I like to travel, I like to do that. You're, you're experiencing other cultures that might have very differing views from your own, seeing how they work in everyday life, behave in everyday life, which, which.

can be very eye-opening. Yeah, travel is always a good idea in my opinion and I can never get too much of it. I actually never like to go back to the same place twice, which is the hard thing for my husband because he loves going back to the same place again again. There's a familiarity to it and I understand that and comfort level and you get to relax a little bit more quickly, which I appreciate all those things. But for me, it's about exploring and discovery and newness.

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Justin Levinson (20:50)

I can pick up what your husband's putting down. I'm a bit of a creature of habit. I got my spots that I go to that I'm used to going to. So I understand that. yeah, your sense of adventure, I definitely respect that as well. Do you have a ⁓ trip? Obviously you'll never return there again, but is there a favorite place?

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Edie Gelardi (21:08)

They all hold such special places in my heart. know, we did a trip to Africa a couple of years ago that was beyond magical. We've, you know, been to Thailand, we've been to Costa Rica, we've, ⁓ you know, traveled all over Europe. I always say, and this is not my saying, but Paris is always a good idea. I adore Paris. You know, been to the South Pacific. think that's the best water I've ever seen.

In the world, just that body of water is wow. Thought I had died and gone to heaven.

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Justin Levinson (21:45)

Sounds cool. It's getting a little chilly here in Vermont. So you're, you're attempting me to buy a plane ticket and get out of here. That's cool. Cool. Well, ⁓ I guess I just had a couple more questions for you. ⁓ Do you see any like a big trends that are, that are coming that, that, you know, brands should be aware of coming into 2026? there any, do you have any ⁓ hidden knowledge?

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Edie Gelardi (22:08)

Yeah, you know, I'll turn back to pop-ups again and tell you that I see a few trends happening there. One is, you know, the beauty of a pop-up is that it can be used as a data-driven moment, right? So you can experiment with everything from, you know, pricing and product assortment and messaging and visuals all without a long-term lease, right? So you're unencumbered and it's easy to do. I think that's why we're seeing as a trend.

very large brands, right, that are global, as well as direct to consumer startups, all using a pop-up as a data-driven exercise. As a matter of fact, I had read that Glossier opened its pop-up in London so that it could do just that before ahead of their physical store, before opening their permanent store. And they measured things like dwell time and local engagement and whatnot to get

data so that their store was successful. So I definitely see pop-ups used that way as a trend. I think there's a lot of other trends happening in pop-ups. think they're becoming, they're happening for a shorter period of time, so they're becoming more exclusive. So you've got two days, right? A pop-up is only alive for two or three days now, and it drives this excitement and this interesting nature about it's going to be gone, so I better go now, right?

So you see the line around the corner and you see the excitement about this, this two day exclusive event. Oftentimes they're also offering something that you can get there that you can only get there. Right. So an exceptional product, line extension or a special fragrance or something just for the pop-up. So that is also interesting. I think in general, everybody wants things to be more sustainable. Nobody wants waste and you know, especially the younger consumer.

⁓ So I think, you know, this pop-up that we did for Dolce & Gabbana where it's on wheels and it goes to a place and then breaks down and then goes to another place is, you know, a pop-up being reused in a very brilliant way and having less waste. think that sustainable materials have been on the rise for a while and will continue to be.

A lot of retailers that we work with that, you know, are only printing on recyclable and recycled fabrics. Yeah. I think that when it comes to like experiences, whether it's digital standalone or integrating that into a pop-up, I think that again, I get back to this data driven equation that people are looking for. So there's a number of like lift and learn displays that we've done where you.

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Justin Levinson (24:35)

That's wonderful.

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Edie Gelardi (24:55)

When you lift up the product, immediately recognizes the display will recognize what you have picked up and start talking about that product. And then, yeah, when you put it down and pick up something else, you can also then, you know, measure how many times was this picked up and put down and how many times was it bought and create other analytics around that.

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Justin Levinson (25:16)

Yeah, I love that. don't think I even thought of it that way, but that's such a great way to capture data and know how things are performing. That's incredible. ⁓ How, final question, I'm always interested in technology and how it's affecting every different agency in the ad services space. Are you noticing a lot of diff changes within like AI or how is that affecting?

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Edie Gelardi (25:35)

Yeah, mean, AI is super exciting, right? I think it is speeding everything up. I think we are just able to do research faster. We're able to do prototyping faster, whether it's, ⁓ you know, AI helping us put together mood boards and final renderings of what something will look like in a day as opposed to even three or four days, right? Those days.

save money and help us get to market faster and save on costs and they're good all around. know, technology in general is exciting. think I mentioned the lift and learn, know, touchscreens are something we do a lot of for brands in store. This kind of self-guided education and learning moment.

They can even be tied to websites where you can shop in store from a website. So that's kind of interesting in the merging of both the online and the physical worlds.

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Justin Levinson (26:33)

That's great. Awesome. Well, Edie, it's so wonderful chatting with you today and learning everything about Dugal. You guys are really doing some exciting stuff. If people are interested in checking out the work you folks are doing, where's the best place for them to go check it out? Dugal.com. Awesome. Cool, Edie. Well, thank you so much for being here and sharing your story. And it's been a wonderful conversation. Thanks. All right. Take care. Bye-bye. Bye.

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Edie Gelardi (26:46)

Thank you, Justin. I appreciate it.