A New Kind Of Gift Shop For Children's Hospitals

Online, January 29, 2011 (Newswire.com) - The newly opened Sallie Bender Guild Gift Shop, located on the first floor lobby of the new Helen DeVos Children's Hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan is a 1900 square foot retail space created specifically for and about children. This first-of-its-kind hospital gift shop combines a uniquely distinctive children's specialty store assortment with developmental-oriented toys and activities created for children with special needs. The store also offers a vast array of products specifically chosen to inspire creativity, promote safety, provide comfort during the recovery process and support the overall well-being of children.

k+iDesigns worked extensively in collaboration with the executive team at Spectrum Health, Helen DeVos Children's Hospital and the nearly 100 volunteer member Sallie Bender Guild in Grand Rapids to bring to life an inspiring new retail store as a part of the new hospital. Through in-depth interviews, market research, analysis and detailed strategy development, k+iDesigns provided custom interior design, fixtures, graphics, operational recommendations, complete merchandise assortment, store set-up and visual merchandising of more than 4,000 distinct items. The objective of the project was to complement the design, mission, and vision of the children's hospital while providing an additional avenue to ensure an exceptional patient and consumer experience. The environment serves as an uplifting escape for the kid in everyone.

"The k+iDesigns team quickly embraced our vision for a very special retail space within our children's hospital and became a partner in seeing the project through to reality," said Trillium Hibbeln, hospital transition leader for the Helen DeVos Children's Hospital. "Our customers are thrilled with the experience of the store and very impressed with the thoughtful product selections that support the health and healing of the families we serve."

"Working with k+iDesigns has been such a pleasure. They more than met our needs and expectations. This team listened to our dreams and visions and helped turn them into reality, said Shari Schwanzl, Vice President of Nursing Services. "Their commitment, energy and work ethic have been extremely impressive and they truly created an exceptional experience for our team!"

"The development of The Sallie Bender Guild Gift Shop was definitely a labor of love for all of us. It quickly became a passion of ours to create the right retail solution for the children, their families and friends, hopefully helping their time in the hospital be a little easier and let them be a kid... no matter where they are." Said Kari Ihle, Partner k+iDesigns.

The Sallie Bender Guild Gift Shop formally opened on January 11, 2011 in conjunction with the opening of the new 206-bed, 464,000 square foot Helen DeVos Children's Hospital at 100 Michigan Street in Grand Rapids, MI.

Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, helendevoschildrens.org, is a member of Spectrum Health, a not-for-profit health system in West Michigan that offers a full continuum of care through the Spectrum Health Hospital Group, a collection of nine hospitals and more than 170 service sites; the Spectrum Health Medical Group and West Michigan Heart physician groups total more than 600 providers; and Priority Health, a health plan with 600,000 members. Spectrum Health's 16,700 employees, 1,500 medical staff members and 2,350 volunteers are committed to delivering the highest quality care. In 2010, Spectrum Health was named a Top 10 Health System by Thomson Reuters.