Marketing
Experiential design puts all the ducks in a row at Duck World
It’s no small feat designing a store selling 800-plus varieties of the rubber duck. But Duck World succeeded using a design that is experiential and unusual.
March 4, 2025 by Judy Mottl — Editor, RetailCustomerExperience.com & DigitalSignageToday.com
What's small, rubber and yellow and used to express club-like comradery among Jeep owners, help coders code, entertain toddlers (and some adults) in a bubble bath and has even become a symbol of corruption?
The answer is the iconic rubber duck, which, according to one account, also reflects the arrival of rubber manufacturing in the late 19th century.
Those first duck iterations, however, weren't so squeezy and fun to play given they were made of hard rubber and didn't float, according to the Toy Hall of Fame.
But, by the 1940s they were light in weight, smooth to the touch and and squeaked when squeezed. On Feb. 25, 1970 the rubber duck was memorialized on Sesame Street as Ernie's best friend in the song "Rubber Duckie." That ditty actually landed on the Billboard chart of best tunes that same year.
While a tiny number of people suffer from anatidaephobia (fear that a duck may be watching), most people have played with a rubber duck, bought a rubber duck, gifted a rubber duck and maybe even collect rubber ducks.
Biggest home for rubber ducks
That love, and growing adoration, for the iconic rubber duck has propelled it way beyond its small stature and yellow color.
Today's rubber ducks come in a wide range of sizes and colors. Just a quick stop at the Duck World store in Miami, Florida illustrates the rubber duck evolution.
Opened in December of 2024, the Miami retailer claims to be the largest home of rubber ducks in North America. The 1,500-square-foot store is home to 800 different rubber duck varieties and duck-themed merchandise including duck-themed artworks and sculptures.
The Miami store is one of six Duck World locations. The brand started in London, U.K., and there are five locations in England.
It was founded during the COVID years by avid rubber duck collectors Filip Perkon and Irina Fedotova and born from the entrepreneurs' first pop up in London offering unusual gifts and memorable souvenirs.
"When we started, we thought that we would be catering to duck collectors and families, but as it turned out, rubber ducks have a much wider appeal, because of their iconic status in the western world," Perkon said in an email interview. "Our customers are actually equally split between tourists, gift seekers, collectors and families, and also fairly evenly split among the age groups. Moreover, we have great interest from Jeep owners (who engage in Jeep Ducking - giving duck gifts to other jeep owners) and cruise passengers (the "cruising duck" trend, where passengers hide rubber ducks on ships)."
The co-founder, who also hold the title of chief Drake [Drake is the term for male duck], describes rubber ducks as a blank canvas for imagination and creativity, as well as a symbol that encourages duck owners to embrace the spirit of their inner child.
Perkon is a serial entrepreneur and angel investor. After graduating from the London School of Economics, he embarked on a career in finance working at BNP Paribas IB and Synergy Innovation VC. He founded Perkon Productions, an event production and consultancy agency and Bamboo Venture Partners, an angel investment syndicate specializing in startup investments.
Fedotova is a business development professional with a decade of experience in marketing and entrepreneurship. While at the University College London, where she founded Europe's largest student-led energy conference and moved on to a business development and marketing executive role at a fintech startup.
Designing a store for rubber duck fans
It would have been simple to just unpacks hundreds of ducks and line them up on hundreds of shelves but Perkon and Fedotova wanted an experiential and unusual store design.
"So the base idea was to create a boutique style space with minimalist elements, but play a lot with illumination and Instagrammable accessories," said Perkon. The founders imagined a mix between a high end sunglasses boutique, art gallery and a collectibles store.
"Something that will catch attention, but focus customers on our products once they come in," said Perkon. "Our store design catches people's attention, then brings them with curiosity and allows customers to have a fun experience, whether taking videos, laughing at our duck puns, or just exploring our beautifully designed ducks, who are all in a row. Pun intended."
The store offers customers specific areas for Instagram posts and what he described as "fun customer service."
Perkon views experiential retail as the answer to beating the growing e-commerce trend.
"Online sales are taking over, it is a fact. It's cheaper, easier, and more convenient to buy on the net," he said. "So how do you attract customers back into retail stores? You need to create something that will never be recreated online, a physical experience. It needs to be done via customer service, store design, micro experiences, product selection, atmosphere, smell and taste. We have to give customers an excuse to come to the store, instead of going online. Disney World will never be replicated online, Lego Store probably won't either."
For the curious, the most popular rubber duck at the Miami store is the Donald Trump Duck followed by the Jurassic Park Duck. Over in the U.K. the top favorites are the Queen Duck and Spider Man.
Perkon's advice to other retailers focusing on the brick-and-mortar sales channel is to create experiences that give customers a reason to visiting the retail store rather than shopping online.
"Online is very product driven and the greatest challenge is to get traffic, whilst offline retail should be experience driven and attract people into the store. It's a subtle difference, traffic acquisition and foot traffic attraction."
About Judy Mottl
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