Facilitating Customer Collaboration

Unilever/North America is the Connecticut based manufacturer of leading nutrition, hygiene, and personal care brands.

In 2006 Ascension consultants were asked to lead a strategic initiative to conceive and design a best-in-class customer insight and innovation center.

The inspiration for the center was drawn from aspirational facilities at Disney (Imagination) and Google (Googleplex).

The articulated goal of the initiative was to help the company build brands with breakthrough strategic insights, innovation, and direct retail customer input. Ascension consultants led strategic ideation and innovation events designed to bring focus and meaning to subsequent facility layout and environmental design plans.

The result was the creation of a state-of-the-art retail collaboration center capable of hosting Unilever retail customers and consumers alike for the purpose of insight mining and growth planning.

The initial Unilever Customer Insight & Innovation Center (CiiC) opened in New Jersey in 2004. Subsequent facilities have since been opened in the UK, Paris, Shanghai, and San Paolo.

The Unilever CiiC is an excellent example of Ascension’s strategic leadership in action and the ability to bring learning and insights from one industry to another.

The past professional experiences of Ascension consultants at Walt Disney and Time Warner brought strategic inspiration to the Unilever CiiC development team.