Case Study
The Royal Horticultural Society
Touchscreen Rental and Software Case Study – RHS
RHS – the Royal Horticultural Society, is one of the world’s leading gardening charities. RHS runs eleven flower shows around the UK every year, including the RHS Chealsea Flower Show, the world’s most prestigious flower show. RHS had the idea of hiring touchscreens at three of their main shows, to encourage visitors to sign up to their Greening Grey Britain campaign, and to provide access to their extensive gardening advice feature on their website.
What was done
For the first show, the RHS Cardiff Flower Show, we provided three 22″ Touchscreens. The 22″ Touchscreen has a sleek tablet style design, but at more than twice the size of a standard tablet and with commercial grade components, is more eye-catching, easier to use and more durable. The three 22″ Touchscreens were mounted onto a cabin wall in the RHS pop-up shop. Power and internet cables were run behind the temporary wall, completely out of sight. We delivered and installed the touchscreens and set everything up on the day before the event started. The touchscreens displayed the RHS website.
The content was locked down using SiteKiosk, which was installed and set-up by us. This market leading software prevents users from exiting the website or surfing other sites, implements a timeout feature with a screensaver loop and integrates an onscreen keyboard. It also means the touchscreen can be put into autostart, so it automatically logged in and displayed the RHS website as soon as it was turned on.
The 22″ Touchscreens we widely used at the event. By using SiteRemote we were able to track usage and provide a detailed statistical usage report after the event. The report showed what RHS already knew. That when connected to the internet the 22″ Touchscreens were well used, but there were significant periods when the event internet crashed or was slow. So for the second event, the RHS Malvern Spring Festival, we redeveloped the key features of the RHS website to work offline. This way the user experience would always be fast and seamless, and no internet connection would be required. In just two weeks we provided an Interactive Experience with the following features:
- Database of gardening articles, searchable by keyword
- Send a specific article to an email address
- Sign-up form with data saved locally on the integrated PC
- Developed to run offline
- Optimised to be multi-touch friendly
For RHS Malvern Spring Festival we provided a touchscreen kiosk with branding, which was positioned at the RHS information point within the main marquee. Without the need for an internet connection, the application worked perfectly.
Finally, for the RHS Chealsea Flower Show, we once again provided three 22″ Touchscreens. We resized the offline application we previously developed to work in a portrait orientation. The 22″ Touchscreens got their most usage at the full capacity RHS Chealsea Flower Show. They brought a digital aspect to RHS’s services at the show, and raised awareness of key campaigns and their gardening information resource.