The owner of luxury brands including Belstaff, Jimmy Choo and Bally is set to sell direct to consumers through transactional brand websites.
Labelux, which counts the three brands among its holdings, has signed a global deal …
Is all about building loyalty by focusing on your customers
Editorials, opinion, analysis, guest writers, industry comment and more
Editorials, opinion, analysis, guest writers, industry comment and more…
Editoriaux, avis, analyses, écrivains invités, commentaires sur l’industrie
Yell has bought DIY website and online shop builder Moonfruit for £18m as part of its ongoing strategy to become a leading provider of local eMarketplaces.
Yell, the digital services company, aims to build new strength through platforms and digital portals where consumers can do business with small and medium-sized companies. The strategy is intended to replace its current business in online and print telephone directories, now a declining market.
Today Yell said its acquisition of Moonfruit would enhance its ability to provide “cutting-edge websites, mobile sites and simple ‘light’ commerce services to millions of SMEs.”
Its chief executive Mike Pocock said: “The addition of Moonfruit’s services and team helps us provide competitive advantage to our global SME customers in connecting with customers through digital, mobile and social.”
Wendy Tan-White, founder and chief executive officer of Moonfruit, said: “We built Moonfruit to make it easy to publish and sell on the internet, and provide stylish web, blog and shop designs as well as easy-to-use web tools for SMEs. Joining Yell and integrating with its local eMarketplace provides access to larger audiences and additional resource to accelerate what is a common vision for the future.”
Moonfruit.com was launched in 2000 for consumers and businesses to build their own sites. Customers building Moonfruit sites can add a commerce option, Facebook stores, and a mobile presence from the same platform. So far nearly 5m websites and 230,000 online shops have been created, most in the UK and US. Key members of Moonfruit’s senior management team will stay with the business for at least two years.
Last year Yell bought multi-store ecommerce specialist Znode to provide SMEs with enterprise opportunities through its ecommerce platform, and it says today’s acquisition will complement that capability.
Groupon’s share price rose last night as the online daily deals company reported a “record quarter.”
The company unveiled a 140% rise in active customers to 36.9m in the three months to the end of March …
Almost two-thirds of consumers who buy premium products and services say they will continue to spend just as much online in 2012 as last year – despite the recession, new research suggests.
A thousand respondents with …
The updated eBay Fashion app for iPhone, available in the UK this month, will now feature innovative Image Swatch technology to allow shoppers to find fashion items on eBay.co.uk that match the colour and pattern …
London’s shoppers are in for a surprise thanks to a new partnership that will see mobile vouchers for nearby shops offered through free public Wi-Fi hotspots for the first time in the UK.
INITIALS Marketing is to roll out an advertising campaign to launch re:route, a new iPhone app based rewards programme created by Recyclebank, the company that motivates people to take everyday green actions by rewarding green …
MEF, the Global Community for Mobile Content and Commerce, has announced the next phase of its m-Commerce Initiative to develop privacy and security standards for m-Commerce in partnership with ASC X9’s Mobile Mirror Group, a …
Consumers are spending increasing amounts of time on mobile connected devices, with time spent on tablets playing a significant role in purchasing decisions as consumers find new ways to research and interact with brands, according …
In the year that has passed since the results of Stibo Systems’s first UK consumer survey were announced, m-commerce – including online shopping via both smartphone and tablet devices – has seen an overall uptake …
After much hyper and build up in mobile circles, UK operator O2 has launched O2 Wallet, a seamless and secure digital wallet service that will deliver the benefits of mobile money to more UK consumers …
Whether it’s to dazzle us with how many people are now starting their purchasing journey by turning to their smartphone or new mobile wallet offerings from the likes of Barclays and O2, m-commerce has become …
Global e-shoppers spend on average 22% (UK average: 25%) of their annual outgoings on goods and services online, shop for 5 hours a month (UK average: 6), watch TV whilst shopping online (global: 46%, UK: …
Retail technology business One iota, is aiming to take on the likes of Groupon and other group buying services, following the launch of DealsJoy – a free platform that enables businesses of any size to …
Cross channel mobile engagement and commerce enabler Digby has expanded its agreement with Venda, a world leader in convergent commerce, to leverage the Digby Localpoint Mobile Platform to help Venda eCommerce enabled retailers take full …
Online and mobile channels are gaining traction, whilst the number of consumers using more ‘traditional’ channels – such as catalogues and call centres – is dropping significantly year on year, finds a study by PortalTech …
The founders of Occa-Home are planning for growth after winning investment from retail specialists The William Currie Group, who also backed ASOS. The investment in the designer furniture and online interior design specialist is for …
Tesco stores in north London and Beckenham are the locations for the first myByBox.com locker banks to be opened as part of a £2m expansion of the company’s network.
Online shoppers can now opt to have …
John Lewis is among the retail clients of Deloitte Digital, launched today by business advisory firm Deloitte to provide clients with digital services including the strategic planning and delivery of ecommerce solutions.
Deloitte Digital says the …
What happens behind the scenes when an ecommerce business is the subject of an hour-long documentary on Channel 4? Richard Longhurst (@rhlonghurst) reveals what we can learn from the eye of the storm.
by Richard Longhurst
Lovehoney …
In the week that saw Clinton Cards go into administration, what are the lessons for other retailers?
Clinton Cards is just the latest in a series of one-time high street success stories to go into administration …
by Patrick Eve
It can be misleading to think of international branding; perhaps localised branding would be a better way of putting it. For a retail brand to be truly international, it has to appeal to multiple localities. A brand …
