La Redoute is launching its own website in China in order to sell directly into a growing ecommerce market.
The company is France’s largest online fashion retailer and a Top350 company in the UK market, according to IRUK Top500 research.
It has launched into the market through its own website, rather than through a Chinese online marketplace. It has partnered with Azoya in order to do so. The two cite benefits including the ability to communicate its brand image directly to China, while avoiding competition and promotion fees related to selling on marketplaces.
La Redoute is selling more than 100,000 lines into the market through its www.laredoute.cn website. Deliveries will be made through direct parcel shipping, removing the need for bulk imports or holding local stock.
“We met Azoya last year when we were considering strategies to expand to China,” said Saida Gallouj, international development director at La Redoute . “We were looking for the right local partner, who has a solid knowledge of this new market, the Chinese culture and consumption patterns, and offers services equivalent to an extension of our teams on site.”
Don Zhao, co-founder of Azoya , said: “With exceedingly good understanding of Chinese customers’ behaviours and overseas retailers’ uniqueness, we are excited and devoted from the start to achieve the optimal results for La Redoute.”
Joining a wider movement towards selling in China
La Redoute follows a host of other retailers into the fast-growing Chinese market. Waitrose said in April that it was now selling via the Royal Mail website, a move which perhaps highlights the importance of delivery issues for retailers looking to target the market. La Redoute has chosen to approach that through the use of direct shipping rather than holding stock in China.
A recent report in InternetRetailing Magazine underlined the growing importance of the Chinese and surrounding Asia-Pacific market to global ecommerce. It cited eMarketer figures that suggested retail ecommerce sales in Asia-Pacific would hit £601bn ($877.61bn) in 2015, up 35.7% from 2014. For the first time, reported Paul Skeldon, the region will not only have the largest digital retail market in the world, but its share of global retail spend will also reach 52.5% – the first time it holds an outright majority of the world market.
