Quiz, Sports Direct, Mothercare, Zalando and AO World on multichannel

In today’s InternetRetailing newsletter, we’re reporting on IRUK – and IREU – Top500 retailers as they set out their varying approaches to multichannel retailing.

These vary widely between retailers. For sports fashion company Sports Direct it’s all about working with brands and improving the customer experience across channels, while for fast fashion retailer Quiz it’s about ensuring its supply chain is competitive through its sheer agility and that customers can buy in the way that best suits them.

For Berlin-based online fashion platform Zalando, it’s about innovation, as Delphine Mousseau explains in our interview today. And for AO World it’s about growing brand awareness in new markets and new categories, while for Mothercare there’s an unusual scenario as online sales growth slowed but store sales rose over the spring and early summer. Mothercare chief executive Mark Newton-Jones says he doesn’t believe this represents a long-term change in consumer behaviour. Indeed, this behaviour can also be seen in June’s retail sales figures, which suggest slowing online sales and rising footfall in stores, particularly in retail parks – amid the unusually good weather that month brought. It seems likely that trend will not continue indefinitely: indeed today’s rain is likely to see more shoppers choosing to buy online and fewer in store.

But that’s the point of multichannel retailing. Shoppers want to buy, and take delivery of their orders, in the way that suits them at that particular moment in time – and the successful retailers are increasingly those who enable their customers to do that, whether it’s via a website, an app, or a store.

Today’s guest comment is, then, a timely one: it comes from Peter Veash of The BIO Agency who considers how retailers can use technology to make a real difference to shoppers’ lives.

The Tamebay Ecommerce Cup

The Tamebay Ecommerce Cup 2017 will be held on September 7 and five-a-side teams are now being invited to sign up. The tournament, now in its fifth year, is moving to a new venue in Shepherd’s Bush and promises FA refs and a comfy new players’ lounge complete with screens to keep tabs on competitors’ matches.

“We had a total of 26 teams enter last year, and it was great to have both suppliers and retailers competing, with Deliveroo taking the top spot and runners up Uber narrowly missing out,” says Mark Pigou, founder of InternetRetailing Media. “This year promises to be just as competitive.” To enter a team of up to 10 people (five players and five subs), sign up here.

Sponsorship opportunities are limited to three companies: email Joey Evans (joe.evans@tamebay.com) for more.

Webinars

Find out more about upcoming InternetRetailing webinars and register for free on the InternetRetailing webinar page. You can also catch up with past webinars on the page: recent sessions have come from IBM Watson on using AI to improve the customer experience, and from SmartFocus and The Entertainer on using social to reach digital customers.