IT IS WITH pleasure that we release our first InternetRetailing Top500 UK report, an in-depth, commercial and comparative view of the UK’s multichannel retailers and ecommerce players. Our guiding principle in undertaking this work has been to reflect the capabilities necessary to run complex retail operations at scale – a focus upon ‘RetailCraft’.
We offer our results in the full knowledge that we are not the professionals running multichannel businesses – millions in turnover, of customers, of SKUs, key words, merchandising algorithms and interactions across all channels. It is in tribute to these efforts that we have assessed across seven Performance Dimensions rather than taking a single measure (be it revenues or web traffic). Our report is dedicated to those professionals who make the UK’s retail market the most competitive and capable in the world.
Brought to you with our Title Sponsor, Digital River
THE DIMENSIONS OF ASSESSMENT
Our research covered seven Performance Dimensions:
0 Footprint – Released in March 2014 this considers the ‘heft’ of a retailer – turnover, ecommerce penetration, web reach and store estate (all measures for the UK only)
1 Strategy and Innovation – for the 2015 research we’ve focused on how retailers extend their channel reach
2 Customer – the experience provided to the customer
3 Operations and Logistics – delivery, returns, click and collect
4 Merchandising – the approaches to selling online
5 Brand and Engagement – the interaction with the customer
6 Mobile and Cross-channel – moving beyond single channels (whether bricks or clicks)
Continue reading the Editor-in-Chief’s introduction
From the Advisory Board
“The IRUK Top 500 ranking is the most comprehensive and thoughtful assessment ever of the state of the art in multi-channel retailing. Having been compiled with great rigour by expert analysts and practitioners, the resulting ranking is a great yardstick by which companies can compare their own performance to their peers, and seek to learn from the leaders.”
Tony Preedy, Marketing Director, Lakeland
“It is unsurprising that those leading the pack are the retailers who have developed capability across the full eco-system of mutli-channel/omnichannel, not just implementing new technology solutions, but also addressing customer experience, business strategy and internal culture to deliver seamless retail experiences.”
Emma Robertson, Managing Director, Transform
“The most comprehensive and authoritative measurement of omnichannel capability in the retailing world.”
Robin Phillips, Multichannel Director, Boots UK
“The InternetRetailing Top 500 heralds the coming of age of omnichannel retailing in the UK. It provides a well thought-through framework for the key dimensions for success for a multichannel retailer, from the ingredients needed for success in individual channels to the ‘glue’ needed to hold it all together. What really sets it apart though is the depth of analysis, combined with the nuanced judgement of a set of real retail experts. This promises to be a very interesting set of reports and will definitely be on the ‘must-read’ list through 2015.”
Siobhán Géhin, Partner, Kurt Salmon
“Moving forward from 2014, it will be interesting to see which retailers continue to expand their reach through new technology solutions such as wearables and IoT, and which ones are looking to their internal operation, culture and service propositions as the next point of differentiation.”
Emma Robertson, Managing Director, Transform
