Retail Operations
29 January 2020
Earlier this month, some of our London team, including our Founder Peter Wake, flew to New York to exhibit at Retail’s Big Show at the Javits Center, alongside 18,000 retailers, and 800 of the hottest retail tech innovators worldwide.
At the highly anticipated event – the first to kick off the decade – it was an opportune time for thought leaders to come together to discuss the trends that will change the way people shop over the next 10 years.
And we learned a lot!
So we thought we’d put together a list of our key takeaways from the event.
While well-established retailers are struggling to innovate and thrive on our dwindling high streets, space has been freed up for digitally native brands to take their place.
These companies are daring to do retail differently.
They use the skills they’ve learned on the web and are applying that to their store estate – and without the constraints of legacy systems and old-fashioned ways of working, they’re able to thrive.
One great example is UNtuckit. Founded in 2010, the men’s apparel retailer sold their casual shirts, designed to be untucked, online. UNTuckit opened their first store in 2015, and since then have opened more than 80 stores – making them one of the fastest growing clicks to bricks brands.
The key to their success is the fact they choose not to think about shopping online and in store as two separate channels.
Their retail spaces allow men, who have previously shunned online ordering, to try before they buy, whilst still shopping with the convenience and ease of the web. Untuckit let their customers shop in whatever manner they want, wherever they want. Their focus is simply to make the shopping experience as easy for people as possible.
And they aren’t the only DTC brands wanting to move into the physical retail space. We met a lot of digitally native players hoping to take the plunge!
Ok, so you’ve heard this one before… But the next decade is going to take experience to the next level.
A great shopping experience is no longer defined by well managing queues, lightning-fast payment and attentive service. Retailers are pushing technology to the limits in order to take in-store experience to the next level.
In the NRF featured session “Redefining the customer experience through immersive technology“, H&M’s Immersive Tech Lead Tomas Stocksen discussed the different initiatives they are adopting to utilise immersive technology to redefine the fashion future of H&M.
Today’s physical stores aren’t just places to make purchases anymore. They are playgrounds; spaces to explore, have fun and lose yourself.
The talk explored how you can implement tools like spatial computing and augmented reality to create a more engaging, richer customer experience.
So what is spacial computing?
Spatial computing combines computer vision and AI to seamlessly integrate virtual content into the real world around us.
We can’t wait to see how H&M will adopt this new technology in the future. Take a look at the full presentation here.
Retail isn’t dying, it’s changing. To survive traditional bricks and mortar need to adapt to the changing times – and fast.
For those who have fallen on hard times, they are looking for ways to streamline processes, and they are looking for the technology that can help them do it.
Losing control in any area of a business can affect your bottom line, so it’s incredibly important that retailers focus on getting “bread and butter” processes perfect. Because in today’s climate, there’s no margin for error.
The industry is collecting, sharing and analysing data and using insights from data to make faster and more effective decisions throughout retail. That’s why they are looking to tech providers that have rich, clean data on their customers, employees and processes — so they can use that data to inform future decision making.
At StorIQ we believe in the power of data. Specifically retail operations metrics.
Whether it’s store visit scores, task completion rates or time to compliance, we help our customers drive performance with retail operations metrics.
Imagine a world where you understood the financial impact of operational activity across your estate, and where your retail management teams could focus their activity on driving results.
If you’d like to know more then get in touch! We’d love to hear from you.
Couldn’t make it to NRF? Don’t worry – you can still schedule a demo with the team. ?
