Retail Concepts

Why Retail Concepts?

Traditional brick and mortar retailers are under attack. eCommerce is growing, and customers around the globe are increasingly willing to purchase products and services online, attracted to the greater selection, convenience and lower prices offered by online retailers.

While there are significant regional differences, as well as variations in customer segments that determine willingness to buy products online, we have identified three areas traditional retailers must focus on to remain competitive and ensure a profitable and resilient existence as online channels grow.

People.

Traditional retailers must have the right roles and responsibilities in place. Customer service expectations have shifted: they demand more expertise and customer service during in-person interactions than ever before. Retail workers are expected to fill in all the missing product/service information the customer is looking for, with a smile. In turn, satisfied customers will likely reward those retailers with the best services with repeat purchases.

Process.

Retailers need to reconsider their organizational structures to ensure cross-departmental and cross-hierarchical collaboration. This can be achieved by rethinking incentives and realigning them to focus on culture rather than processes. Strong leadership capabilities and qualifications are essential to this change.

Technology.

The foundation of a competitive retailer is backend. Omnichannel management is enabled by strong IT capabilities. Ensuring an end to end integration of all systems required to serve the customer is key to success.

How We Work

Developing retail concepts requires in-depth understanding of the market, both from an industry-specific and external perspective. We ensure this holistic point of view by:

• Leveraging our close collaboration with startups from all over the world. We work intimately with start-ups as channel partners and mentors of weXelerate, the biggest startup hub in CEE. Our clients benefit from a combination of market insights from our client work on mobility solutions and digitalization, as well as strong innovation capabilities, coming from the start-ups we work with.
• Once we have developed scenarios, we ensure that all departments work together closely and that regional differences are not forgotten. The individuals involved in the concept development process need to bring those different perspectives to the table.
• After developing a first concept draft, we conduct quick proof of concept phase, to get fast feedback on the concept feasibility.
• Once we receive feedback, we finalize the concept and initiate the rollout

What We Deliver

Development of various retail concepts (e.g. retail outlets of the future, new roles), considering all customer touchpoints, to create a memorable personalized and seamless customer journey.

Photo by Alessandro Spataro on Unsplash