Technology and services company Anatwine is in negotiation, contracted or live with 150 of the world’s 200 top fashion brands and retailers, including House of Fraser, Zalando, La Redoute, Australian retailer The Iconic, and India’s Jabong; Adidas, Reebok, Next and Superdry, as fashion companies globally confirm that a new era of online fashion retailing – that enables a brand’s range and stock mix to be made available in real-time to the retailer’s customer – has become a global reality.
In a market increasingly dominated by the quality of the overall customer experience, from online product availability to delivery, retailers and brands are now exploiting Anatwine’s proven technology that integrates every aspect of a brand’s and retailer’s operations to mitigate the constraints of the traditional wholesale model and complement this with an innovative retail environment based upon delivering the perfect stock mix to the retailer’s customer, all the time.
Traditionally, retailers have been limited by budget and warehouse space to merchandise just a fraction of a brand’s product range that has been selected ahead of the season based on a forecasted wholesale buying model. Despite the advances in forecasting tools and the sophistication of retail buyers, the retailer’s brand stock mix is selected many months in advance so can not reflect the brand’s best selling products as the season unfolds. With the result being a limited and often sub-optimal stock mix, this model misses a huge incremental revenue opportunity; undermines brand value; and negatively impacts the customer experience for both retailers and brands.
Enabled by reliable, low cost logistics, Anatwine overcomes the constraints of this traditional forecasted buying model by connecting in real-time brands’ and retailers’ business systems through a single integration. Crucially, this enables the retailer to present the brand’s optimal stock mix to its customers at all times and allows the brand to fulfil the retailer’s online orders within the boundaries of the retailer’s clearly defined Service Level Agreement (SLA). Every customer touch point, from imagery to delivery and returns is identical, creating a consistent and guaranteed customer experience irrespective of whether an order is fulfilled from a retailer’s or brand’s warehouse.
Chris Griffin, CEO and Founder, Anatwine, confirms, “The benefits of real-time merchandising supported by a consistent experience for the customer are compelling for both brands and retailers. With no budget or warehouse constraints, a retailer can radically expand the range available from each brand and through the use of real time analytics can merchandise to create a product set that features all the brand’s best selling items with no guess work, while also being able to refine, expand or reduce the range at will.
“The brand can ensure that all their best selling products are being sold by the leading retailers; and customers can be confident that their preferred retailer is carrying the best product range available reinforcing both customer experience and brand value. Significantly, the work we have done with our brand and retail customers to date has proven to deliver like-for-like sales increases of hundreds of %.”
Global lifestyle brand Superdry has been working successfully with Anatwine for two years as both an early stage investor and as a customer. Euan Sutherland, Chief Executive Officer of SuperGroup, says: “Anatwine forms a key part of our wholesale partner programme, complementing our other traditional wholesale relationships. Working with Anatwine has enabled Superdry to increase materially the size and relevance of the product range available via online retailers while guaranteeing high levels of availability and so enhancing the end to end customer experience. As a result, Superdry is seeing significant sales momentum from a number of leading online retailers across the world.”
Sir Terence Leahy, ex-CEO, Tesco and non-executive director, Anatwine, comments, “Wholesale processes have remained substantially unchanged within fashion retail for decades. Yet within a couple of years, Anatwine has developed a proposition that is set to fundamentally transform the fashion retail model across the world. By introducing real-time data transparency, with guaranteed customer experience and service levels, Anatwine is opening up opportunities for both retailers and brands to drive up sales, improve reputation and provide consumers globally with the product they want when they want it.”
Griffin concludes, “It is time for change. By creating an environment where the customer experience is guaranteed, irrespective of the point of fulfilment, and coupled with real-time sales analytics, retailers and brands can truly move towards nirvana: the perfect stock mix.”
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