How DTC-style insights are starting to come from stores
It’s the kind of data that a digital-first DTC brand is built on, but finally captured within a retail environment.
One of the most fundamental advantages even the most basic ecommerce site has over a physical store is measurement.
While many of the world’s best physical stores continue to measure sales per square foot, footfall and not much else, that basic ecommerce site offers bounce rates and dwell times for each and every product you sell.
In this respect, the game might feel rigged if you’re a store-heavy retailer or a store-reliant brand competing with new, online-only incumbents.
But, as always, change is on its way. And surprisingly, it isn’t happening at the fringes; it’s happening within a business that could be a poster boy for traditional store-led retail.
The invisible becomes visible
Curry’s is an electronics retailer in the UK with more than 300 physical stores. That, in itself, is fairly remarkable.
Electronics retail is a sector that Amazon tends to eat for breakfast. And what Amazon doesn’t eat, Apple stores might finish off. Take Maplin as an example - a once beloved high street fixture that disappeared in 2018.
But Curry’s has always been quietly innovative. They use stores both to support and complement other channels, and are often early adopters of new strategies and technologies.
So perhaps it isn’t surprising that Curry’s, in partnership with SharkNinja and The Valley Group, have been an early adopter of something that’s really grabbed my interest.
Using LiDAR-empowered sensors on hundreds of SharkNinja displays across Curry’s throughout the UK, data is being collected that informs SharkNinja on how customers are actually interacting with their products.
This has already given the brand millions of data points that are completely new - from how often customers touch their products, to how good their displays are at grabbing attention.
In a sense, it’s the kind of data that a digital-first DTC brand is built on, but finally captured within a retail environment.
And the effects have been dramatic. SharkNinja, by their own admission, have now redesigned various displays and fixtures according to this in-store data - and those redesigned concepts have often performed better.
The invisible has started to become visible, allowing creative teams to do their thing. It’s the sort of story that excites even the most hardened non-techies like me.
A tech story that isn’t about tech
I am among the vast majority of people who aren’t innately excited by technological advancements.
That doesn’t mean we don’t enjoy technology - the problems it solves or the opportunities it creates.
It just means that most of us don’t get excited when we see a picture of someone in a VR headset.
However, what’s happening within these Curry’s stores isn’t really a tech story, despite the fact that tech is at the heart of it.
Because LiDAR isn’t new. Nor is the problem it solves. Nor is the desperate need for better in-store data from brands that rely on retail sales.
This isn’t a victory for tech innovation. It’s a victory for common sense, creativity and collaboration.
And so often, the best examples of technology helping brands and retailers to solve problems are quiet stories like this. They don’t involve headsets or magic mirrors. And they most definitely don’t involve the metaverse.
It’s notable too that SharkNinja and Curry’s aren’t talking about the technology when they celebrate what’s happening here either.
The thing that really excites them is what the tech does for their creative teams designing fixtures, their in-store staff and their customers.
People, in other words, are the ultimate winners.
Want to know more about how this data is being gathered and put to good use? Watch the replay of our chat with Paul Phillips, Senior Director Global Retail Excellence at SharkNinja, and The Valley Group for the ins and outs of bridging the knowledge gap.