Special interview
Written by: Kwong Yueting
2021-02-22 08:00
The last update date: 2021-02-22 11:32
In the past year, the new crown pneumonia epidemic has dealt a heavy blow to the retail market in Hong Kong. Many retailers have closed their stores, and lucky shops have appeared on the streets.
However, Decathlon from France, the world's second-largest sports goods chain, managed to expand against the market on time. In the second half of last year, it opened new stores in Central and Kowloon Bay, covering 8,500 square feet and 4,000 square feet, respectively.
In an interview with "Hong Kong 01", Lisa Noraz, the co-chief executive of Decathlon Hong Kong, said that even though the epidemic has reduced the flow of people in the stores, the business of the online store is growing very fast. With the increase and decrease, the business still records growth. Combining online and offline sales strategies to develop business, and plans to open more branches in Hong Kong's livelihood and shopping areas.
Founded in 1976, Decathlon is the largest sports goods chain in Europe and the second largest in the world. It has opened more than 2,000 stores in 56 countries or regions around the world. The company entered Hong Kong in August 2017 and has opened 5 stores so far.
Lisa Noraz pointed out that Decathlon’s model for opening stores in other countries is to buy land and build stores on its own. These stores are very large in size. In Hong Kong, they lease stores. Store design and merchandise must be adjusted, but each store still has interaction. Experience area, so that guests can touch and try products.
The production process of more than 13,000 products attracting customers is nearly packaged
One of the company's competitive advantages is the complete range of sports products, covering 70 kinds of sports. Common ones include fitness, hiking, camping, cycling and yoga. The less popular ones include skiing, snorkeling, golf and trampoline.
Lisa Noraz explained that when the company was first established, it only sold sports products for cycling and running, but as the company continues to grow, employees who love different sports gradually join the team. "Everyone hopes to launch products that are better than the leading brands or are cheaper. Therefore, there are more and more types of products. At present, there are more than 13,000 products in Decathlon's product catalog.
However, even in Hong Kong’s largest General Macau store (the store area is about 36,000 square feet and has an outdoor open space of the same size), customers can only find 60% of the products, and the rest must be purchased in the online store.
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In addition to the wide variety of Decathlon products, many consumers’ impressions of the product’s price are "flattened". For example, a 10-liter backpack costs 24 yuan; a 0.8-liter plastic water bottle costs 19 yuan; two 0.5kg dumbbells and 1 kg dumbbells are only priced at 29 yuan and 49 yuan, and most of the products are entry-level.
Lisa Noraz revealed that the company adopts an integrated business model. Products are designed and produced by its own team. The entire production process is handled almost by one hand. Big data is used to improve inventory management and sales processes, and robots are used for warehouse inventory work. To reduce production costs.
In addition, the company works closely with factories to reduce the impact of peak production periods and fluctuations in raw material prices, so that products are inexpensive and high-quality.
"Affordable products attract more sports novices to start. We will also take into account the needs of ordinary users and professional users. We hope that through these cost-effective products, more people will develop the habit of sports."
Lisa Noraz said that the company will decide to let them be responsible for the sales of goods in that area and answer customer questions according to the sports of the store staff. Some store staff are even athletes and coaches.
(Photo by Huang Baoying)
Expected to combine online and offline retail in the future
Under the epidemic, Hong Kong people will not only do sports at home, but also go to the suburbs to relax physically and mentally.
Lisa Noraz said that the company's main product categories continued to grow in sales, including fitness, hiking, camping and yoga products.
"During the epidemic, people pay more attention to their personal health. Exercise can make them stronger and relax!"
She continued that under economic uncertainties, people are more cautious when shopping, and the company will help customers choose products that best suit their needs and are inexpensive.
"As the epidemic eases, some people may return to the fitness room to exercise, and some may have become accustomed to exercising at home. The two exercise modes will be balanced; and the vaccination program launched by the Hong Kong government later will help retail sales. The market is gradually recovering.” When asked if it would consider price reduction promotions, she said that the company is convinced that customers should not buy products because of discount promotion activities, but shop according to their own needs, and if they launch sales promotion activities There will be such activities every year in the future, so price reduction will not be considered.
The Hong Kong retail market is in a cold winter. Many retailers are reducing the number of physical stores or reducing the area of stores to reduce rental expenses. However, Decathlon has taken the opposite approach and opened a large area of stores, each store retaining at least 15% of the experience area.
Lisa Noraz believes that the future retail industry will not only be online or offline, but a combination of the two. Merchants need to provide customers with both service experiences. "If I want to go camping on the weekend, I will want to try it out. Chairs and touch the camping tent; if I’m going to prepare for next week’s yoga class, I can buy yoga mats directly from the online store.” In order to enhance the shopping experience of customers, the company has already adopted digital transformation for its layout, such as the introduction of RFID in 2013 Technology, customers only need to put the goods in the shopping basket in the self-service cashier counter, and they can quickly settle the settlement. In the future, the company will use big data to analyze the preferences of the customers and recommend products to them.
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