Fujitsu Pan-European Retail Survey 2013: The Store will Remain the Hub for Engaging with ‘Connected Customers’

Fujitsu today reveals that despite the rise of online and mobile commerce across Europe, the store will continue to be the hub for retailer engagement with ‘connected’ customers. According to a new survey of European retail management commissioned by Fujitsu¹, a top-three retail solutions and services provider working with over 500 retailers and 82,000 stores around the world, ongoing competitive pressure requires retailers to combine efficient processes with delivering a valued customer experience – whether in store, online, or via smart phone.

The Fujitsu Pan-European Retail Survey 2013 explores the future of the store in such a multi-channel environment, including store challenges such as driving sales and managing people, the importance of a unified view of customers across all channels, plus technology innovations to deliver multi-channel solutions that deliver valued customer experiences at a competitive investment level.²

Among the findings, two-thirds of retail managers who took part in the study believe that the importance of stores has increased significantly within Europe (65%), and this is particularly the case in countries such as Italy (74%) and France (68%) where high-street culture is as strong as ever. While overall, online shopping is considered the most attractive distribution model from the perspective of retail customers today (72%), there are wide national differences that demonstrate that ‘bricks’ have not been entirely replaced by ‘clicks.’ German retailers currently find online shopping most attractive to their customers (81%), while in Italy in particular ‘hypermarket and supermarket’ models remain the most attractive (78%), closely followed by ‘city-center urban shopping’ (71%), and in the UK there is a greater balance across all models.

So despite the ongoing rise of e-tailers, the Fujitsu study finds that most traditional retailers are convinced that brick and mortar stores have a place in the future of retail, although there are widely varying views on what the store of the future will look like. Stores are likely to remain the place where retailers can realize the ‘physical’ brand experience for the shopper in a way that complements and is consistent with the ‘online’ and ‘mobile’ brand experience. The store is still the fundamental shopping channel for retailers and their customers across Europe; however its role and operating model are changing rapidly to meet the needs of the multi-channel shopper. Service is becoming a key value-add for the store – including online/in-store hybrid services such as click and collect. Overall, 86% of respondents defined the most important role of stores as a place for service – this was particularly true in France where the figure jumps to 94%.

However, national differences see UK retailers considering a store’s role as a shopping point as being most important (91%), while for the Italians exposure to the brand is key (88%), and Germans have a more balanced view of the range of roles a store plays. These results demonstrate the importance that in-store experience plays in product discovery and sales associate interaction – of the overall service experience – while providing retailers with the opportunity to provide a differentiating ‘wrapper’ around their offerings to convert customers to buy, rather than losing out to constantly competing on price alone. However, when it comes to rating the importance of distribution models for the future of their business, on a scale of attractiveness from 1 to 10, online shopping still leads overall, landing nearly 8 out of 10.

Richard Clarke, Vice President, Global Retail at Fujitsu
“It is clear the store remains the shopping ‘hub’ for the majority of consumers across Europe, but the store operating model is changing rapidly to meet the needs of the multi-channel shopper. Service – in terms of both experience via sales-associate interaction and process efficiency via models like Click ‘n’ Collect – is becoming the competitive value add for the store. Fujitsu helps retailers to achieve this goal by simplifying their technology deployment and radically increasing agility and customer intimacy.”

Retailer Organization Manager, France
“The store is the ‘central hub’ of everything we do as a retailer.”

Retailer Chief Information Officer, Italy
“We rely on our stores to provide exceptional customer experience, exactly the right environment in which to display and promote our products.”

Retailer Head of Innovation, Germany
“Consumers want to interact with our products – and the best place to do this is still our stores.”

Retailer Department Manager, United Kingdom
“Our stores are vital, but we need to improve how we combine customer proximity and digital access.”

Retailer Executive Vice President, Belgium
“The key to our success will be making the web work better with the stores, and the stores work better with the web.”

¹ Fujitsu Pan-European Retail Survey 2013:
Future of the store in a multi-channel environment: How to turn today’s challenges into tomorrow’s successes through improvement of store efficiency and customer experience?
Novametrie, the specialist provider of opinion leader research, was commissioned by Fujitsu to undertake independent research with senior managers in retail businesses in France, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom, and other countries (including multiple countries covered by HQ representatives). During September/November 2012, Novametrie undertook 20 qualitative interviews (face-to-face and telephone), followed by 161 quantitative interviews (online) during January/February 2013. Initial findings from the survey can be found here

² These findings will be shared separately in the next weeks.

The retail industry is changing at an unprecedented pace. Cross-border expansion, multi-channel shopping, the mobile device and smarter back office technologies are transforming shopper expectations and experience, store operating models and business performance. Retail executives are looking to stay ahead of the curve and drive profit by offering a differentiated customer experience and increased business efficiency.

Fujitsu works with retailers to help them master these challenges, using IT to take the customer experience and business efficiency to the next level. Building on a deep understanding of retailing that we have gained over the past 30 years with more than 500 customers and 82,000 stores, Fujitsu’s mission is to deliver a differentiated customer experience which will increase sales, operational effectiveness and customer satisfaction for our retail clients.

We deliver high-performance, best-of-breed hardware solutions, integrated software applications and multi-vendor lifecycle support services to help retailers around the world deliver on their brand promise and operate more effectively.

Spanning front- and back office, our portfolio includes point of sale, mobile and self service solutions, end to end retail business applications including business analytics, customer loyalty and dynamic digital media, and a suite of managed IT services across the store, networks, applications and infrastructure.

Fujitsu is the emerging leader in cloud and the role of cloud technology and services for today’s retailers.