The online retailer of fashion and accessories Zoot ends up with its own branches, so it wants to reduce its costs. The branches will replace cooperation with more than 120 partner stores, where they will have a test booth. Dozens more are to be added this year. The reason for the change in strategy is, according to the company, a coronavirus pandemic that changes customer behavior.
The so-called Dispensaries of Joy were one of the pillars in the birth of the fashion e-shop. For many years, however, they faced high costs and, in particular, a demanding return system. “Many customers ordered much more items than they really needed to pay for free delivery without paying in advance,” the seller explained.
“We have customers who ordered things together for 600 thousand crowns a year, but bought goods for 20 thousand crowns. Thanks to that, we calculated that we have 20% of the entire inventory constantly on the way between our warehouse and Joy Dispensaries, which we want to change because “One of the values of our company is sustainability. We will motivate responsible customers with various rewards and VIP services and we believe that we will be able to get the return to a level that is reasonable for the customer, for us and for our planet,” says Milan Polák.
According to Polák, a change in Zoot’s corporate strategy was helped by a pandemic that radically changed customer behavior. “Over the past year, the proportion of orders delivered to houses has increased from 20% to 60%. As a result, our average return has dropped from 70% to 50%, and this year we aim to gradually reach an average of 35%,” he explains.
Zoot originally had over two dozen of its own dispensaries in the Czech Republic, where customers tried things right at pick-up. Their numbers have gradually started to decrease and there are currently no more in operation.
On the contrary, the company wants to further expand the network of Výdejen radosti within fashion stores throughout the Czech Republic and Slovakia, of which there are now 120 and by the end of the year there should be around 150.
“We will help many Czech fashion boutiques in difficult times, we will bring a lot of potential customers to their stores and they will help us – issue our orders and further expand our ‘trial and check-out’ service,” describes Polák. According to him, this does not change much for customers. “They still have the opportunity to try the goods right at the time of collection and leave what doesn’t suit them at the dispensary,” he adds.
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