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Moosejaw, known by most as an online outdoor retailer, recently named Eoin Comerford as it?s new president and chief executive officer. Coming from his role as the company?s marketing and technology senior vice president, it?s no surprise he?ll continue to push the retailer to be at the forefront of technology.
Besides opening new brick-and-mortar stores around the country, Moosejaw is rolling out a mobile POS system that enables its floor employees to make sales without customers going to a desk full of cash registers.
Skiing Business caught up with Comerford to find out more about his technology goals, brick-and-mortar strategy and his vision for the future.
Eoin Comerford, Moosejaw president and CEO
Where do you plan on taking the company now that you?re in control of its wheel?
To a degree it?ll be much of the same. I was second in command before and pretty much ran the e-commerce side of the business-which is the largest part. Certainly my passion is around the brands and consumers we work with as well as expanding Moosejaw?s presence.
But I?m also a techie guy, so this stuff around the mobile site, mobile POS and social media will continue to get a ton of attention and we?ll continue to be a leader in that space.
It really comes down to being the most fun outdoor retailer on the planet. I really believe that and want to bring that to people. We want them to visit our brick-and-mortar stores even when they don?t want to buy anything. It?s not just a job for me. It?s a passion.
You guys have been putting more emphasis on brick-and-mortar stores. How many do you have, and what?s your strategy there?
We?ll be opening our 9th store in May (in Boulder, Colo.). We opened our 8th store earlier this month near Boston, and then we?ll open our 10th in Kansas City in September. We want to be in key markets where we can have a bigger presence, and build a physical presence. We?ll first look at markets where we have a big online customer base, and when we are ready to launch in a specific market, we reach out to our customers there to see what activities they do, what they want to see in the store and even what they want to see for a grand opening.
We really want to expand our overall presence, and there are generally two ways to do that: with advertising and more stores. We don?t have a huge ad budget, and we?d rather expand our physical footprint. Still, brick-and-mortar is only about 20 percent of our business right now. It might get to about 30 percent, but not reach 50 percent anytime soon.
What markets are you looking to for future expansion?
I can?t tell you where we?re looking, but you can probably figure most of them out. We?re big into outerwear, so it doesn?t make sense for us to be in warm climates like Florida anytime soon. We?re looking at colder climates like the Northeast, Midwest and Northwest for sure.
Moosejaw mobile POS
The stores you?re opening are pretty high-tech. Talk about what you?re doing there and how it?s changing the face of retail.
It?s a new prototype for us. We?ve always been pretty leading edge on the website, but we?re taking it to a new level in the store, and it starts with the layout.
We think shopping in a store should be a good, fun experience. We?re hanging TVs in the store that stream customers? pictures and displaying social media posts. We have the dressing rooms in the middle of the store, so they are easier to access and people can try on clothes and show their friends. And we have our products displayed in strategic areas around the store that make sense to shoppers.
We?ve also done away with the standard cashiers desk that you see when you walk in, and replaced them with mobile POS systems that our employees carry. It?s basically an iPod Touch that?s cradled in a device that also has a barcode scanner and credit card swiper. A store these sizes, with our old POS system, would have required four POS units. Now, we have two units and three handheld POS units.
It saves money, but it?s more about allowing our employees to better engage customers. They can also check inventory on the spot, look up products that we only sell online, and be a better asset to our shoppers.
What?s the feedback been?
We?ve had great feedback from customers and employees. We set a goal to run 50 percent of our in-store orders through the mobile units, and it?s at about 36 percent and increasing as our employees become more comfortable with it. The customers love it too. It?s a talking point if nothing else.
My favorite story is of a woman who came into our Ann Arbor, Mich. Store looking at two pieces of clothing. She bought one via the mobile POS, but we later got a call that she wanted the other one. However, she said she had her kids with her and didn?t want to come into the store. She asked if we could get the item, bring it out to her car as she was parked out front, and do the transaction right there. We did.
Do you see that drive-thru approach gaining momentum?
We talked about doing it more as a stunt this past Christmas. But, because we had only debuted it a couple months before that at our Michigan stores, we weren?t ready to roll it out. Now that we have it up and running, we may do it for Christmas this year. It could be a great thing for those guys who forgot to get their significant other something and need to make a quick purchase and then get back to the house.
I don?t think you?ll get rid of cash registers though, because you still need them for cash transactions.
What?s the investment?
It depends on what options you want. Square is a pretty affordable option that anyone can use with an iPad, iPhone or Android phone. There are other affordable options like that, which allow you to process credit cards, but they don?t link to your inventory system. It?s definitely becoming more mainstream.
For us, though, we integrated ours with our POS system and everything is tied together. But really, cost will depend on what type of program you use, how tied together you want your system to be and how many POS terminals you have.
You guys also have a full mobile e-com site. What advice do you have for other retailers thinking about taking that leap?
We had a mobile site back in 2006, but that was before smart phones were so popular. Then we created a smart phone mobile site, but we found out that it was hard integrating that with our regular website in terms of online shopping and inventory. So we created a site that?s flexible. It automatically knows if you?re on a mobile phone and it switches over to a different layout, but it?s essentially the same website that you?d pull up on your desk computer.
In terms of tips, the first and foremost piece of advice is to create a mobile site of some sort. You absolutely need to have a mobile option or you?ll lose customers. Mobile is only about 10 percent of our traffic, but you could potentially lose that 10 percent if you don?t have a site that works on mobile phones.
Sometimes people just want to check a product?s price, add something to a wish list or look up features. They don?t always want to buy, so if that?s what?s stopping a shop from having a mobile site, then don?t have the e-commerce feature.
Source: http://skiingbusiness.com/12690/profiles/moosejaws-new-ceo-talks-retail-future/
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