How Matalan shipped over 1 Million orders with Ship from Store
For over 30 years, Matalan has been on a mission to provide outstanding quality and value for modern families. As one of the leading omnichannel retailers in the UK, they operate over 200 retail locations spread across the UK, Europe, and the Middle East. The fastest-growing sector of their business now, however, is ecommerce. When Matalan initially brought on ShipStation partner, SHIFT Commerce, a digital retail platform, to help tailor and optimise their marketplace strategy in 2017, they knew the future of retail was online and that they needed to become a more agile ecommerce brand. Based on their brand awareness and physical retail presence, Matalan also knew they needed to build their online store on a platform that could handle high volumes and still have room to scale. In a matter of a couple of years, SHIFT Commerce enabled Matalan to adapt to the digital market, grow a strong online presence, and open and staff a distribution centre solely for ecommerce orders.
Capitalisation on In-Store Inventory During COVID-19 Once news of COVID-19 started to spread in early 2020, the Matalan team met with SHIFT to discuss opportunities for encouraging in-person shoppers to buy online.
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After a meeting of the minds, they decided to experiment with a fulfil-from-store distribution model. Emma Sutton, Operations Director of SHIFT Commerce recalls the brainstorm with Matalan as “We’ve got the stores, we’ve got the staff. Let’s get them picking orders,” she said. With hundreds of retail locations spread across the UK, the concept of converting empty retail stores into mini distribution centres was a no-brainer. As a budget retailer, margins are key to Matalan’s business success. With this new process, they would not only save money on postage by shipping parcels from the closest retail location, but they were also able to capitalize on selling the inventory already stocked in-store. “Having flexibility and being agile was really important for Matalan. Since coming on board, their online revenues have grown by 77%, organic traffic has risen by over 30% and conversion rates continue to climb.” Emma Sutton, Operations Director, SHIFT Commerce The only problem? Matalan needed a shipping software solution that would support shipments through multiple carriers, allow them to fulfil orders from multiple locations, and seamlessly communicate with their existing platforms.
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