Company Profile
A Very merry
clickmas
The Very Group has enjoyed an incredibly strong year, with its Very, Littlewoods and Littlewoods Ireland brands producing standout performances that helped increase sales nearly 25% YOY. Rachael Simpson-Jones spoke to Ann-Marie Edwards, category manager – Girls & Pre-school Toys, and Nicole Sweeney, category manager – Boys & Outdoor Toys, to find out how the online department store Very approaches the toy category and what it offers its suppliers and customers. In October we reported a strong set of results for Very - how have the past couple of months been since the run-up to Christmas kicked in?
Ann-Marie: Our most recent full year results showed record breaking growth in 2020, and in October our Q1 results revealed that The Very Group was still trading at almost 10% up YOY with growth across all categories. Electricals really fuelled this growth, driven by huge demand for new games consoles such as PlayStation 5. With the end of lockdown we’ve seen an uplift in other categories that r eflects modified customer behaviour.
What factors are behind this performance? How much do you feel the pandemic has had an impact on your business? Ann-Marie: The pandemic really accelerated our growth and helped drive a substantial influx
of new customers that have migrated to The Very Group’s brands for the first time. As a business we’d become more reactive to market conditions over the last 12-18 months, pivoting our trading and marketing plans to ensure our stories continue to resonate with customers. For example, our latest Christmas campaign, ‘It’s the Very Best Excuse’, focuses on the fact that we didn’t get to enjoy a big Christmas with our friends and family last year, whereas this year we have the excuse to really let our hair down and celebrate. From a toy perspective, we’ve maintained share in a difficult market – it’s been tough. Sales this year have been erratic since August, but we are confident that we’ve outperformed the market and our pre-Christmas numbers in those final few weeks were really strong. The wider performance of the entire business reflects the resilience and relevance of our trading model.
Have you seen signs that customers shopped earlier this year than in others?
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Ann-Marie: Absolutely. We know from our data that Very customers love shopping early, so much so that we go out with an annual Christmas message just after the August bank holiday. This year we released our Christmas TV ad a month early, in the first week of October, and we’ve seen the benefits of that decision reflected by our sales. We’ve seen a big surge in the amount of online shopping by customers, as well as the number of retailers offering an online service. What sets Very’s online shopping experience apart from a customer facing POV? Annie Marie: Two obvious things spring to mind. Firstly, we’re a ‘department store’ with a wide range of offerings in all the biggest categories, and all the best brands too. Customers love our flexible ways to pay: our Take 3 payment option on Very.co.uk is one of our most popular ways to pay. There’s a lot customers don’t see that goes into making Very what it is. We’ve invested heavily in our digital customer experience, such as our website assistant and app that can answer queries
