Inside the 2015 IR Awards for Excellence

Transcription

2015 Award Special Edition
July 2015 |www.internetretailer.com
Inside the 2015
IR Awards
for Excellence
Profiles, financial data, and commentary on
34 finalists and 10 winners of Internet Retailer’s
awards for the best retail websites for 2015.
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contents
July 2015
02 Greetings
Letter from the Publisher
Publisher Jack Love Explains the Awards
6-7 judges
The 2015 Internet Retailer Award Judges
38
Awards Photo Gallery
The Internet Retailer 2015 Excellence Awards Nominees & Winners
08-09
newcomer of the year
Nominees: The Honest Co., NatureBox,
& Uniqlo USA
Winner: Uniqlo USA
10-12
Comeback of the Year
Nominees: JC Penney, Pier 1, & Target
Winner: Pier 1
14-16 E-Retail Growth Award
Nominees: Dollar Shave Club, Etailz,
Groupon, Choxi & Warby Parker
Winner: Dollar Shave Club
24-25 Best Video of the Year
Nominees: Tiger Direct, Lululemon, &
Previously Owned by A Gay Man
Winner: Previously Owned by A Gay Man
26-28 Global E-Retailer of
the Year
Nominees: ASOS, Xiaomi, & Yoox
Winner: Yoox
30-31 B2B Player of the Year
Nominees: Environmental Lights,
MSC Industrial Supply, Newark Element 14, Tacoma Screw Products, Grainger
Winner: Grainger
18-20 Web reDesign of the Year
Nominees: Luxottica, Medelita,
Signature Hardware & New York
Times Store
Winner: Signature Hardware
22-23 Marketer of the Year
Nominees: Charlotte Ruse, Julep, & Macy’s
Winner: Macy’s
32-33 Mobile Commerce Award
Nominees: Groupon, QVC, Target & Amazon
Winner: Groupon
34-36 Internet Retailer of
the Year
Nominees: Amazon, Etsy, Home Depot & Wal-Mart
Winner: Home Depot
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letter from the publisher
Introducing the
2015 Internet
Retailer Excellence
Awards
I
’m delighted to introduce this Special
Edition report on the inaugural Internet
Retailer Excellence Awards, which were
presented at a dinner banquet honoring the
nominees and recipients June 3 during the 2015
Internet Retailer Conference and Exhibition
Show. Our judges nominated 34 finalists for the
10 awards that we presented at the banquet to
e-retailers who demonstrated a very high level of
performance in the last year in various areas of
online retailing. Nine of the awards are focused
on specialty areas of e-retailing and the 10th
award—the Internet Retailer of the Year Awards—
went to Home Deport for excelling in virtually
every aspect of an e-retailing business last year.
This Special Awards Edition of Internet
Retailer contains sales and growth data on all
34 finalists, along with a concise but detailed
description of their performance in 2014 that
explains why they were selected as an Award
Finalist and one “one key to success” for each
finalist that caught the judges’ attention. In
identifying each winner, we describe in detail
the reasons the judges gave for selecting each
winner. Finally, we include comments from top
executives of the winning websites.
I believe all web merchants will find the
content of this Special Edition to be compelling
and helpful as they attempt to improve their
own e-retailing businesses. The descriptions
of the performance of the finalists and winners
are loaded with useful facts, not empty platitudes. Indeed, the major advances made in the
e-retailing business in the last year are well
documented here.
But before you begin reading, I want to
answer three questions you may have.
Why give awards to e-retailers? The first
question is: Why should anyone present these
awards to the best performers in e-retailing?
That might have been a good question to debate
a decade ago when e-retailing was still a cottage
industry with relatively few serious competitors and still many non-believers. But today,
e-retailing is a big and vital part of our economy.
Last year, e-retailers in the U.S. generated
$305 billion in online retail sales, or about
one-tenth of this country’s total retail sales.
And because web retailing is growing five times
faster than store sales, it accounted for fully
one-third of the total retail growth last year. In
short, it’s just too important to our economy not
to recognize the trailblazing efforts of Best of the
Best in this business.
E-retailing is also the most innovative segment
of American retailing. Every year, this business
changes dramatically, thanks to new technology, new marketing tools and new methods of
operation. If you want to succeed at e-retailing,
you have to understand these changes and
implement them in your own business.
These awards have been created to spotlight
the achievements of the e-commerce trend-setters in hopes that e-retailers around the globe
will emulate them, thereby lifting the performance of an entire industry.
Why is Internet Retailer presenting these
awards? There are many good reasons Internet
Retailer is extremely well positioned to organize
an awards program for the e-retailing industry.
First, we are the oldest and largest media company in the field. We’ve been covering e-retailing
for 16 years. We have the largest full-time staff
of journalists covering e-commerce. They are
passionate about reporting all the news and
major trends in e-retailing and most importantly
they have no bias in favor of certain competitors.
Additionally, we have a large research staff
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letter from the publisher
that each year collects and reports dozens of financial, marketing and performance metrics on nearly 5,000 of the largest retail websites around the world.
As you read about the finalists and the winners of the 2015 Internet Retailer
Excellence Awards, please note that our justification for selecting all finalists
and winners relies heavily on the performance numbers our research team
generates.
How we did it. That brings me to the final question: How did we do it?
Given the millions of retail websites, how did we select the 34 nominees and
the 10 winners?
First, we reached out to our thousands of subscribers at retail companies to
invite them to submit their websites for any of the awards. We got hundreds
of submissions, each one documenting why they believed their site worthy
of consideration. Second, our editorial staff made dozens of additional
nominations—each backed up by their reporting and our research in the field.
In all, the judges reviewed 450 submissions for these awards.
Finally, we assembled a large panel of judges who thoroughly reviewed the
merits of each proposed nominee. That team included 16 of Internet Retailer’s
fulltime editors and researchers and 16 industry experts with whom we regularly consult on many e-commerce topics.
This team spent months reviewing the performance of the hundreds of
the retail websites that were initially in the running. You can imagine all of
the work that was involved in winnowing this list of hundreds down to the
34 finalists and then down to the 10 winners. We are extremely grateful to the
judges for all their hard work on this project.
The one thing the judges DID NOT consider, however, was the wishes of our
award sponsors and advertisers, who played no role in the selection process.
Separating editorial from advertising has been a core principle of Internet
Retailer since its beginning in 1999, which gives us the very credibility needed
to present these 10 awards.
Jack Love
Publisher, Internet Retailer
Vertical Web Media | Chairman: Jack Love | CEO/President: Molly Love Rogers
Executive Vice President: Kurt T. Peters
Volume 17, Number 8
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Associate Editor, Research: Jonathan Love
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judges
internet retailer judges
Bill Briggs
Matt Lindner
Managing Editor, Production and
Special Projects, Research
Research Analyst
Mark Brohan
Jon Love
Research Director
Assistant Editor, Research
April Dahlquist
Tracy Maple
Associate Editor, Mobile
Managing Editor, Digital Content
Don Davis
Kurt J. Peters
Editor in Chief
Executive Editor
Paul Demery
Zak Stambor
Managing Editor, B2B Commerce
Managing Editor
Sylvia De Oliveira
Frank Tong
Research Analyst
Senior Editor, China
Allison Enright
Mary Wagner
Editor
Katie Evans
Editor, Mobile
Editorial Director, Conferences
july 2015 | www.internetretailer.com
industry judges
Gene Alvarez
Miya Knights
Managing Vice President
Gartner Inc.
Senior Research Analyst
IDC Retail Insights
Nikki Baird
Sucharita Mulpuru
Managing Partner
RSR Research
Vice President and Principal Analyst
Forrester Research Inc.
Tom Clifton
Steve Rowan
Co-Founder and Head of Product
Animoto
Managing Partner
RSR Research
Charlie cole
Bill Siwicki
President
The Line
VP Mobile Strategy & Research
GPShopper
Lauren Freedman
Jamie Troia
President
The E-tailing Group
Krishna Gupta
CEO
Sortfolio
Andy Hoar
Principal Analyst
Michael Hughes
CEO/Founder
Plushbeds
Managing Partner
Greystack Digital Marketing
Andrea Weiss
Founding Partner
The O Alliance
Brendan Witcher
Principal Analyst
Bernardine Wu
CEO
FitForCommerce
«7
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awards
The website which grew its sales to emerge from relative obscurity to a firsttime ranking in the Top 1,000 of North American retail websites.
The Nominees:
The Honest Co.
NatureBox Inc.
URL: Honest.com
Year Launched: 2011
2014 Web Sales: $149.2 million
2014 Rank: 195
2014 Growth Rate: 198%
CEO: Brian Lee
Company Address: 2700 Pennsylvania Ave., Suite 1200,
Santa Monica, CA 90404
URL: NatureBox.com
Year Launched: 2012
2014 Rank: 387
CEO: Gautam Gupta
Company Address: 1056 Commercial Street, San Carlos,
CA 94070
Company Background: For an e-retailer of baby items
and natural personal care products that only came online
in 2012, The Honest Co. grew up fast. Co-founded by
actress Jessica Alba, Honest.com struck a successful chord
with young parents. The merchant began by selling subscriptions for monthly shipments of product bundles, such
as a 30-day supply of diapers and wipes or a “health and
wellness” bundle of organic vitamins, for a flat monthly
fee of $39.95. The web retailer now also fulfills one-time
orders. There’s nothing childish about Honest’s ability
to attract investors—last August the company raised
$70 million in a new funding round, bringing total
funding to date to $122 million.
Company Background: Venture capitalists search for
companies that have a shot at building really big businesses—and fast. A good example is NatureBox Inc., an online
healthy snacks retailer that investors have already funded to the tune of $28 million. Americans buy about $110
billion in snack food every year, according to the Snack
Food Association. And they’re buying 2% of that online,
says NatureBox CEO Gautam Gupta, so there’s plenty of
room for growth. What’s more, Gupta says, he develops
his own products, so the items he sells are not available
anywhere else. That ticks off two important check boxes
for investors—a differentiated product and a large market
opportunity.
Baby product e-retailer Honest.com
tripled its sales last year in part by tripling
its conversion rate with personalized
welcome letters.
Using a subscription service to sell healthy
snacks, NatureBox.com boasts high repeat
trade, a 6% conversion rate, and 2.6 million
monthly visitors.
One Key to Success: Honest.com nearly tripled its
conversion rate last year when it began personalizing the
series of six welcoming emails it sends to new website
visitors who provide their email addresses. The e-retailer
applies page visit and click data from a new customer’s
first web visit and aggregated data from other visitors to
craft welcome email messaging and product offers that
are most likely to appeal to her, says Sue Cho, manager of
email marketing.
One Key to Success: For startup pure-plays, market
positioning is everything, and NatureBox succeeds in part
because it put itself at the crossroads of two major market
forces—snack foods and healthy eating. As with many
new niche sites in the food market, it relies on a subscription service, which insures higher repeat trade. Internet
Retailer data also shows that NatureBox.com boasts a
6.0% conversion rate and receives an estimated 2.6 million
visitors per month.
Uniqlo USA
URL: Uniqlo.com
Year Launched: 2012
2014 Rank: 388
CEO: larry H. meyer
Company Address: 546-48 Broadway, New York, NY 10012
Company Background: Uniqlo is off to a fast start
in youth apparel and accessories, an online retail
category where many of its competitors are slowing
down or going out of business. Uniqlo was the fastestgrowing e-retailer in Internet Retailer’s 2014 Top 500
Guide, increasing web sales in North America 341% in
2013 over 2012. And the company backed that up with
100% growth in 2014, again ranking among the fastest
growers in the 2015 Top 500 Guide. Uniqlo, a chain
owned by Japan-based Fast Retailing Co., only began
selling online in the United States in 2012, one year after
it opened its first four stores in the United States. The
apparel retailer plans on building 20 to 30 new stores in
North America every year through 2020, when it hopes
to be generating $10 billion in online and offline sales
annually from its American operations.
Targeting the youth apparel market,
Japanese chain retailer Uniqlo grew sales
on its American website 341% in 2013
and another 100% last year.
One Key to Success: Uniqlo credits its growth to
fast site search, one-click shopping on many product
pages and a website built with responsive design
techniques that adapts the site to the size of the
screen the consumer is using.
the winner
Uniqlo USA
Accepting the Newcomer of the Year Award for Uniqlo are two store
managers from Chicago, Stacey Hamai (left) and Ronena Richardson.
“
Judges’ comments: While Uniqlo was well-known
internationally, it was relatively obscure when it first
dipped its toes into the U.S. waters in 2012. But thanks
to a sleek, well-designed responsive website that
features one-click shopping on many product pages, as
well as a host of other bells and whistles, it’s managed
to make its mark as one of the fastest growing online
retailers in North America. Its success in an online
retail category where many of its competitors are
struggling is what led judges to pick it over two
other worthy nominees.
”
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awards
The website in the top 1,000 showing the greatest growth after a year or two of
stagnant or declining sales and which achieved such improvement through better
marketing, merchandising, site performance, site design, product selection and
other operational enhancements.
The Nominees:
J.C. Penney Co. Inc.
URL: JCP.com
Year Launched: 1994
2014 Web Sales: $1.2 Billion
2014 Rank: 37
CEO: Marvin Ellison
Company Address: 6501 Legacy Drive, Plano, TX 75024
Company Background: Many observers were tempted
to write the obituary for this traditional department store
chain after its sales declined on the web and in stores
during the tenure of Ron Johnson, who served just 17
months as J.C. Penney’s CEO before being ousted in April
2013. Soon afterward, J.C. Penney, once one of the biggest
catalogers around, managed to regain some of its online
footing. After declining 36% in 2012 alone, J.C. Penney’s
web sales grew 6% in 2013 and increased another 13% in
2014 to $1.2 billion. While that was well below the
record $1.59 billion in online sales the chain set in 2011,
JCPenney.com nonetheless accounted for 10% of total
sales of $12.3 billion in 2014, up from 9.2% in 2011.
One Key to Success: J.C. Penney’s turnaround can be
attributed primarily to reversing Johnson’s merchandising
strategies, which stressed everyday pricing over the many
periodic sales promotions that J.C. Penney’s customers
five years of web sales ($ millions)
had grown accustomed to. Going forward, new CEO
Marvin Ellison promises to tie the web more closely to J.C.
Penney’s store business, stressing a so-called omnichannel
strategy that will include same-day in-store pickup of
online orders.
Pier 1 Imports Inc.
URL: Pier1.com
Year Launched: 2012 (Re-launch)
2014 Web Sales: $200 million
2014 Rank: 161
CEO: Alex Smith
Company Address: 100 Pier 1 Place, Fort Worth, TX 76161
Company Background: After struggling online for several
years, Pier 1 concluded in 2007 that it would never catch up
with its housewares competitors on the web, and took the
drastic step of closing its web business altogether. The site remained closed for five full years, but Pier 1 returned to e-commerce in 2012 with a vengeance. With a firm commitment
from its new CEO, Alexander Smith, to leverage the chain’s
brand online, Pier 1 built a state-of-the art retail website. That
investment paid quick dividends; Pier 1’s web sales grew four
fold in 2013 and nearly three fold last year to $200 million.
One Key to Success: A vital component of Pier 1’s
online revival involved equipping all associates at
600 stores with web-enabled tablets, which allowed them
$200.2
$1,530 $1,590
$1,080 $1,080
$1,220
$68.1
$0
2010 2011201220132014
$0
$16.8
2010 2011201220132014
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awards
to fulfill store shoppers’ orders online when the desired
merchandise was not in the outlet’s inventory. By the
second half of 2014, nearly one-third of the chain’s
online sales were originating from the store.
the winner
Pier1.com
Target Corp.
URL: Target.com
Year Launched: 1999
2014 Web Sales: $3 billion
2014 Rank: 16
CEO: Brian Cornell
Company Address: 1000 Nicollet Mall,
Minneapolis, MN 55403
Company Background: It’s no secret that Target had
a very bad year in 2013. The chain suffered a disastrous
data breach during the 2013 holiday shopping season,
with credit and debit card details of 40 million customers and other personal information of 70 million shoppers exposed. Breach-related expenses topped $191 million that year. Target also abruptly closed all 133 stores
in Canada, less than two years after it opened them.
That was followed, understandably, by a top management change. Through it all, e-commerce proved to be
Target’s one shining light: Online retail sales increased
30% during the chain’s fiscal 2014, which ended Jan. 31,
2015, a rate that’s double the U.S. e-commerce growth
rate of 15.4% during 2014 as estimated by the Commerce
Department.
One Key to Success: During its all-important 2014
holiday shopping season, Target offered free shipping
with no minimum order in the lower 48 states through
Dec. 20. When that program delivered unexpectedly high
online sales, Target announced it was lowering its normal
threshold for free shipping from $50 to $25.
$2,300 $2,2990
$1,930
$1,500
$1,760
2010 2011201220132014
Accepting the Comeback of the Year Award for Pier 1 is Stacey Renfro,
Senior Vice President of E-Commerce.
“
Judges’ comments: Under CEO Alex Smith the task
of bringing e-commerce back became a top corporate
priority. What makes Pier 1 an award-winning comeback
story isn’t just the big annual growth in web sales, but
the retailer took due diligence by talking with shoppers
and benchmarking the competition prior to launching a
new e-commerce infrastructure that is integrated with its
network of 1,065 stores. About 60% of all e-commerce
transactions involved online orders being picked up in
store or originated in store by tablet-equipped and
web-enabled sales associates.
Winner’s comments: “Pier 1 Imports relaunched Pier1.com
in 2012 as part of our ”1 Pier 1” omnichannel strategy.
Operating Pier 1 Imports brick-and-mortar stores without
an e-commerce presence proved to be an advantage,
since we were able to thoughtfully build a strategy and
a website focused on the holistic customer shopping
experience instead of a singular channel experience.
Leveraging our ”1 Pier 1” approach also enabled us to
build systems, processes and organizational structure
from the beginning instead of trying to retrofit an existing
platform. ”1 Pier 1” is deeply rooted in our culture and
embraced by everyone within the organization, which
is evident in our results. Approximately 30% of our web
sales are purchased online and picked-up in store, while
another approximately 30% of e-commerce sales originate
from an in-store digital selling device.”
Stacey Renfro, Senior Vice President
of E-Commerce
”
2015 INTERNET RETAILER EXCELLENCE AWARD “COMEBACK OF THE YEAR”
Hundreds of leading retailers, like Pier 1 Imports, choose
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14
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awards
The website that has been ranked in the top 1000 for at least two years and achieves
the highest growth rate in the current year.
The Nominees:
Dollar shave club
URL: DollarShaveClub.com
Year Launched: 2011
2014 Rank: 319
CEO: Michael Dubin
Company Address: PO Box 5688, Santa Monica, CA 90409
Company Background: An erstwhile improvisational
comedian, Michael Dubin, founder and CEO of Dollar
Shave Club, has turned his creativity into a booming
e-retail business. Dollar Shave Club did not launch its web
business until the end of 2011, when it began selling shaving products online, supported mightily by a funny and
clever video that went viral. Since then, the pure-play web
merchant has shaken up a staid industry dominated by
Gillette. Relying on a monthly subscription model, Dollar
Shave Club started selling inexpensive but high-quality
razor blades targeted to men fed up with paying a lot for
shaving products. The company has since branched into
other consumable products for the bathroom. Dollar Shave
Club grew 242% in 2014 to $65 million, and it expects to
double web sales in 2015. “We want to own the bathroom
cabinet,” Dubin says.
Dollar Shave Club owes its phenomenal
launch to a 90-second YouTube video.
One Key to Success: If ever a company could attribute its
successful launch to a web video, it’s Dollar Shave Club.
In March 2012, the company released a slick and irreverent
90-second video staring Dubin. In it, Dubin questions
the long-standing practice of driving to a store for overlyfeatured razor blades that cost $20, when his company
could ship high-quality razors for “a couple bucks” a
month. The video racked up nearly 20 million views.
Virtually overnight Dollar Shave Club went from processing
three orders a day to “tens of thousands,” Dubin says. The
moral for web entrepreneurs: Pick a niche, find a weakness
in store-based shopping and hammer the message home
with creative video messaging.
Etailz Inc.
URL: Etailz.com
Year Launched: 2008
2014 Rank: 336
CEO: Josh Neblett
Company Address: 850 E. Spokane Falls Blvd., Suite 110,
Spokane, WA 99202
Company Background: Newcomer Etailz is making a name
for itself with eco-conscious web shoppers. A case in point is
Etailz-owned GreenCupboards.com, which sells organic, natural products for the home and office that were not tested on
animals. Knowing its shoppers prioritize how the products
they buy are made, the e-retailer sorts its merchandise by
eco-trait, using symbols representing 17 categories, including organic, kosher, cruelty-free and sustainable materials.
The site is one of several brands owned by Etailz, which also
implemented eco-traits at ecomom.com, a web retailer of
household and baby products that Etailz acquired in 2013.
Etailz last year grew online sales 122% to $60 million.
Etailz attracts young, tech-savvy staffers by
giving them “the chance to be a big fish in
a small pond.”
One Key to Success: Staffing a fast-growing web business
with young, tech-savvy e-commerce professionals is one of
the greatest challenges e-retailers face because the demand
for such talent is huge. Yet, in 2014, Etailz grew its full-time
e-commerce headcount by 68% to 121, and in the first
half of 2015, that count has topped 150. CEO Josh Neblett
attributes that recruiting success in part to his company’s
willingness to train and develop young employees and give
them the chance to be “a big fish in a small pond.” Etailz
focuses its recruiting efforts on technology positions with
design and marketing professionals in lesser demand.
Groupon Inc.
URL: Groupon.com/goods
Year Launched: 2011
2014 Web Sales: $1.56 billion*
2014 Rank: 30
E-Commerce Chief: Aaron Cooper, VSP, Groupon Goods
Company Address: 600 W. Chicago Ave., Suite 400,
Chicago, IL 60610
*Figure represents Groupon Goods division only.
Company Background: Groupon made its name by promoting daily-deal vouchers for local stores, a digital form of
local classified advertising newspapers. But two years ago,
the company shifted strategies by selling physical products
online. In the 2015 Top 500 Guide, Groupon surged into 30th
place among American e-retailers based on online retail
sales of $1.56 billion in 2014, an increase of 70%. A big part
of Groupon’s future lies in expanding Groupon Goods.
Groupon is building on its fast start in e-retailing with innovations such as Groupon Stores, a beta program launched
April 1 that enables brands and retailers to establish a
Groupon storefront at Groupon.com/stores. The program
requires that products sold through the marketplace be at
least 5% cheaper than elsewhere online.
One Key to Success: Groupon owes much of its rapid start to
its highly popular mobile app. More than 100 million shoppers have downloaded Groupon’s mobile app, and in some
markets, as much as two-thirds of Groupon’s e-commerce
transactions are conducted on mobile devices.
« 15
Choxi (formerly NoMoreRack.com)
URL: Choxi.com
Year Launched: 2010
2014 Rank: 66
CEO: Deepak Agarwal
Company Address: 381 Park Avenue South, New York,
NY 10016
Company Background: Formed in 2010, Choxi (pronounced Chock’-see), was one of many flash-sales sites
launched about the same time. Many were flash-in-thepans, but Choxi (formerly NoMoreRack.com) prospered by
keeping close tabs on its suppliers. Like other flash-sale
sites, Choxi relies on drop shipping to fulfill online orders,
which makes its fulfillment only as good as its suppliers.
Choxi’s dedicated team of supply chain experts uses a
tracking system the company developed to check whether
suppliers meet the time and quality requirements the company sets. CEO Deepak Agarwal says Choxi uses a system
of warnings and monetary penalties for fulfillment delays.
If an order doesn’t ship from a manufacturer’s warehouse
in the time allotted, the system triggers a warning. If it
happens again, the supplier pays a penalty than can be
significant, Agarwal says. The system is working: Choxi
doubled its web sales last year to $700 million.
One Key to Success: In a detailed study of the four digital
marketing channels used by America’s Top 500 e-retailers,
Internet Retailer found that Choxi ranked first in overall
web marketing, based on its effective and diverse use of all
digital marketing tools—social marketing, paid and organic
search and email marketing. In 2014, 35% of Choxi’s
monthly traffic came from social media.
242%
150%
122%
100%
71%
Online Sales Growth in 2014
16
»
awards
the winner
Dollar Shave Club
Warby Parker
URL: WarbyParker.com
Year Launched: 2010
2014 Rank: 247
CEO: Neil Blumenthal
Company Address: 161 Avenue of the Americas,
Second Floor, New York, NY 10013
Company Background: Eyeglass retailer Warby
Parker focuses on people in more ways than one. First,
it donates a pair of eyeglasses to the needy for every
set of frames purchased through its partnerships with
nonprofits. And secondly, it seeks to give customers
the latest in online shopping tools. Selling prescription
eyeglasses online only since 2010, Warby Parker offers
as much help as possible in buying eyeglasses—an
often tough online purchase. Shoppers can upload
their photos to virtually try on glasses. They can also
use photos of models on the site to see how the models
look in various styles of eyeglass frames. Eyeglass
shoppers like what they see—Warby Parker’s online
sales grew 150% in 2014 to $100 million.
Warby Parker makes shoppers feel
confident about buying prescription
eyeglasses online.
One Key to Success: Social media is one of Warby
Parker’s most popular and effective customer service
channels. About one-third of all customer comments
and questions come through social media. Questions
asked by customers run the gamut from how the retailer
handles prescriptions to how it makes its glasses affordable. The viral impact of interacting with customers in
this manner publicizes the company’s customer service
and builds confidence in its brand.
Accepting the E-Retail Growth Award for Dollar Shave Club is
Eric Adams, Vice President of Operations.
“
Judges’ comments: Choosing the winner here was
easy, because the award description itself requires
judges to consider only retail websites that have been
ranked by Internet Retailer in the top 1,000 for each of
the last two years and to pick the fastest growing retail
website from that group based on 2014 e-retail sales.
While all five nominees grew many times the 15.6%
national average e-commerce growth, no one topped
Dollar Shave Club’s remarkable 242% growth rate.
Winner’s comments: “Since Dollar Shave Club was
founded a little over three years ago, we’ve built a
community of over 1.9 million members who trust and
rely on us to deliver a collection of men’s grooming
products, interesting lifestyle content and a world-class
member experience. In this short time, we’ve had an
undeniable impact on men’s grooming. We now ship
70 million men’s razor cartridges per year. We are
on track to top $140 million in revenue this year.
To achieve this, all forms of communication are
incredibly important to us. Our videos online have
been watched more than 25 million times and our first
made-for-TV commercials began airing last fall. We
have successfully positioned ourselves as a leader in
men’s grooming by speaking honestly and directly to
our members as we seek to build a massive lifestyle
brand.”
Eric Adams, Vice President Operations
”
CONGRATULATIONS
INTERNET
RETAILER
EXCELLENCE
AWARD
WINNERS!
Cheers to you for taking on key challenges
and reinventing ways of doing business.
www.neustar.biz
18
»
awards
The Web Redesign of the Year is awarded to the e-retailer that unveiled the most
effective redesign last year. The judges looked for a retail website that achieved a
major improvement in appeal, functionality and customer friendliness, meeting not
only today’s requirements but pointing the way to the future of online retailing. The
new design must also produce improved results. That includes higher average ticket,
conversion rates and sales, and lower bounce rates.
The Nominees:
Luxottica Group S.p.A. (For its SunglassHut.com)
Medelita
URL: SunglassHut.com
Year Launched: 1998
2014 Rank: 119
CEO: Massimo Vian
Company Address: 1 Icon, Foothill Ranch, CA 92610
URL: Medelita.com
Year Launched: 20088
2014 Web Sales: unknown
2014 Rank: not ranked by internet retailer
2014 Growth Rate: unknown
CMO: Dan Stepchew
Company Address: 1046 Calle Recodo, Suite D,
San Clemente, CA 92673
Company Background: Luxottica Group owns a number of
well-known eyewear brands and websites, including Oakley.
com and Rayban.com. But it is nominated in this category for
its SunglassHut.com, which implemented a full global site
redesign to strengthen its position as an authority in sunglass fashion, focusing on the needs and wants of its primary
customer, millennial females. Because these younger women
use mobile devices a lot, Sunglass Hut started there, then
proceeded to make sure the shopper can move easily from
smartphone to tablet to computer and back again. After the
redesign, revenue per visit to SunglassHut.com increased
17%, and the site’s overall revenue increased 35%.
One goal of the SunglassHut.com redesign:
Overcoming consumer concerns of buying
eyewear online without trying the frames
on first.
One Key to Success: As part of its redesign, Sunglass
Hut added two tools, Face Shape and the Interactive Style
Guide, which were both designed to get past the biggest
hurdle to buying eyewear online: not being able to try
frames on first.
Company Background: Medelita is a brand manufacturer
and e-retailer that sells uniforms for healthcare professionals, such as lab coats and scrubs, and manages single-order
and business-to-business orders from one site. In 2014,
the company completely changed its traditional B2B sales
model, laying off or reassigning its entire field sales force
and replacing them with a newly redesigned website. The
new site handles all B2B orders by calculating group discounts automatically, a feature that’s built directly into the
shopping cart. The site consistently converts more than 3%
of all traffic with an average order value of $220 or more.
A redesigned website allows hospitals to
add custom logos or embroidery design on
the uniforms the buy online.
One Key to Success: The site allows buyers to easily
customize their orders. For example, if customers wish to
add a logo or embroidery to a lab coat, they can upload a
logo (or embroidery design) file directly to the product page
to customize their order. “We simply get out of the customer’s
way, but we’re there when they need us with all contact
information clearly visible on every page,” the e-retailer says.
« 19
Signature Hardware
The New York Times Store
URL: SignatureHardware.com
Year Launched: 1999
2014 Rank: 253
CMO: Mark Morse, VP of Marketing
Company Address: 2700 Crescent Springs Pike,
Erlanger, KY 41017
URL: NYTimes.com/store
Year Launched: 1998
2014 Rank: 798
E-Commerce Manager: Ikonya Nginyo
Company Address: 620 Eighth Ave., 9th Floor East,
New York, NY 10018
Company Background: Signature Hardware is a webonly retailer of sinks, bathtubs, shower accessories and
other home products. It transformed a text- and data-heavy
website into a highly visual, modern shopping site that
makes it easy for consumers to understand the product
customization opportunities available. The site also is fully
responsive to appeal to shoppers on all devices. Consumers
can customize products—such as placing one of 30 sinks
atop different vanities—to find the right combination for
their home, and a new navigation tool helps consumers
search the 60,000-SKU catalog in various ways.
Company Background: The New York Times
e-commerce arm sells gifts, photography, art and other
collectible items related to its years of covering the news
of New York, the nation and the world. But last year The
Gray Lady’s web store needed a facelift, having never
had a real redesign since its launch in 1998. The new
site, which uses responsive design, includes a clean
design and close integration between the New York
Times magazine and newspaper sites, allowing shoppers
to move between those sites with only one login.
The company added more product detail, along with
recommendations and the ability to tailor collections to
the individual shopper.
To sell bathroom fixtures online, Signature
employs licensed plumbers on its customer
service staff.
One Key to Success: The e-retailer stocks more 60,000
products in its northern Kentucky warehouse and employs
licensed plumbers on its customer service staff to ensure
customers get answers from knowledgeable sources.
One Key to Success: The New York Times online store
capitalizes on the newspaper’s massive archive of editorial and photographic content by allowing web shoppers
to purchase reprints, artwork and customized bound
newspaper editions.
The redesigned website for the New York Times Store (above) represented the first major overhaul of the site since it was launched
in 1998.
20
»
awards
the winner
Signature Hardware
the clear winner, calling its redesign a “night-and-day change”
and a “premium, luxury design that has great usability.” The
e-retailer’s before-and-after metrics also showed improvement
in average order value and bounce rates.
“
Mark Morse (left), vice president of marketing, at Signature Hardware
accepted his company’s Web Redesign of the Year Award from presenter Lucy Lawrence, head of thought leadership, eBay Enterprise.
Judges’ comments: Signature Hardware’s web sales have
grown at a compound annual rate of more than 36% since
2009, but executives didn’t want to be complacent about the
design of SignatureHardware.com. Three Signature Hardware
staffers managed the redesign project with design firm Gorilla
Group consulting, and the new site debuted in January 2014.
The category judges unanimously agreed that the e-retailer was
before redesign
Winner’s comments: “Signature Hardware partnered with
Magento Enterprise to upgrade our ecommerce channel,”
says Mark Morse, Vice President of Marketing. “A clean,
sophisticated, product-driven design system was built on
a responsive design framework that allows customers to
effortlessly shop the brand across multiple devices. Color
swatching and a custom group configurable product module
were added to enable customers to easily select and
completely customize certain products. Not only has this
level of customization made consumers happy (with sales
of bathroom vanities up over 250% since the new website
launched), the product type’s ability to add multiple skus in the
cart under one master product has reduced product set-up time
by over 50%. The new website redesign reflects our ongoing
focus on our customers. We’re working hard every day to take
the pain out of the home improvement process.”
”
after redesign
22
»
awards
This is the Internet Retailer Top 1000 retailer which most effectively uses all forms
of online marketing based on email, paid search, SEO and social marketing metrics
tracked by Internet Retailer research to achieve above-average sales growth in its
merchandise category.
The Nominees:
Charlotte Russe
Julep
URL: CharlotteRusse.com
Year Launched: 2007
2014 Rank: 422
CEO: Jenny Ming
Company Address: 4645 Morena Blvd., San Diego, CA 92117
URL: Julep.com
Year Launched: 2011
2014 Rank: Not ranked by Internet Retailer
CEO: Jane Park
Company Address: 111 Queen Anne Ave N, Seattle, WA 98109
Company Background: Retail chain Charlotte Russe
sells trendy clothing and accessories for young women
and teens. Shoppers can browse the retailer’s site by item
or trend, and receive free shipping on orders of more than
$50. The retailer is very active on Facebook, Instagram,
Pinterest and Twitter. In 2014, Charlotte Russe partnered
with visual analytics and marketing vendor Curalate to
help its more than 650,000 Instagram followers find and
buy items featured on the retailer’s Instagram profile page.
“Instagram is no longer just about branding for us,” says
Kristen Strickler, the company’s social media and public
relations manager.
Company Background: Julep sells a variety of make-up
and skincare products on its website. The following company
description is from Julep’s website: “Founded as a nail parlor in
2007, Julep has expanded into a rapidly-growing beauty brand
that takes an end-to-end approach to product development,
testing, and distribution. As we’ve evolved, connection to our
customers has remained core to our approach. That’s why we
source high-quality ingredients that actually work, and never
make anything we wouldn’t use ourselves—or recommend for
our moms, daughters, and best friends. Every month, we bring
a portfolio of the latest in beauty to market, launching over 300
branded products per year, including cosmetics, nail color, and
skincare. Our newest discoveries debut through our wildly popular Julep Maven subscription program, the first fully customizable monthly beauty box.”
650,000 Instagram followers of Charlotte
Russe can find and buy items featured on
the merchant’s Instagram profile page.
One Key to Success: Charlotte Russe encourages young
fans to share Instagram selfies of themselves wearing
Charlotte Russe clothing, along with the CharlotteLook
hashtag. Its buyers can post these photos on an inspiration gallery on the chain’s website. Thanks in part to this
feature, shoppers on average spend five minutes per visit
on the retailer’s site.
Product images on Julep’s unboxing hashtag
(#MavenUnboxing) were viewed by 20
million social users last holiday season.
One Key to Success: Julep encourages online consumers to
share photos of themselves wearing the brand’s nail polish
and cosmetics in just about every interaction with its customers—on product pages, via Facebook contests, in confirmation
emails. In fact, when customers complete an online purchase,
Julep places a Pixlee widget in the confirmation email reminding buyers to upload their own photos once they receive their
product. That strategy has helped the brand build a community
around its product, as its unboxing hashtag, #MavenUnboxing,
reached 20 million social users in the fourth quarter of 2014.
Macy’s
URL: Macys.com
Year Launched: 1998
2014 Web Sales: $5.4 billion
2014 Rank: 7
CEO: Terry Lundgren
Digital Center Address: 685 Market St., 10th Floor,
San Francisco, CA 94105
Company Background: Macy’s has long been one of the
most aggressive department store chains in promoting and
expanding its online operations, and now it is using social
and mobile technology to thoroughly remake its image
for the digital age. Macy’s announced in January plans
to merge its online and store merchandising marketing
teams, hire 150 more employees for its digital center in San
Francisco, and trim the number of workers in each store.
“Our business is rapidly evolving in response to changes in
the way customers are shopping across stores, desktops,
tablets and smartphones,” says Macy’s chairman and CEO,
Terry Lundren.
Macy’s has rapidly expanded its Digital
Center in San Francisco as it trims the
number of workers at its stores.
One Key to Success: Macy’s ranks fourth in online
marketing success according to data compiled in Internet
Retailer’s 2015 Digital Marketing Report Series. That’s
thanks in part to the retailer’s leveraging of its sponsorship of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade with a flurry
of posts and tweets during the event that included photos
of celebrities and balloon characters. From Nov. 24-Dec. 1,
its average Facebook post received 236 engagements
(Likes, comments, shares and other interactions), and its
Twitter posts 263 engagements according to Unmetric.
the winner
Macy’s
“
Accepting the Marketer of the Year Award for Macy’s is Tony Giannini,
Senior Vice President, Media Strategy & Marketing Effectiveness.
Judges’ comments: For a brand that predates Darwin’s “On
the Origin of Species,” Macy’s stays fresh by finding new ways
to market its brand and drive sales online. It kicked off last
holiday season, for example, by showing every woman 21 and
older who looked at Facebook on Thanksgiving Day a video ad
that aimed to capture the “magic and spirit” of the retailer’s
holiday promotions. Shoppers who interacted with the video
then saw follow-up ads featuring Macy’s sales throughout the
« 23
weekend. By using social media as a place to engage with
shoppers, rather than simply a sales tool, it inspired consumers
to interact with the brand in a way that ultimately helped it
deliver a 30% boost to its online sales last year.
Winner’s comments: “A famous quote from one of Macy’s first
female executives, ‘Be everywhere, do everything, and never fail
to astonish the customer’ has never been truer than it is today.
This customer-centric focus has guided us along the way to our
current omnichannel approach. Our customers love shopping
seamlessly across channels; these are our best customers.
Another great strength of Macy’s is our marketing. We have a
very active social media presence across all channels and have
leveraged our content to attract nearly 15 million Facebook fans
along with a highly interactive following on Twitter, Pinterest,
Instagram, and other platforms. A recent cross-channel example
is our #AmericanSelfie campaign, which has received the
strongest response to a hashtag we’ve seen. We also leverage
in-store events, have an app for Black Friday shopping, connect
to the customer via relevant cause marketing initiatives, and are
always improving the functionality of macys.com.”
Tony Giannini, Senior Vice President
Media Strategy & Marketing Effectiveness
”
24
»
awards
The judges looked for a retail video that was well produced with high entertainment
and promotional values, and that results in higher sales and a high level of viral
distribution and awareness.
The Nominees:
Tiger Direct (Owned by Systemax)
Lululemon Athletica
URL: TigerDirect.com
Year Launched: 1998
2014 Rank: 32
CEO: Richard Leeds
Company Address: 11 Harbor Park Drive, Port Washington,
NY 11050
URL: LuluLemon.com
Year Launched: 2009
2014 Rank: 108
2014 Growth Rate: 25.4%
CEO: Laurent Potdevin
Company Address: 400-1818 Cornwall Ave., Vancouver, BC,
Canada V6J 1C7
Company Background: Tiger Direct is owned by computer
gear direct marketer and web merchant Systemax, which
ended 2014 with an acquisition and began 2015 with a push
to sell non-computer gear online to business clients. Systemax announced on Dec. 31, 2014, an agreement to acquire
business-to-business direct marketer Plant Equipment
Group. The acquired business, along with other Systemax
direct marketing brands, including TigerDirect.com, Global
Industrial, Misco and Inmac, will help Systemax become an
even bigger provider of maintenance and industrial supplies
to businesses, says CEO Richard Leeds.
One Key to Success: Orphanage Robbery Prank:
YouTube star Roman Atwood stages a fake break-in of
an orphanage, trashing the office area. Employees are
shocked as they enter their offices, but are soon pleasantly
surprised when they realize that it’s all been a stunt to
promote a program through which Tiger Direct donates all
new office equipment for the orphanage. The video has
received 5.7 million views in seven months. Check it out at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBfVwjRuwxk.
Company Background: Aiming to capitalize on the
growth of the so-called “athleisure” trend, Lululemon is
adding seasonal and fashionable items to its core assortment of yoga pants and workout apparel. The company
is also trying to speed growth internationally and among
male customers, who it says, may be a $1 billion revenue
opportunity.
One Key to Success: Give Presence: The video
urges viewers to use the hectic holiday season to
give the gift of their presence—with a “ce”—rather
than just presents—with a “ts.” Here’s the link to the
feel-good video, which is all about connecting with
family, friends and loved ones during the holidays:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86qAkvaCgso.
A feel-good video from the retailer of yoga and workout apparel urged
its shoppers to give friends and loved ones the gift of their presence
during the holidays.
Tiger Direct’s Orphanage Robbery Prank, featuring YouTube star
Roman Atwood, received 5.7 million views.
Previously Owned by a Gay Man
URL: PreviouslyOwnedByAGayMan.com
Year Launched: 2013
2014 Web Sales: Unknown
2014 Rank: Not ranked by Internet Retailer
2014 Growth Rate:
CEO: Michele Hofherr
Company Address: Oakland, CA
Company Background: This new pure-play e-retailer
sells primarily high-fashion and used furniture and
other home furnishings. The About page of the website
says the following: “We are a destination marketplace
for new and previously owned home furnishings from
designers, influencers and, of course, well-heeled gay
men. Call them what you will, the gay men behind this
site’s collections are style arbiters in their own right.
When they decide to part with their prized possessions,
we’re there to pick up the surplus and bring it to you.
We are a trusted editor for those looking to furnish and
decorate their homes beautifully and affordably; the
curated alternative to craigslist or eBay filled with only
hand-picked treasures.”
One Key to Success: Mom, Dad I Have Something to
Tell You: This clever video entertains as it succinctly
explains the value proposition of this e-commerce
site that sells used designer furniture and home
furnishings. It’s entertaining, and in tune with its hip,
urban target audience, while still making important
points—including that anyone can buy there. View it at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sAmnodY2co.
In Mom, Dad I Have Something to Tell You, the online seller of home
furnishings used a humorous skit to play on its unusual name.
the winner
Previously Owned by a Gay Man
Michele Hofherr, founder & CEO of Previously Owned by a Gay Man,
accepted the Video of the Year Award from presenter Don Davis,
editor-in-chief of Internet Retailer.
“
Judges’ comments: Previously Owned By A Gay Man
launched in June 2013 with practically no marketing
budget for attracting sophisticated urbanites to its
e-commerce site that sells used designer furniture
and home furnishings. So the founders rounded
up a bunch of local writers, actors and other video
talent, most of them working for free, and put on a
show. The result is this hilarious video that mixes
clever, wink-wink humor with effective visuals to
explain convincingly why consumers should shop at
PreviouslyOwnedByAGayMan.com. It’s a triumph of wit,
imagination and passion over the bigger budgets of the
two other excellent videos nominated in this category.
Winner’s comments: “We feel our video ‘Mom Dad
I Have Something to Tell You’ was both successful
and deserving of the ‘Excellence’ award because as a
new company we have the challenge of both creating
awareness and telling a story. Obviously the name
‘Previously Owned by a Gay Man’ says a lot about the
brand and captures our sense of humor. That said, with
the wrong collaborator, we could have easily missed the
opportunity to both create awareness through humor
and articulate what we do. We love how the video hit
both notes: first creating humor around the brand and
then specifically spelling out what we do.”
Michele Hofherr, CEO
”
« 25
26
»
awards
This award goes to the retailer that has most successfully invested in selling in online
markets around the world and that has dedicated time and resources to developing
an understanding for each local market it enters.
The Nominees:
ASOS Plc Holdings
Xiaomi
URL: Asos.co.uk
Year Launched: 2000
2014 Rank: 17 (Europe 500)
CEO: Nick Robertson
Company Address: Greater London House, Hampstead
Road, London, UK NW1 7FB
URL: Xiaomi.com
Year Launched: 2010
2014 Rank: 2 (China 500)
CEO: Lei Jun, Chairman and Founder
Company Address: Wangjing W. Road, Chaoyang District,
Beijing, China 100102
Company Background: ASOS has long been a global-minded player. The U.K.-based apparel retailer’s website
features its own branded clothing line plus a marketplace
section that sells more than 800 other apparel brands. Its
marketplace section allows the consumer to shop merchandise by country, and it’s one of the 130 U.K.-based
companies selling to Chinese consumers via Alibaba Group
Ltd.’s Tmall Global marketplace. To help boost international sales, ASOS recently rolled out what it calls “zonal”
pricing, essentially different prices for different markets
based on trends, the economy and other factors.
Company Background: Founded in 2010 with the idea
that it would price feature-rich mobile phones at just
above the cost of production, Beijing-based Xiaomi is the
third largest smartphone maker in the world and China’s
second-largest e-retailer. It made clear its international aspirations in 2013 when it hired Hugo Barra, a central figure
in developing and marketing Google’s Android mobile operating system, and began testing the international market by
selling phones via the web in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore. The company followed through on that strategy in
2014 by beginning to sell phones online in the Philippines
and India. Other target markets include Russia, Turkey,
Brazil and Mexico. Recently, the company also announced
plans to sell accessories in the United States.
The UK-based online apparel retailer
became Europe’s 17th largest e-retailer by
aggressively developing the global web
market.
One Key to Success: In 2013, ASOS invested
$22.4 million in a new checkout and order processing
system, which partly contributed to its website’s
dramatic 27% growth in 2014.
Beijing-based Xiaomi is the world’s thirdlargest smartphone manufacturer and
is using its retail website to sell phones
internationally.
One Key to Success: Xiaomi has listened to customers
closely, incorporating on its website a feature that allows
its 4 million customers to download weekly applications
updates to the operating software. It is also keeping costs
low by selling only online.
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28
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awards
Yoox Group
URL: Yoox.com
Year Launched: 2000
2014 Rank: 211 (U.S. rank) and 72 (Europe rank)
CEO: Federico Marchetti
Company Address: Via Nannetti 1, Zola Predosa, BO,
Italy 40069
Company Background: Yoox.com, an online-only
apparel and accessory e-retailer based in Italy, was an early
entrant into European e-commerce. Unlike many retailers
in Europe, which initially viewed e-commerce as a national
market, Yoox from the beginning saw the global potential
of online shopping. It launched its business 15 years ago
with an international rollout throughout Europe, working
with local supply chains, local currency, and local fashion
designers. Most importantly, it focused on learning how
web shoppers think and act in each market and reacted
accordingly. Last year, Yoox ranked 72nd in European
e-commerce, increasing sales there by 16% to $375 million, driven in part by sales at its two other primary URLs,
TheCorner.com and Shoescribe.com. In 2006 Yoox entered
the North American market, where last year it increase
online sales 12% to $131 million, making it 211th in online
sales there. Far from slowing its international expansion,
Yoox last year entered China, the world’s largest
e-commerce market.
The Italy-based online-only apparel
retailer targeted the global market from its
beginning 15 years ago. In now sells around
the world using websites that feature
11 languages and accept nine currencies.
One Key to Success: Yoox in recent years has become
a global leader in mobile commerce. “Visits from smartphones and tablets exceeded our goal of 50% (of total
traffic) at Christmas, ahead of our schedule, thanks also
to the significant contribution of the new Yoox.com native
app, again confirming the key role played by the mobile
channel for our customers,” says Federico Marchette,
founder and CEO.
the winner
“
Yoox.com
Judges’ comments: Yoox is celebrating its 15th
anniversary this year and during that time it has sold
products across most of the globe. Today, the fashion
retailer ships to around 100 countries ranging from
Albania to Vietnam. Based in Italy, Yoox continues
to expand globally via acquisition. Earlier this year it
purchased London-based Net-A-Porter, and in 2012
it launched a joint venture with luxury powerhouse
Kering, which owns Gucci, Bottega Veneta and several
other high-end brands. And Yoox aggressively invests in
overseas markets. For example, in February it launched
an app for Chinese shoppers that showcases top-selling
items in such fashion-focused cities as Paris, London
and New York. The app’s Around You features what
nearby shoppers are buying on the web. Yoox created a
winning formula for building a global e-commerce brand
that’s diversified and evolving.
Winner’s Comments: “Yoox Group is the global Internet
retailing partner for leading fashion and luxury brands.
It has established itself amongst the market leaders
with the multi-brand online stores yoox.com, thecorner.
com and shoescribe.com, as well as with numerous
mono-brand online stores, all of which are Powered by
Yoox Group. Since the very beginning, 15 years ago, our
strategy has been to offer the best online experience to
our customers throughout the world, and for Yoox, this
means investing seriously in localization for different
countries—a global reach with local expertise. Yoox’s
aim is to be close to its customers with a tailor-made
offering: 11 languages, nine currencies, different
shipping couriers, size conversions, etc.”
Clement Kwan, President Yoox Corp.
”
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30
»
awards
This is the manufacturer, wholesaler or distributor that most effectively uses a B2B website to
increase online sales to business customers and which is considered a pioneer in business-tobusiness e-commerce development. For this category the judges found so many outstanding
examples of pioneering companies breaking the B2B e-commerce mold that we felt compelled to
honor five companies by making them finalists for this award. Because Internet Retailer will not
rank and report financial and operating details on B2B e-commerce competitors until late fall,
there are no such details available for nominees in the category.
The Nominees:
Environmental Lights Inc.
URL: environmentallights.com
Year Launched: 2006
CEO: greg thorson
Company Address: 11235 W. bernardo ct., suite 102,
san diego, ca 92127
Company Background: Cited as an unusually attractive
e-commerce site by industry experts, Environmental Lights,
a wholesaler and retailer of LED lighting, takes on the
challenge of displaying its high-tech products in a way that
is useful and appealing to its largest customer base—B2B
buyers like architects and engineers—while also serving the
buying needs of consumers who shop its site. It did this by
redesigning its e-commerce site to ensure that it rendered
properly on the oversized screens typically used by its professional customers.
One Key to Success: Environmental Lights knows how to
use imaging and organized web content to attract business
buyers, including architects and engineers—as well as the
consumers who shop its site. It also takes the extra step of
ensuring that images of its high-tech LED lighting products render properly on the oversized screens used by its
professional customers.
MSC Industrial Supply Co.
URL: MSCDirect.com
Year Launched: 1999
CEO: eric gershwihd
Company Address: 75 maxess rd., melville, ny 11747
Company Background: Having implemented its current-day e-commerce technology and strategy five years
ago, industrial products distributor MSC has developed its
e-commerce operation to the point where it now amounts
to more than $1 billion in annual sales, or more than half
of total revenue. Its e-commerce site, MSCDirect.com, is
recognized by industry experts as superior in its overall
design, customized B2B research and purchasing features,
site search and navigation and overall product information.
All those elements combine to make the job of purchasing
products faster and more productive for customers.
One Key to Success: MSC Industrial Supply provides the
companies that buy its industrial supplies many ways to
quickly find and buy what they need online. Our judges felt
that its e-commerce site, MSCDirect.com, serves as a model
to other B2B sites in overall design and function.
Newark element 14
URL: Newark.com
Year Launched: 1998
CEO: paul buckley
Company Address: 300 S. riverside plaza, Suite 2200,
Chicago, IL 60606
Company Background: Newark element 14 offers more than
450,000 in-stock choices for the design, maintenance and repair of electronic systems, as well as a general range of office
and industrial merchandise. Newark element 14’s e-commerce site at Newark.com is recognized by industry experts as
providing the online features and web content buyers need to
make complex purchasing decisions.
One Key to Success: From 360-degree spins of computer electronics products and how-to videos of electronics
assembly, to details on product specs and pricing from
multiple manufacturers, Newark.com engages customers with useful information in a way that helps them sift
through reams of options. The site also constantly asks for
customer feedback.
Tacoma Screw Products, Inc.
URL: tacomascrew.com
Year Launched: 2012
CEO: Eric Niesz
Company Address: 2001 center st., tacoma, wa 98409
the winner
W.W. Grainger
Company Background: Launched as a regional distributor of screws and other industrial fasteners and tools in the
Seattle area, Tacoma Screw Products has used a combination of effective web marketing and e-commerce website
design to become a larger player that competes with major
national distributors of industrial products. As one industry expert says, Tacoma is “punching above its weight” in
the industrial products market.
One Key to Success: Its site search and navigation are
particularly well designed and helpful for customers in
its mostly B2B client base to sort through the many technical options when trying to purchase the right fastener,
bolt or tool to complete a job.
W. W. Grainger Inc.
URL: Grainger.com
Year Launched: 1995
2014 Rank: 13 (Top 500 Guide)
CEO: James T. Ryan
Company Address: 100 Grainger Parkway, Lake Forest,
IL 60045
Company Background: Formed the year Amazon.com
began selling online, Grainger.com is a true e-commerce
pioneer and one of the most-established B2B e-commerce
companies, selling a wide range of industrial products
to corporate customers through the same site individual
shoppers use. The company now generates more than $3
billion annually in online sales, a third of its total sales.
And it continues to improve. With its new web platform
and mobile app, for example, customers can view real-time
availability of products without even clicking a button,
then order a product for delivery or pickup in a store and
quickly view the invoice online. Grainger’s e-commerce site
and app were also rated highly by industry experts for their
overall design and information important to B2B buyers.
One Key to Success: Grainger continues to work hard to
engage customers online. Its web pages provide a wealth
of advice on choosing the right products and on how to use
them. And to ensure its e-commerce strategy never gets
stale, Grainger displays a button for customer feedback on
every web page.
Accepting the B2B Player of the Year Award is Paul Miller, Vice President of Global E-Commerce, Customer Information and Innovation.
In the background is Geoffrey Robertson, Vice President, Product,
Innovation & Business Integration at Grainger.
“
Judges’ comments: W.W. Grainger Inc. has been selling
online since the 1990s, making it one of the pioneers
of business-to-business e-commerce. And it never
ceases to innovate how it sells business and industrial
products. It knows how to present thousands of
products—like endless styles of light bulbs and many
types of thermal imaging diagnostic tools for measuring
humidity and temperature—in ways that make it quick
and easy for buyers to find what they need, and learn
how a product operates and, if necessary, how to install
it. Grainger makes these buying features as easy to use
on mobile devices as on desktops, helping to keep it top
of mind among customers as well as in the lead among
competitors.
Winner’s comments: “Our customers are faced with
the ongoing challenge of maintaining their facilities
efficiently and keeping their people safe while at the
same time reducing expenses, and Grainger is uniquely
positioned to help solve those challenges. Getting
our customers what they need and when they need it
means they spend less time looking for and ordering
products, maintain less inventory, and spend more time
focused on their business. We are not interested in
technology for the sake of technology. The customer is
at the core of everything we do. Recognition, like the
honor we received from Internet Retailer, is validation
that we are headed in the right direction.”
Paul Miller, Vice President of
Global E-Commerce and Innovation
”
« 31
32
»
awards
This award goes to the retailer showing the greatest creativity, performance and
sales growth from a mobile-specific website and/or apps.
The Nominees:
Groupon.com
URL: Groupon.com/goods
Year Launched: 2011
President: Rich Williams, President, North America
Company Address: 600 W. Chicago Ave., Suite 400, Chicago,
IL 60610
Company Background: Groupon still sells discount
vouchers to promote sales for local retailers, but the
company now generates more than half of its revenue from
its online deals marketplace for merchandise—Groupon
Goods. Groupon, which ranks 11th in the Internet Retailer
2015 Mobile 500, offers apps for smartphones and tablets
that feature a sleek and vibrant design that makes shopping
not only easy but fun. And the online-only merchant’s mobile commerce design and strategy have paid off big-time:
More than half of total e-commerce sales in 2014 came from
mobile devices, and 70% of that stemmed from its popular
mobile apps.
One Key to Success: The Groupon app, one of the first to
enable one-touch checkout via the transformative Apple
Pay technology, continually ranks as one of the most
downloaded apps, with more than 110 million downloads
worldwide.
QVC.com
URL: QVC.com
Year Launched: 1996
CEO: Mike George
Company Address: Liberty Interactive Corp., 1200 Wilson
Drive, West Chester, PA 19380
Company Background: QVC, the country’s largest TV
shopping channel, was one of the pioneers of online mass
merchant retailing. With online sales of $3.5 billion, it ranks
15th among e-retailers in North America. But it’s also one
of the pioneers in mobile commerce, ranking 5th in the
Internet Retailer 2014 Mobile 500 guide. Before any other
e-retailing giant, QVC completely overhauled its website
with responsive design, which automatically optimizes the
site to display on mobile devices. It now operates one site
that effectively and efficiently serves customers on desktops, tablets and smartphones. Thanks to its early adoption
of mobile commerce technology, QVC now gets more than
half of all online sales from mobile devices.
One Key to Success: QVC has always been an early adopter
of new technology for selling products—first on cable, then
on desktops and finally on mobile. And this year, before
any other e-retailer, it unveiled its Apple Watch app, which
enables customers to shop with a flick of the wrist. QVC
remains a trendsetter.
Target
URL: Target.com
Year Launched: 1999
2014 Web Sales: $3 billion
CEO: Brian Cornell
Company Address: 1000 Nicollet Mall, Minneapolis,
MN 55403
Company Background: : It took Target some time to
enthusiastically embrace e-commerce. For years, it relied
on Amazon to operate its web business, before bringing
it in house in 2011. But the company made up lost ground
rapidly: Target’s online sales have doubled since Target
split from Amazon. Target, however, is anything but a late
bloomer in mobile commerce. Ranked 37th in the world in
the Internet Retailer 2015 Mobile 500, Target is ahead of the
chain retailing pack, doing what most chains are going
to have to do if they wish to satisfy their customers: Use
mobile technology to bring the wonders of web shopping
into stores and use it to enhance the ways customers
shop online.
the winner
Groupon
One Key to Success: Target’s Cartwheel app is an enormous success—the country’s fourth most popular retail
app, even more popular than Target’s main app, which
ranks 7th and was one of the first to accept one-touch
Apple Pay checkout. Cartwheel curates mobile coupons
for shoppers to use in-store. The main Target app offers
such features as in-store maps that lead customers to the
very shelf a product is on. Target’s mobile site and apps
are not only driving online sales, they’re driving increases in in-store sales.
Amazon
URL: Amazon.com
Year Launched: 1995
CEO: Jeffrey Bezos
Company Address: 410 Terry Ave. North, Seattle, WA 98109
Company Background: Just as Amazon invented
e-retailing 20 years ago, it has led the e-commerce
industry in its second revolution—to mobile commerce.
Amazon is the world’s largest mobile commerce operator,
according to the Internet Retailer 2015 Mobile 500 Guide.
Last year, the company grew its mobile business by 110%
to nearly $17 billion, or 21% of its global e-commerce
sales. Amazon.com offers the mobile consumer precisely
the kind of experience she needs: easy, intuitive and fast.
Amazon pioneered one-touch checkout in 2009, and today
is among the first retailers to incorporate Apple’s TouchID
feature, which allows Amazon app users to log in and
check out with their fingerprint.
One Key to Success: While Amazon can get a mobile
shopper in and out fast, its mobile shopping platforms
also offers massive amounts of product information, customer reviews, HD imagery and much more for shoppers
to peruse at their leisure—and help shoppers gain the
confidence they need to make a considered purchase on
the small screen of a smartphone.
Accepting the Mobile Commerce Award for Groupon is Dan Roarty,
Senior Vice President of Marketplace.
“
Judges’ comments: Consumers have voted three times
to name Groupon’s app as one of the most popular
in existence. A recent study by Pivotal Labs, which
designs, develops and manages software and apps,
ranked Groupon’s app among the five best apps. Pivotal
Labs analyzed the 50 most recent app store customer
comments, grouping feedback into three buckets:
performance, features and design. App Annie, a mobile
app analytics company ranked the Groupon app as one
of the most downloaded ever. And finally, a study from
ExactTarget finds that Groupon ranks among the 10 mostvisited brands and organizations on mobile devices. With
more than half of sales stemming from mobile devices,
Groupon is a true mobile leader.
Winner’s comments: “At Groupon we think of our
mobile experience as the great enabler for what is fast
becoming an on-demand economy. Whether it’s products,
transportation, restaurants, spas or entertainment,
consumers expect high quality and fast service at great
value whenever they want it. Groupon is extremely
fortunate that our business lends itself to this trend. In
under seven years, Groupon has seen its business transform
itself from a deal-of-the-day, delivered via email, to a
mobile-centric marketplace with hundreds of thousands
of merchants selling billions of dollars of products and
services to nearly 105 million people who have downloaded
our app in 42 countries around the world. We will continue
to push the boundaries in removing friction for customers
and merchants alike by connecting local commerce in ways
that never seemed possible before.”
Dan Roarty, Senior Vice President
of Marketplace
”
« 33
34
»
awards
This award goes to the Internet Retailer Top 1,000 merchant which in the past
year has demonstrated extraordinary performance in all aspects of e-commerce
activity and on all major e-commerce metrics.
The Nominees:
Amazon
URL: Amazon.com
Year Launched: 1995
2014 Rank: 1
CEO: Jeffrey Bezos
Company Address: 410 Terry Ave. North, Seattle, WA 98109
Company Background: Had the Internet Retailer Excellence
Awards been developed in 1995 instead of 2015, Amazon
would have pocketed more Internet Retailer of the Year
Awards than Meryl Streep has collected Oscars. The fact is
that Amazon has excelled in virtually every performance
category since it entered e-retailing 20 years ago. Despite the
massive recent surge of Chinese e-retailers, Amazon is still the
world’s largest online retailer, if you exclude the marketplace
centric Alibaba, which relies on millions of e-retailers as the
original source of its sales volume. And even though its huge
revenue base makes it more difficult for Amazon to grow at
the rates it once did, it achieved a compound annual growth
rate (CAGR) of 23.5%. Amazon achieves that growth because
it sets the performance standard for an entire industry, which
explains why it leads all online retailers in customer satisfaction. In addition, Amazon continues to invest in innovations
as it focuses on long-term growth rather than short-term profits. Its latest strategic initiatives include same-day delivery,
expansion of its online grocery business, and its entry into
the B2B e-commerce.
Had the Internet Retailer Excellence Awards
been developed in 1995 instead of 2015,
Amazon would have pocketed more
Internet Retailer of the Year Awards than
Meryl Streep has collected Oscars.
One Key to Success: Over the years, Amazon has created
an unrelenting stream of innovations—the latest being
the Amazon Dash Button that enables customers to reorder
single products without going to the website. And it’s now
expanding overseas with a bigger London-based European
headquarters, 44 million square feet of fulfillment space
outside North America and a presence on China’s Tmall.com
marketplace.
Etsy
URL: Etsy.com
Year Launched: 2005
2014 Rank: 24
CEO: Chad Dickerson
Company Address: 55 Washington St., Suite 512, Brooklyn,
NY 11201
Company Background: Etsy makes selling online accessible
to small artists and artisans. Nearly 1.5 million artisans sell
their art, crafts and and vintage goods on the 10-year-old
web-based marketplace. Etsy.com’s dual mission of discovery
and shopping likely results in its low conversion rate. People
browse Etsy the way tourists visit local galleries and craft
shops while on vacation. They’re often not on the site to buy
but to peruse a wide range of fascinating products, such as a
$529 turquoise 1957 Royal Quiet De Luxe typewriter. Last April
Etsy raised $267 million through its IPO. Etsy plans to invest
those funds in marketing and logistics to expand globally
and to expand its program to sell manufactured items in
addition to hand-crafted products. Started in October 2013,
that program allows sellers to outsource production and
fulfillment of items once made by hand.
Having raised $267 million in its IPO last
April, Etsy is positioned for a major expansion
beyond hand-made crafts produced by the
1.5 million artists who provide most of its
products today.
One Key to Success: Etsy has been a leader in developing
its mobile commerce operation. Its initiatives in mobile
produced surprising results in the first quarter of this year,
when mobile accounted for an astonishing 41% of its online
sales and 58% of traffic.
Home Depot
URL: HomeDepot.com
Year Launched: 2000
2014 Rank: 10
CEO: Craig Menear
Company Address: 2455 Paces Ferry Road, Atlanta, GA 30339
Company Background: Of all retail chains, Home Depot
is making arguably the biggest and best push to maximize
e-commerce. In 2014, Home Depot’s e-commerce sales grew
37% to $3.76 billion. Nor was last year’s e-retail growth a
fluke: HomeDepot.com has achieved a compounded annual
growth rate (CAGR) of 39%. The company has clearly made
e-commerce a strategic priority. A key part of the plan is
involving the chain’s 2,000 stores more deeply in e-commerce
and figuring out ways to use the web to encourage shoppers
to buy more once they set foot in stores. Almost 40% of
online orders are picked up in the store.
One Key to Success: Home Depot plans to open warehouses
in California and Ohio over the next two years to handle online
orders. It intends to focus more on same-day shipping of web
orders and enabling online customers to have products delivered from stores. And it’s all part of a $300 million investment to
boost e-retail, warehouse and supply chain capabilities.
« 35
Wal-mart
URL: Walmart.com
Year Launched: 2000
2014 Rank: 3
CEO: Joel Anderson (of Walmart.com, U.S.)
Company Address: 850 Cherry Ave., San Bruno, CA 94066
Company Background: Wal-Mart, which became the
world’s largest retailer by using computer systems to
effectively manage global product sourcing, logistics and
inventory, was slow to capitalize on its natural advantages
to build an e-retailing business. But the late bloomer has
lately become an e-commerce juggernaut, which last
year grew faster online than rival Amazon (21% to 17%).
It is achieving that growth by spending massively on
e-commerce technology and fulfillment operations.
In its current fiscal year, ending January 31, 2016,
Wal-Mart plans to spend as much as $1.5 billion on
Walmart.com, after spending $1 billion the previous
fiscal year. Walmart.com also has adapted to consumers’
rapid embrace of mobile devices. Wal-Mart expects to
more than double its online inventory to more than
10 million SKUs in the coming year. The company has
experienced significant online sales growth in China,
Brazil and Europe as well. A further indication of
Wal-Mart’s commitment to e-commerce is the revamp
of its web platform. It is undertaking the work internally
with a goal of speeding checkout and further integrating
the shopping experience across platforms and channels.
It also is planning to open four online fulfillment centers
this year.
For the first time ever, Walmart.com
grew faster in 2014 than archrival
Amazon.com.
HomeDepot.com Boasts A Five-Year CAGR
of 38.6%
$3.76
Web Sales (in $Billions)
$2.75
$1.79
$1.02
$1.27
2010 2011201220132014
One Key to Success: While some retail store chains have
subscribed to a so-called omnichannel strategy, where
the web exists primarily to facilitate store shopping and
fulfilling online purchases at stores, Wal-Mart is looking
to compete head-on with Amazon. Why else would it
locate its website’s new headquarters just south of San
Francisco—2,000 miles from its Arkansas corporate headquarters, where it has built a state-of-the-art tech center to
tap into the rich pool of Silicon Valley Internet talent? Why
else would it build separate online fulfillment centers?
And why else would it use the web to expand overseas
even as it slows the growth of new store construction? The
key to its success might be called dual-channel retailing.
An entrepreneur like Sam Walton would approve.
36
»
awards
the winner
Home Depot
“
Accepting the first ever Internet Retailer of the Year Award is Kevin Hofman, President of HomeDepot.com
Judges’ Comments: Home Depot not only posted 37% growth in online sales in 2014, it made a profit doing so. That’s
something Amazon.com, the No. 1 retailer by online sales, can’t claim. And given the maturity of e-commerce, the judges felt
profitability should be an important consideration. Plus, it’s impressive that Home Depot’s mobile app can direct a shopper to
the exact location in the store where he’ll find the product he’s looking for, a big step forward in convenience at a time when
it can be a chore to find help in massive big-box stores. And the retailer is building three new e-commerce distribution centers
and fulfilling web orders from stores to deliver online orders fast.
Winner’s Comments: “There was a time when The Home Depot was opening a new store location about every 48 hours, but
leadership realized this wasn’t a sustainable growth model for the future. Around 2008, the company mapped out a strategy
of interconnected retail. Our strategy is for online to support the growth of the stores, and the stores to support the growth of
online. We know they’re mutually beneficial when we see that 40% of online purchases are picked up in our stores, and that
those customers make an additional purchase in the store 25% of the time. We think it’s important that our entire organization is
completely aligned with our online channel growth; with stores receiving credit for online sales, which in turn impacts our store
associates’ bonuses. In fact, 10% of online sales originate in our stores. We also align with merchandising, supply chain, and so
on. We recognize that we need to be everywhere the customer is shopping, which means a heavy pivot to digital marketing and
creating a ubiquitous presence through our more than 2,000 stores, mobile web, our app, tablet and PC.”
Kevin Hofmann, President, HomeDepot.com
”
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38
»
photos
2015 IR Awards
photo gallery
Before the Awards
More than 250 e-retailing professionals attended
the 2015 Internet Retailer Excellence Awards
Banquet, at the Hyatt McCormick on June 3,
2015, following the second day of IRCE 2015. The
banquet was preceded by a cocktail party for all
attendees of the Awards presentation.
during the Awards
Attendees of the awards banquet viewed the
presentations and acceptance speeches of
the 10 recipients of the 2015 Internet Retailer
Excellence Awards, which included slide
presentations highlighting the performance of
each award finalist.
after the Awards
The Internet Retailer 2015 Excellence Awards
winners and presenters: Front Row (left to right):
Michele Hofherr (Previously Owned By
A Gay Man), Molly Love Suchomel (CEO
Internet Retailer), Paul Miller (Grainger),
Lori Jackson (Dollar Shave Club), Eric Adams
(Dollar Shave Club), Stacey Hamai (Uniqlo),
Rolena Richardson (Uniqlo) Back Row (left to
right): Ana Belaval (Master of Ceremonies),
Tom Duggan (Internet Retailer), Tony Giannini
(Macy’s), Sean Fisher (Signature Hardware),
Stacey Renfro (Pier 1), Geoff Robertson
(Grainger), Dan Roarty (Groupon), Mark Morse
(Signature Hardware), Kevin Hofmann (Home
Depot), Kurt Peters (Internet Retailer)
Congratulations
2015 Internet Retailer
Excellence Awards Nominees!
Joey Carmichael,
VP of Integrity &
Security
Ai is committed to transactional intelligence.
That means planning, designing and developing
ecommerce solutions that deliver big results.
Visit us at alexanderinteractive.com.
thank you to our sponsors
Internet Retailer would like to extend a special thanks to our event sponsors
for making the IR Excellence Awards dinner a success.
diamond sponsor Symantec Corporation (NASDAQ: SYMC) is an information protection expert that
helps people, businesses and governments seeking the freedom to unlock the opportunities technology brings
—anytime, anywhere. Founded in April 1982, Symantec, a Fortune 500 company, operating one of the largest
global data-intelligence networks, has provided leading security, backup and availability solutions for where
vital information is stored, accessed and shared. The company’s more than 20,000 employees reside in more
than 50 countries. Ninety-nine percent of Fortune 500 companies are Symantec customers. In fiscal 2014, it
recorded revenues of $6.7 billion. To learn more go to symantec.com or connect with Symantec at symantec.
com/social/.
platinum sponsor eBay Enterprise is a leading global provider of retail-optimized commerce
solutions, including the Magento platform, order management, fulfillment, customer care, and marketing
solutions. We enable brands and retailers of all sizes to deliver consistent omnichannel experiences across
all retail touch points to attract and engage new customers, convert browsers into loyal buyers, and deliver
products with speed and quality. With unrivaled flexibility and control, our clients are armed to accelerate
sales growth and win with today’s digitally connected consumer.
SOASTA is the leader in performance analytics. The SOASTA platform enables digital business owners to
gain unprecedented and continuous performance insights into their real user experience on mobile and Web
devices in real time, and at scale. With more than 10 million tests performed and more than 100 billion user
experiences measured, SOASTA is the digital performance expert trusted by industry-leading companies
including Experian, Hallmark, Intuit and Microsoft. SOASTA is privately held and headquartered in Mountain
View, Calif. For more information about SOASTA, please visit soasta.com.
Grainger is a business-to-business distributor of products used to maintain, repair and operate facilities.
Millions of organizations rely on Grainger for products like safety gloves, ladders, motors and janitorial
supplies, and services like inventory management and technical expertise. Customers place orders online
and using mobile devices, over the phone and at local branches.
Demandware, the category-defining leader of enterprise cloud commerce solutions, empowers the world’s
leading retailers to continuously innovate in our complex, consumer-driven world. Demandware’s open
cloud platform provides unique benefits including seamless innovation, the LINK ecosystem of integrated
best-of-breed partners, and community insight to optimize customer experiences. These advantages enable
Demandware clients to lead their markets and grow faster.
Google is a global technology leader focused on improving the ways people connect with information. Google’s
innovations in web search and advertising have made its website a top internet property and its brand one of
the most recognized in the world.
Built on Neustar PlatformOne™, we enable activation of customer and media intelligence in real time so that
agencies and brands have a comprehensive, up-to-date portrait of customers and prospects. By linking online
consumer interactions with offline authoritative datasets, you can use a single identity across all channels and
devices in order to understand your best consumers, create a personalized experiences, and drive an increase
in reach and sales. More information is available at www.neustar.biz.
Alexander Interactive, is a NYC-based UX, design and development firm that has been building award winning
B2C and B2B ecommerce sites since 2002. Our clients include Saks Fifth Ave., Lowe’s, MetLife, The New York
Times, Louis Vuitton, Schwinn and Tourneau. We are a firm dedicated to transactional intelligence. What does
that mean? Simply put, we think about behavior, commerce and measurable success, not just websites. We’re
pros at anticipating user behavior and turning insight into websites that deliver results.
IR
Excellence
AWARDS
See you next year in Chicago
w ww.inte rne tre taile r.com

Inside the 2015 IR Awards for Excellence

Transcription

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