Yorkshire RetailTheBusinessDesk.com supplemenT | Yorkshire | novemBer 2013 Facing up to a changing retail landscape FEATURING Destination shopping. 4 Using technology to make connections. 9 Last mover advantage for Morrisons? 12 in association with Yorkshire Retail 2 Supplement editoR FoRewoRd November 2013 Keeping contents pace sponsor forewords: Jim Whittaker of Baker tilly; matthew lewis of Squire Sanders. 3 ➔ ETAIL is a fast paced sector – Destination shopping. Fundamental changes to rand the implementation of new the retail landscape mean technologies is seeing that pace councils need to look at changing the use of properties quicken every day, to the point that on the high street to increase the leisure consumers can find it hard to keep offering and drive footfall. 4 ➔ up at times. A polarised landscape for retailers and landlords. The retailer/landlord relationship That’s been evidenced by the announcement, as this supplement goes to is evolving but that also creates new publication, that tesco is installing face-scanning technology at its 450 challenges. 6 ➔ petrol stations to target adverts on digital screens to individual customers using technology to make connections. High street at the till. The technology will use a camera to identify a customer’s gender retailers need to embrace and approximate age, before showing an advertisement tailored to that technology if they want to demographic. stop losing sales and help facilitate a purchase while the customer is in as the saying goes, retail is detail and the same is true of the drivers for store. 9 ➔ changes within the sector – they are varied and far from straight forward. Information nation. Those leveraging big data to provide a more targeted Rather than decrying the death of the UK high street, in this supplement, offering are still just supported by Baker tilly and Squire Sanders, we aim to look at ways high scratching the surface street retailers can adapt to maintain their bricks and mortar presence and of what is possible. 11 ➔ at how the use of mobile and online sales channels need not be a threat to case study: last mover advantage for physical stores but in fact help to boost in store revenues. morrisons? Bradford-based Morrisons is to finally enter the world of online grocery sales and home deliveries in January, following its i hope you find it useful. deal with ocado. 12 ➔ People power. Retail is a sector that David parkin Founder and director, experiences high employee TheBusinessDesk.com churn rates and where the vast majority of staff are on lower pay. 13 ➔ case study: multichannel strategy suits Tm lewin. For shirt maker tM lewin the in- store experience is a hugely important part of its offering, regardless of the sales channels a customer ultimately chooses. 15 ➔ Round Foundry Media Centre, Publication editor: Joanne Birtwistle Foundry Street, leeds lS11 5QP. [email protected] round table discussion. The UK high street - Tel: 0113 394 4321 Commercial manager: lee-J walker a tale of two halves. 17 ➔ [email protected] « Previous | Back to Contents | Next » SPonsoR 3 FoRewoRd The pulse of retail RETAIL has put the brakes on the expansion of we think the pulse of retail continues experienced hypermarket formats, as it began to feel to beat. Recent retail press has been unprecedented the squeeze from online players. Space largely positive and so far this year the change in recent has been freed up for gyms and Giraffe general retail sector has significantly years. Rapid Restaurants. Sainsburys will have more outperformed the market. leeds has developments in convenience stores than supermarkets had a retail shot-in-the-arm thanks to technology, the loss by the end of the year. The race for space a sparkling £350m development called Jim Whittaker of imported price has switched to the ‘corner shop’. trinity. head of retail for deflation (remember Yorkshire, The fact that retail is ever-changing the strong pound?) Retaining customer loyalty in the digital Baker Tilly and unpredictable is both its joy and plus the worst space is a genuine challenge for retailers its challenge. Those retailers that have consumer recession in living memory. who have relied upon a store presence. tackled their operational issues, invested This year we’ve had the coldest weather at least the grocers should have a head in technology, have a distinct offering for 50 years in the first quarter replaced start with commercial exploitation of and understand their customer should by a heat wave in the second. ‘big data’, as they have the most mature loyalty cards. Now more than just a be able to look ahead to 2014 with How things change. Not long ago buzzword, some of the biggest changes justified confidence. supermarkets were aggressively in big data are coming from the apparel expanding their general merchandise side of retail, as they experiment with ranges and causing problems for retail multiple digital channels, tailored offers specialists by creaming off seasonal and targeted campaigns. The reason we profits on gardening, camping and such dislike junk mail is because most of it is like. irrelevant. Big data is changing that. if you build it, they will come. Not So after several years in and out of anymore. tesco was the first to casualty, what’s our current diagnosis? SPonsoR Change for the better FoRewoRd witH the retail law firm to take a 360 degree view of just be “shopping” but for now shoppers landscape constantly multichannel retail and publish our are the drivers of the industry and they evolving, it is vital findings: The Multichannel High Street: are currently empowered by digital that businesses A Nation of Shoppers – But is it a Nation technologies. embrace new of Shopkeepers? This was undertaken in technologies conjunction with Kantar Retail and the But their needs have changed; they are and processes to Retail trust. increasingly looking for a high-level of matthew strengthen their personalisation in their interaction with lewis brand and increase Using the report as a basis, we held a brand. Suppliers also have to be alive partner and customer loyalty. retail debates in leeds and london with to this to ensure their brands are at the head of retail, industry leaders to discuss the future of forefront of change. Squire Sanders even small changes the retail sector, to help understand how over the next year, the high street in businesses’ we can better help retailers to succeed. approach to retail can be the difference needs to work out how to successfully between success and failure in the The output from the retail debates integrate physical stores, online and marketplace. This is not always an and our research demonstrated that mobile in order to win back consumers easy balance and is one of the reasons businesses which can provide genuine from online-only businesses and deal a number of retailers find themselves and seamless multichannel offerings with the threat of showrooming. under operational and financial are likely to succeed in this new retail pressures. environment. Recognising the challenges the sector indeed, in years to come, we may not faces, Squire Sanders was the first be talking about “multichannel”, it may « Previous | Back to Contents | Next » ➔ 4 Fundamental changes to the retail landscape Destination mean councils need to look at changing the use shopping of properties on the high street to increase the He opening of land Securities hugely successful trinity leeds leisure offering Tscheme - more than 12.5 million people have visited since its opening in March - has been a major boost for the overall and drive footfall. attractiveness of leeds city centre, drawing more shoppers to the city in general. whilst rents in leeds have fallen 11% in big centres, such as leeds and Sheffield, the last five years, it is the only centre in and smaller convenience locations. the Yorkshire region to witness growth in the last 12 months, with average Matthew lewis, head of retail at Squire is a good chance their rents increasing 1.9% to £275 per sq ft, Sanders, says that although there have situation will worsen according to property agent Colliers been more high street failures over the as good locations international’s retail report, published last 12 months, with those stores being suck footfall from the in July. replaced with a proliferation of charity bad. shops, cheque cashing outlets and But retail rents across Yorkshire and the betting shops, there is talk of a return of Jim whittaker, Jim Whittaker Humber as a whole remain 5% below consumer optimism. partner at business partner, average, having declined 20% over the advisory firm Baker “Portas and Grimsey have both tried Baker Tilly last five years to £125. encouragingly, tilly’s leeds office, to get to grips with the problems of the however, the decline from 2012 to 2013 says the answer lies high street and they both agree that was just 2.1%. with politicians, adding there is a lack of this is a wider and more endemic issue Colliers’ report also revealed that the than poor retailers and the impact of skills and money to deal with the issue number of empty shops on high streets online,” he says, adding this view was within local authorities. across Yorkshire continues to rise with expressed by participants at a recent “it will take significant investment to a vacancy rate of around 17.5%, higher retail debate, hosted by Squire Sanders create that skill with a mandate to make than the national average of 14.5%. at the everyman Cinema in trinity change. Planners have to follow national leeds. it forecasts that the long delayed and local guidelines and they need to recovery in the retail market will start Unless local authorities in second and change.