2023-11-22 10:14:15
Published on Nov 22, 2023 at 9:14 a.m.
Change of scenery at Kiabi. As soon as you entered the store of this pilot store located in the Auchan shopping center in Petite-Forêt, near Valenciennes, everything changed.
No more “Ikea” type routing to force customers to go through all the departments. Large overhead illuminated signs indicate the worlds – woman, man, boy, girl, baby – presented in a more intimate way with a central island per sector.
Completed alignments of racks on the ground. The basics are now stored in high shelves to catch the eye with three ways to wear them displayed.
“It’s a circular, sparkling and colorful journey for this concept that we want to be disruptive,” describes Fabrice Obenans, Brand and Customer Manager at Kiabi. The goal is to be less segmented. Moreover, the second hand is scattered throughout all the departments.
A store for teenagers
Everything has been revised, from the tiling to the ceiling lighting equipped with sensors that increase the intensity depending on the crowd. This concept was developed with the Market Value Design agency (which operates at Picard, Palais des Thés or LCL, etc.). It multiplies the colors: in the departments, but also in the fitting area which has become a real little lounge with comfortable seats at the entrance.
In each cabin, a tablet, operational at the end of the year, will allow you to search for another size that a salesperson can bring. One cabin is dedicated to families – larger with changing tables – and another for teenagers.
In it, a mirror with colored light dimmer allows for “Instagrammable” selfies. Just like in the boutique dedicated to them within the store, a large cube identified “12-21” with the specific junior offer. “Teenagers no longer necessarily want to go shopping with their parents,” explains Fabrice Obenans.
In the center of this 1,600 m2 store, an island called “the service heart” allows families to relax with seats, a water fountain and portable batteries to recharge their phones. It is dedicated to events or live shopping.
“There will be a laser denim washing workshop at the start of the year,” announces Miguel Esnault, in charge of design and merchandising. Without forgetting the repair-customization workshop, which already exists in a few stores.
Exfoliate irritants
To avoid queues, four automatic checkouts have been distributed among the departments, in addition to the four installed near the traditional checkout island. “We tried to erase as much as possible of what we call irritants for customers,” explains Fabrice Obenans, “by listening to them via consumer groups.” There are also strollers available at the entrance.
Lockers at the entrance are dedicated to click and collect, alongside an independent terminal for product returns. With e-reservation, you can also reserve a fitting room online for 20 to 30 minutes. “Everything has been reviewed so that the visit to the store is a real pleasure, a moment in its own right for the whole family,” summarizes Fabrice Obenans, convinced that “the customer tomorrow will have more and more demands on the quality of their shopping.”
Bring people into the store
Because the objective of this new concept – the last one dates from 2017 – is to bring people back into stores by “thinking about the retail of tomorrow”. The Mulliez galaxy brand is thus anticipating the future, because its attendance is not decreasing, far from it and its 2022 turnover, at 2.2 billion euros, had recorded a increase of 10%, contrary to the entire clothing market.
Kiabi, which does not give any trend on its activity in 2023, is also testing this new concept in Spain in Madrid, in a shopping center store. The company is giving itself six months to learn lessons and make the necessary adjustments, before ultimately deploying it on its fleet of 579 sites today (25 countries), almost half of which are in France. The investment will not exceed the cost of a traditional remodeling, indicates the brand without further details.
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