Wayne Kulkin, CEO of luxury shoe retailer Stuart Weitzman, remembers a time when luxury brands shied away from selling online.
“There was a stigma,” he says. “People thought, ‘Gosh, it would be detrimental because people would see our products so easily, people could knock off our products so easily; our customer wants to walk up to a store and get the complete experience.’”
That all changed once industry leaders realized how much money their brands could make online.
Kulkin estimates one in four pairs of shoes that Stuart Weitzman sells is purchased online, though he wouldn’t give specific web sales figures. “That’s a pretty conservative estimate,” he says. “A decade ago, if you would ask anyone on the planet in our industry that 25% of our products would be sold on the Internet, I don’t think anybody in the industry would’ve raised their hand.”
The company has been selling online since 2004, operating its e-commerce site in-house every year since, with the exception of 2010 when its e-commerce operations were outsourced.
Since 2011, e-commerce has been the company’s biggest growth channel both domestically and internationally, Kulkin says. And the company is investing heavily in e-commerce to continue that growth.
Stuart Weitzman hired eBay Inc. veteran Monica Schwartz in July to fill the new role of chief global digital and e-commerce officer, beefing up the brand’s e-commerce team and charging her with growing the brand’s online presence domestically and globally. “Monica has brought on a myriad of new talent,” Kulkin says. “We’re still building our bench.”
Schwartz says she has a team of 18 employees working on e-commerce. One of the biggest challenges that she and her team are facing is how to recreate online the shopping experience that luxury consumers have come to expect in a bricks-and-mortar store.
“Online, we try to address various areas where retail has an advantage,” she says. “Our associates are very well trained in the product and fit. We tackled fit with detailed product descriptions, customer reviews and our stylists’ advice. We ask our associates on the floor to contribute their knowledge of fit on particular styles to further train our customer service team.”
A clean, simple layout greets consumers visiting the retailer’s web site. The site allows consumers to get a 360-degree rotating view of each product, including the soles of boots or an overhead view of a clutch.
Kulkin describes e-commerce as “the great equalizer” of the luxury industry in that it provides a similar experience to everyone.
“It gives you the ability to go to 10 different stores in five minutes,” he says.
Because of that, Kulkin says it’s important for brands to provide as much information to shoppers as possible in order to earn their business. “It’s all experiential,” Kulkin says. “How are you able to get customer service as needed if you want to have contact with a product expert, how fast does that package come to you, how do we present that product with such care?”
As part of improving its online presence, the company is investing in mobile technology. The brand has built a version of StuartWeitzman.com optimized for viewing on smartphones. It now is building a new version of its site using responsive design techniques that will tailor the look of the site to the device the consumer is using. That is scheduled to roll out early in 2015.
“We must enable our customers to access our brand across any device they choose with a seamless shopping experience,” Schwartz says.
Near-term plans include expanding the brand’s e-commerce presence even further internationally, Kulkin says. The company launched an e-commerce site in Hong Kong this year and is planning to launch in China by the middle of next year.
“[China] still hasn’t quite reached its maturity in selling full-price contemporary and luxury goods but that’s going to happen because it’s such a massive market,” he says. “Socialization of the brand really is so important over there. That’s why in three years, I think that will be the dominant market.”