News Briefs

Gap Inc. owned Athleta will add outlet locations to its store fleet this year.

Athleta’s two new outlet stores will debut at Chicago Premium Outlets in Illinois this summer and Leesburg Premium Outlets in Virginia this fall, underscoring the brand’s commitment to open 30-40 new stores in its 2022 fiscal year.

Each outlet store will feature a curated assortment of Athleta’s performance and lifestyle product, including the Salutation Stash Tight, Momentum Seamless Tank and Conscious Crop. The remaining outlet store assortment will offer customers value on existing Athleta styles.

“As part of our long-term strategic growth plan, Athleta is investing in new access points to reach new customers, deliver new value to customers who already know and love our brand, and expand our community of empowered women and girls,” said Mary Beth Laughton, president and chief executive officer of Athleta. “Our new outlet stores are intentionally designed to stand out from traditional outlet and clearance store models, helping drive new customer acquisition and increased brand awareness for Athleta.”

Athleta’s first outlet location, featuring more than 3,100 square feet of dedicated retail space, opens at the Chicago Premium Outlets this summer. Its second location, a more than 3,300-square-foot store at the Leesburg Premium Outlets, will open this fall.

To date, Athleta has added 12 new stores in North America in 2022. In June, Athleta underscored its commitment to international growth, confirming it will add four additional Canadian locations by the end of 2022.

Cabinets.com, the largest online retailer of U.S.-manufactured and assembled cabinets, has selected Dassault Systèmes’ “HomeByMe for Kitchen Retailers” to disrupt the kitchen market with a fully online business model that transforms how consumers shop for their kitchen cabinet needs.

Cabinets.com can now enhance the user experience by integrating this cloud-based 3D planning solution into its website. Consumers can choose from one of the largest selections of kitchen cabinets and design their dream kitchens online without having to visit a physical store.

“As a purely online company, providing an easy-to-use, web-based user experience was essential. We were impressed with the ease of use and intuitive flow of the ‘HomeByMe’ solution. We will be able to offer our customers an effective and easy-to-use tool to digitally design their kitchen with the latest styles and trends,” said Jeff Robertson, president, Cabinets.com.

Although digital technologies, coupled with the COVID-19 pandemic that shuttered brick and mortar stores, have transformed the way consumers shop, purchasing kitchen cabinets online is still new for many homeowners and renovators. Cabinets.com is aiming to transform this market and make this process easier for consumers by becoming a purely online hub for all kitchen cabinet needs.

With “HomeByMe for Kitchen Retailers,” Cabinets.com can deliver a personalized design experience that draws consumers closer to its brand. The solution combines 3D space planning, automation and intelligence. This offers capabilities to automatically highlight potential planning and design errors in real time, guarantee the precision of customized options, propose design alternatives in seconds, and ensure up-to-date products and pricing while enabling efficient collaboration with its designers. Customers can create and modify door styles and colors, accessories, and a wide array of custom options according to their needs and budgets, and make faster, better decisions based on high quality 3D renderings of the expected finished look. The experience will be made available on the company’s website to all customers at no charge.

“The pandemic has significantly transformed the market and the consumer decision-making process. Individuals have been investing in their homes to improve their day-to-day quality of life, and e-commerce for home furnishings has become the new normal. Kitchen and bath, but also home and decor retailers and manufacturers, need to fundamentally transform the way they engage with their customers,” said Vincent Picou, CEO, 3DVIA, Dassault Systèmes. “‘HomeByMe for Kitchen Retailers’ is the omnichannel solution that boosts retailers’ business by bringing game-changing 3D experiences directly to consumers.”

European fashion leader Lindex has selected the Aptos Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solution. With Aptos PLM, Lindex will streamline and automate critical processes involved in the creation and management of its collections, resulting in faster time to market, increased emphasis on quality and sustainability and better collaboration within the organization and with suppliers.

Based in Gothenburg, Sweden, Lindex is one of Europe’s leading fashion companies, with approximately 4,000 employees. Founded in 1954, Lindex operates 440 stores in 18 markets and has online sales worldwide through third-party partnerships. With an assortment that spans womenswear, kidswear, lingerie and cosmetics, Lindex offers inspiring and affordable fashion. Since 2007, Lindex has been a fully owned subsidiary of the Stockmann Group. 

As demand for Lindex’s collections has grown, both in its own channels and in partnership with global fashion platforms, Lindex recognized the need to centralize product information and allow its design, product management, planning and buying teams to access a single source of truth for all data throughout the product lifecycle. 

After conducting a comprehensive evaluation of third-party PLM software applications, the fashion leader found its right fit with Aptos. 

“Lindex was looking for a PLM solution that offered a modern and scalable technology platform, advanced functionality specific to the fashion vertical, and robust support and tracking for sustainability initiatives,” said Elisabeth Hedberg, Director of Design, Purchase & Production at Lindex. “We found that — and more — with Aptos PLM. We were impressed with the fashion know-how of the Aptos team as well as the system’s ability to facilitate improved collaboration across our end-to-end product development processes.

“We have production offices in Europe and Asia,” Hedberg added. “Our employees at these offices need to work closely with our design and buying departments as well as our suppliers to ensure the styles we produce meet our high standards for quality, fit and sustainability.

“Once it’s fully deployed, we expect Aptos PLM to be utilized by internal and external stakeholders, resulting in vast gains in productivity, collaboration and visibility for all parties involved,” Hedberg said.

The solution will also support Lindex’s sustainability programs, which focus on driving circularity in the fashion industry and taking action for the climate.

With the tool, Lindex can assess the environmental impact of its designs and suppliers in real time and better meet consumers’ demands for environmental impact transparency and accountability.

“Lindex captures the hearts and minds of women everywhere by offering affordable, eco-friendly fashion,” said Richard Willis, regional vice president, EMEA and APAC, at Aptos. “With Aptos PLM, Lindex can optimize every aspect of its product development processes and better manage the vast complexities of its global enterprise. We are proud to provide Lindex with a powerful digital foundation that can empower its business to get higher-quality products to customers faster and more profitably, while respecting the planet.” 

Amazon Prime Day is nearly here and already the company is announcing a flurry of deals and partnerships. The latest gets Amazon Prime members a free, year-long membership trial with delivery service GrubHub (normally $9.99 per month).

U.S.-based Prime members get waived delivery fees on orders over $12 along with access to other rewards such as a donation match on Grubhub+ orders through Grubhub’s Donate the Change program. 

"Being able to give Prime members one year of Grubhub+ and no delivery fees from restaurants is our way of saying 'thank you'," said Jamil Ghani, vice president, Amazon Prime. "The value of a Prime membership continues to grow with this offer, and this year is shaping up to be a great time to enjoy the convenience, savings, fun — and deliciousness — that membership provides."

[Read more: Amazon to Begin Drone Deliveries this Year]

Ariella Kurshan, senior vice president of growth, Grubhub, said that both companies have transformed lives through convenience. 

"With the new Grubhub and Amazon offering, Prime members now can enjoy free delivery from hundreds of thousands of restaurants across the country, when they sign up for a year of free Grubhub+,” Kurshan added. “I'm thrilled that new Grubhub diners from Amazon can get even more delivered to their door with their Prime membership."

H&M is looking to overhaul its data infrastructure, focusing on sustainability and security in order to improve the customer experience and supply chain enablement. 

The company tapped Google Cloud, leaning on its tech offerings to implement a core data platform, data product, and advanced analytics intelligence and machine learning. These new capabilities will allow H&M to access more data from multiple sources, including in-store, online, and its ecosystem and suppliers. 

[Read more: H&M Group and Amazon Launch Tech-Enabled In-Store Shopping Experiences]

"H&M Group has a long history of innovation across all our brands and always wants to build meaningful relationships with our customers,” said Alan Boehme, chief technology officer, H&M Group. “We are now further accelerating digitalization as we believe in sustainable growth powered by advanced analytics and tech.”

Eva Fors, managing director of the Google Cloud Nordic Region, said the company admires H&M Group's commitment to innovation. “We are excited to move forward in our journey together."

Kroger is getting a tech overhaul, improving access to product availability data across its 2,700 stores in 35 states. 

Through a partnership with Omnicom Media Group, Kroger’s retail media arm — Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM), powered by 84.51° —  is enhancing data visualization and daily access to valuable insights, feeding SKU-level store inventory data to a new open operating system that will allow brands to quickly redirect media spend and improve KPIs in a supply-strained landscape. 

In addition to product availability data, the platform will also display fulfillment rates from e-commerce orders as well as market basket insights related to SKUs purchased together and substituted. 

This will give media planners day-to-day visibility into SKU inventory data at the physical store and digital shelf levels. Through this increased access, users can leverage consumer’s shopping behavior insights to optimize spend based on product availability. Additionally, they can avoid low-inventory products, and move toward items with high repeat purchase behavior. 

"Kroger Precision Marketing is committed to bringing more transparency to the media supply chain to help brands be more effective in their advertising," said KPM SVP Cara Pratt. "Our collaboration with Omnicom aligns with our mission to make brand advertising more accountable."

Omnicom Media Group chief activation officer Megan Pagliuca said the collaboration enhances account teams' ability to reduce media waste, meet brand performance goals, and ensure a positive consumer experience.