When global sportswear giant Decathlon hired Ikea’s digital boss Barbara Martin Coppola as its new chief executive last year, it signalled its desire to compete with the world’s best in online.
While Coppola – who spent seven years at Google prior to her stint as the Swedish furniture giant’s first chief digital officer – certainly ups Decathlon’s digital expertise, plans were already in place to transform the business on this front.
Jérôme Dubreuil joined the sportswear giant in January 2020 to lead its digital transformation. The ex-Silicon Valley executive had come from Samsung, where he spent seven years building SmartThings, its Internet of Things business.
Dubreuil tells Retail Gazette that when he joined the sportswear giant he wanted to “take the opportunity to become super powerful when it comes to digital so that we can enhance everything that we do”.
While the retailer was coming from a “good base in terms of digital”, Dubreuil says that wasn’t enough.
Dubreuil and his team have made some serious headway as it looks puts “digital is at the heart of all of the business and its services”, he says.
During his tenure at the retailer he has helped to grow digital sales from “a few percent to 20% of global turnover”, switched to a marketplace business model in many of the countries in which it operates, moved fully to the cloud and has built in-house AI and machine learning solutions across its business.
In short, Decathlon has undergone a restructuring of its entire business model to prioritise digital technology in a bid to become even more accessible, dependable and useful for its customers.
While the retailer’s move to prioritise digital was no mean feat to get up and running across all aspects of the group from top to bottom, Dubreuil says Coppola’s appointment, meant he had “the full sponsorship of the CEO” allowing him to push ahead with full steam.
Customer-first approach
Dubreuil believes that digital can be a vital tool to tap into its customer’s needs.
One example is through the co-designing of its products.
Dubreuil says that while Decathlon is conscious to functional and durable products, “who knows better than the people that use our products”.
“It seems so obvious but we thought to ourselves ‘why don’t we use the knowledge of people that will buy our to make sure that they are the right products for them’.”
The retailer has launched a standalone digital platform that allows the design teams to showcase projects where they’d like input from the Decathlon community.
Dubreuil says shoppers are all “super motivated to participate” and get involved throughout the entire journey of designing the product, from the ideas stage through to when they hit the shelves.
“We’re co-designing more and more products” he adds. Inflatable camping shelves, a race walking shoe and a new kind of bow are just three of the products that have been co-created.
Creating digital experiences
The retailer is also using connected technologies, such as AR and VR headsets, to make sports more accessible.
Recently, Decathlon partnered with table tennis equipment firm Pongori and is now selling an adapter, in a similar shape to a table tennis racquet, which can be attached to a VR handheld device that connects to the Oculus headset.
“We worked with them to tune the experience so that it is as close as possible to the real thing,” said Dubreuil.
“Now, you can start playing table tennis that’s really realistic without the need for a table.”
Dubreuil believes it is important for Decathlon to expand into other digital experiences, outside of retail, so it can form a deeper connection with its sports-loving shoppers.
He uses the example of the free hiking app, Decathlon Outdoor, which launched to help hikers find routes to fit their preference. The routes are fed by the community with a range of options based on location and abilities.
“A lot of the people or customers are a bit afraid to go full on into hiking because they’re not too comfortable going in the wild so we thought, ‘we we’re going to help our customers go hiking’,” he explains.
Users of the app have a higher average order value, and Dubreuil says they often end up purchasing goods before or after entering the app.
“It creates a beautiful circle, for customers to discover the rest of our offer, and then to stay in the digital ecosystem,” he says.
It’s a tactic Decathlon has used elsewhere across its business. It launched coaching app, Decathlon Coach, which provides free, customised training programs for running, cross-training, yoga, pilates and more.
But its not stopping there.
The company is prepping to launch another app which he said is “more about performance”.
“How do you get ready for training for marathon? There’s a dedicated app that we’re building right now, where you can, based on your characteristics create a training plan.
“Little by little we want to build the 360 degree sport experience, making sport available to the many because you know, you might want to train for a marathon but don’t know where to start.”
Unlocking the power of data
Dubreuil is also unlocking the power of data at Decathlon and is using AI to better understand the behaviours of its shoppers and help to boost customer lifetime value.
He says the retailer is able to predict when customers are going to “disconnect a little bit from Decathlon”.
This allows the business to engage with those customers ahead of time and help them stay engaged with the brand.
He explains that the retailer can get back in favour with personalised offerings for new sports that users are interested in, which he says can be “really impactful”.
“It’s important for us to detect them ahead of time because its really hard to get them back once they’ve gone,” he says.
Through smartly using digital and data, Decathlon can make sure it is the sports enthusiasts’ retailer of choice, whatever their endeavour.
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