Full shelves, looking for the right size, queuing in front of the dressing room to find out: this piece doesn't fit me at all! …Who likes that? In bonprix’s new fashion connect pilot store in the center of Hamburg, costumers won’t have a shopping experience like that. Instead: You will find everything your fashion heart beats for! Everything here is unique and unseen: from self-check-in to a click-and-collect system, a virtual shopping basket via app, innovative technologies and a real, exclusive shopping tour. For bonprix, the new fashion connect concept is not only the new brand flagship. It clearly aims to be an experimental shopping lab that sets standards in the design of the customer experience journey and reinvents the future of retail. bonprix's multichannel strategy also exploits the opportunities offered by digitalization in offline retail. Digital services are integrated into the physical future store to create a benefit for the customer. The unique concept was developed by bonprix in cooperation with the strategists and retail designers of the dan pearlman brand architecture.
In Hamburg’s Mönckebergstrasse 11, bonprix is bringing its e-commerce expertise to a store space for the first time. The fashion retail brand is one of the most successful online shops in Germany. Now, after a two-year conception and test phase, the online fashion retailer is officially a pioneer in the field of multichannel retail. Under the motto “fashion connect”, the internationally successful fashion company of the Otto Group combines the advantages of stationary retailing with those of online shopping. In the future store, current fashion trends are staged in a special way using intuitive, digital technologies. The entire customer journey is connected – from stationary retail to online business. It is consistently customer-centered, digital and, above all, adaptive. The focus lies on the further developed bonprix app which is intended to accompany customers smartly and navigate them through the shopping experience. It is used like a personal, digital shopping assistant and serves both as an admission ticket and as a remote control. The unique shopping experience starts with the check-in via app. “We have made the smartphone the essential tool in our new store because it is our customers’ everyday companion – no matter whether they want to search something in the web or shop with it”, says Daniel Füchtenschnieder, Managing Director of bonprix. Anyone entering the store will be welcomed to a well-organized and always up-to-date trend floor. What is noticeable immediately: no mountains of clothes. The spacious shop area of the pilot store offers plenty of room for inspiration. The attractive look is made possible by exciting individual presentations of current fashion themes using precisely selected looks, styled down to the smallest detail. As soon as there is a certain “vibe” between the customer and an item, the costumer can scan the item´s QR code with her smartphone and it automatically lands in the appropriate size in the virtual shopping basket. After that, without the hassle of lugging around, the items are on their way to the personalized changing room. There is no queuing but instead you find refreshing drinks, inspiring news and spontaneous conversations at the fashion bar – this is where you meet while waiting for your personalized fitting room to be ready. The generously designed fitting room has been reserved for the customer since check-in and welcomes the costumer with the items of the personal digital shopping bag that are neatly placed on the hanger for fitting. The cabins are equipped with pleasant ventilation and four selectable lighting scenarios to ensure that customers feel comfortable. Catwalk sounds increase the shopping experience. But this is not where the journey ends. The digital room service gives the fitting a unique touch that we traditionally only know from an exclusive fashion boutique. Each of the 18 cabins is equipped with a large touch screen that allows the items to be changed. If you want to try on an item in a different size, just a few taps on the touchscreen and your reorder appears in the wardrobe of the fitting room. The fashion assistants in the store are always ready to respond and help. This means that personal fashion advice is just a push of a button away. If you decide to buy something at the end of your fashion session, you just take your piece with you and either pay via the app at the quick self-checkout or at a normal cash register. Quite deliberately, long queues should be avoided. The future store is a milestone in revolutionizing the global retail landscape in the long term and offers a one-of-a-kind shopping experience in the heart of Hamburg. In 2019, the store won the POPAI honorary award in the category “best digital integration” and the German Design Award in the category “retail architecture”. In 2020 the fashion connect store was chosen as Store of the Year by the Handelsverband Deutschland (HDE). At the “World Retail Awards” the concept receives international recognition and wins in the category of “Best Customer Experience Initiative – Retailer “.
Further information on the future store:
Microsite: www.fashion-connect.store
Tutorial: www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWOCYJZ0BzQ&t
Image film: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rfv_KTx_XW4
Animated info graphics: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qnel742WO4I
