After six months of testing and rolling out its new Canadian e-commerce site, Costco Wholesale Corp. is expanding its online product inventory to include more high-end consumer electronics and furniture.
Costco, which ranks No. 27 in the Internet Retailer Top 400 Guide to Retail Web Sites, launched Costco.ca in February, but is now adding lines of merchandise such as furniture which will bring the total number of SKUs to 1,000. “Eventually we will have the same number of SKUs offered online in Canada as we do in the United States, which is about 3,000 products,” says Ginnie Roeglin, senior vice president of e-commerce and publishing for Costco.
Costco, which has about 65 warehouse stores in Canada, is launching and expanding Costco.ca to offer a new way to shop for members and non-members who live in rural areas. The company is promoting the new site and its growing array of merchandise in bi-weekly newsletters. To generate more business, Costco is also letting non-members shop the new Canadian site, though they must pay a 5% surcharge upon completing an e-commerce transaction. “We add a surcharge for non-members if it’s not prohibited in a certain state or province,” Roeglin says. “In Canada, we see opening the site to non-members as a way for them to shop online with us, especially if they live in a rural area.”
Merchandising for Costco.ca is handled by a small headquarters staff in Ottawa, but most other operations are based at Costco’s U.S.
headquarters in Issaquah, WA. The new Canadian site is popular. “We are getting about 2.3 million unique visitors per month,” Roeglin says.
To facilitate easier site search and shopping, Canadian customers can view the home and landing pages in both French and English. The new e-commerce expansion is also helping Costco.com increase annual web sales, which are on track to reach $525 million in the U.S. in 2005, up from web sales of $376.6 million in 2004, Roeglin says.
Back...
