Housewares / HomeFurnishings:
Style to apsire to and how to pull it off at home

IRWD2010 Conference

Style to apsire to and how to pull it off at home

Internet Retailer's Best of the Web 2005

BombayCompany.com
CrateandBarrel.com/CB2.com
PotteryBarnKids.com
Williams-Sonoma.com

The home and housewares category is driven by what consumers need for products to equip a household, yes, but it's as much about their dreams and aspirations regarding how they would like to live as it is about simply making sure there are towels in the bathroom and chairs to tuck under the dining room table. This category's most successful retailers know that, so it's no surprise to find among those named to Internet Retailer's Best of the Web for 2005 some of retail's merchandising geniuses.

By and large, these marketers have nailed the back end of their online efforts. While continuously monitoring site and support operations to drive improvements, they've reached a level at which further enhancements in that arena are incremental rather than radical. That moves the competition onto the field of merchandising, where they're equipped to shine.

Take Crate & Barrel. It's successfully translated online its in-store ability to romance even objects as mundane as kitchen knives into must-haves. "Like other major retailers they've focused a lot on operations to make sure things didn't go wrong. Now they're able to showcase their core skills, which are in merchandising," says Jim Okamura, Chicago-based senior partner with retail consultants J.C. Williams Group. "That's finding the right product and presenting it in a way that entices people to buy. That's what separates great from good retailers."

So does the wisdom of further leveraging what you're already good at. These lifestyle merchants are tweaking successful formulas to pursue consumers at different price points and with different concepts as they move among life stages. Crate & Barrel launched its younger, edgier and less expensive sub-brand CB2 online this year, after experimenting with the concept in one store over a number of years.

Williams-Sonoma Corp. puts its marketing mission to "Own the Home" into play with a whole series of brands targeting its shoppers by age segments. Its Pottery Barn Kids brand, which it launched online three years ago after its stores and catalog, has since helped spark similar niche market concepts at other retailers.

These retailers also use the web for what the web does best in its ability to communicate extended product information. Product information on Bombaycompany.com, for instance, features more details on dimensions, construction materials, instructions for how to care for furniture and other items, and has links to furniture assembly instructions. Williams-Sonoma.com's Thanksgiving line-up featured holiday-geared products, recipes, and table setting tips, as well as a reminder that shoppers could see chefs put it all together in the week before Thanksgiving in live broadcasts from a Williams-Sonoma store on the CBS morning show.

With photography, content and merchandising that showcase a lifestyle that shoppers dream about, these category leaders use their online channels to inspire the confidence that consumers can create the looks and the experiences depicted online at home. And it's that confidence which makes shoppers not just look, but buy.

With its roots in selling replicas of 18th and 19th Century English furniture, The Bombay Company strives to live up to its reputation as a retailer that offers an unusual shopping experience. "95% of our products are designed and manufactured by Bombay, so that in and of itself gives us a unique position in the marketplace," says Stacey Gross, director of Internet operations. It's a distinction that Bombay promotes on its web site, Bombaycompany.com, as well as in its stores and catalogs. "We try to make the web a unique experience, and our site reflects that," Gross says.

It does that by playing to the strengths of the web. In addition to extensive use of photography to present online the images found in its stores and catalog, Bombay recently introduced as part of a site redesign on an Amazon e-commerce platform new features that assist shoppers with the kind of service they'd be more likely to expect in a store. Product pages now include more details on dimensions, construction materials, and instructions for how to care for furniture and other items. "If a product is noted as vintage mahogany, the customer can learn that it goes with certain other products," Gross says.

One of the biggest potential headaches furniture buyers face, she adds, is taking on a difficult assembly project for products delivered in pieces. So the new Bombaycompany.com now lets customers click on detailed assembly instructions. "Customers can see how difficult or easy it is to assemble a product before buying it," Gross says.

The recent site improvements add to Bombay's reputation for providing a helpful shopping experience, says Anne Brouwer, senior partner with retail consultants McMillan/Doolittle. "I give them high marks for being easy to navigate and find information," she says.

Bombay says it will continue to improve its sites, which include BombayKids.com and BombayOutlet.com, with product presentation and navigation features.

That could play to its strength in offering product collections, the many items that go into decorating a room, for instance, Brouwer says. "An opportunity for them going forward," she says, "is to be more proactive in building the market basket from cross-selling and upselling."

The Bombay Co. Inc.
550 Bailey Ave. Forth Worth, TX 76107
Date Launched
October 1999
Unique visitors (monthly)
668,350
Annual Web-Based Sales
$22,900,000 (est. '04)
Vendor Relationships
Site Design
Amazon, in-house
E-Commerce Platform
Amazon Services
Web Hosting
Amazon Services
Site Search
Amazon Services
Content Management
Amazon Services, Seller Central
Order Management
Amazon Services, Pulver Technologies, In-house
Payment Processor
Paymentech through Amazon Services
Fulfillment
In-house
Affiliate Marketing Management
LinkShare

Search Engine Management
Concussion Interactive
E-Mail Marketing
Silverpop
Web Analytics
Coremetrics

Content Delivery Network
Amazon Services, Pulver Technologies, In-house
Rich Media
Scene7

Top 500 Guide

Dancing chopsticks and animated martini glasses aren't the norm at CrateandBarrel.com -but they are at CB2.com. The online launch of the edgier home gear sub-brand has occupied much of the retailer's focus this year and--no surprise--it shows much of the same expertise that's made Crate and Barrel a perennial hit with shoppers.

"They're fanatical about the merchandise and making it look as appealing as possible," says J.C. Williams Group senior partner Jim Okamura. "That's translated well into the CB2 organization. The Crate and Barrel mentality is to pay a lot of attention to fine details and provide good customer service through its product information and policies. That comes across in-store and online."

While CB2.com replicates the quality of the online experience at CrateandBarrel.com, it offers a completely different look. It trends toward the quirky and whimsical, which lines up precisely with the merchandise itself and the experience of being in what are now two Chicago-area CB2 stores. The color palate, ultra-modern designs and price points aim for a young adult market, reflecting a growing home furnishings trend that segments the market into age niches.

It's significant that Crate and Barrel chose to launch CB2 online only after experimenting with the concept in its original store over a number of years. "It's true to Crate and Barrel's way of doing things. They've played with the concept to the point that they are comfortable with it and the business model is probably going to work," says Okamura. "The online channel should play a larger role in the growth of CB2 as a brand overall--it's an efficient way for people to try it."

After more than two decades in business, Crate and Barrel has reached a level at which further improvements are incremental rather than radical, and it's moving the competition online beyond operations onto a different plane. "Like other major retailers they've focused a lot on operations to make sure things didn't go wrong. Now they're showcasing their core skills, which are in merchandising," says Okamura. "That's finding the right product and presenting it in a way that entices people to buy. That's what separates great from good retailers, and Crate and Barrel does it very well."

Crate and Barrel
1250 Techny Road Northbrook, IL 60062
Date Launched
April 1999
Unique visitors (monthly)
2,000,000
Annual Web-Based Sales
$37,500,000**
Vendor Relationships
Site Design
In-house
E-Commerce Platform
Microsoft
Web Hosting
Fry Inc.
Site Search
Endeca Technologies
Content Management
In-house
Order Management
In-house
Payment Processor
ISD, Paymentech
Fulfillment
In-house
Affiliate Marketing Management
In-house
Search Engine Management
In-house, Performics
E-Mail Marketing
DoubleClick
CRM
In-house, Unica
Web Analytics
DoubleClick
Rich Media
RichFX, Flash, Scene7

**Internet Retailer Top 300 Guide est., 2003

Inside retail merchandising powerhouse Williams-Sonoma Corp., the marketing mantra is "Own the home" -and the brand portfolio's child- and baby-focused Pottery-BarnKids.com gets it off to an early start. The 3-year-old web site, which followed the launch of the Pottery Barn Kids catalog and stores, represents the youngest audience target in a lifestyle marketing strategy that follows customers across home gear concepts and price points that address their needs at different life stages.

"At lot of retailers are growing their business by taking their core competencies and applying them to different customer segments," says Mary Brett Whitfield, senior vice president at consultants Retail Forward Inc. "Certainly someone who has a Pottery Barn sensibility in the rest of their home would welcome the ability to take that into their children's rooms."

PotteryBarnKids.com made that easier this year with initiatives that enhance home page presence; for example, launching a feature that lets parents visualize their child's name as applied to a custom chair. Navigation was streamlined to differentiate products for boys from those for girls as well as babies' items from kids', to allow customers to get more quickly to the types of products they are looking for.

A key part of PotteryBarnKids' success is that along with kids' furnishings, it also supplies shoppers with the confidence to make purchase decisions. The web site supports that with the ability to shop by room, for example, presenting all the product elements that go into making up a depicted room setting on one page. It also offers extended tips and advice, with information on how to recreate at home looks and experiences shown on the web site and catalog, whether it's arranging the holiday "kids' table," or setting up a crib.

The presentation of deeper information along with a broader assortment are two of the site's designated roles, says Paul Miller, e-commerce vice president at Williams-Sonoma. "At any time you are typically going to see the biggest, richest assortment we have available on the web," he says. The rest is giving shoppers a look to aspire to. "We use the web as a way to connect with our customers and inspire them," Miller says.

PotteryBarnKids.com/ Williams-Sonoma Inc.
151 Union St. San Francisco, CA 94111
Date Launched
May 2001
Unique visitors (monthly)
1,000,000
Vendor Relationships
Site Design
Ashton Abeck, In-house
E-Commerce Platform
Macromedia Coldfusion
Web Hosting
In-house
Site Search
Mercado Software

Content Management
In-house
Order Management
In-house
Payment Processor
NA
Fulfillment
NA
Affiliate Marketing Management
In-house
Search Engine Management
Performics
E-Mail Marketing
In-house
Web Analytics
Coremetrics

Content Delivery Network
Akamai Technologies
Rich Media
Scene7

It's no surprise to find a frying pan listed on a kitchen and cooking-focused web site: Williams-Sonoma.com has 20 of them. Look at the site's tool for wedging hardboiled eggs, however--or its circus pancake molds or peppermint-swirled marshmallows--and part of what sets Williams-Sonoma Corp. apart becomes clear.

"We will always have items that people say are classic," says Paul Miller, Williams-Sonoma e-commerce vice president. "But we also will have things that you have never seen before. Is it inexpensive? No. But they are so unique and interesting that it brings to the brand the spirit people look for."

Beyond the merchandise itself, the rest of the site's appeal--and success--rests in large measure on how the merchandise is presented, a skill the lifestyle retailer's flagship brand has shined to brilliance over the years. "In the original manifestation of the brand online, we used outline photos almost exclusively," says Miller. "We've made a shift over the yeas to a lot more lifestyle photography."

Beyond beauty shots that tap into shoppers' aspirations for cooking and home entertaining, the site makes it easy to find and buy the specific products that support the pictured lifestyle. "In a category as SKU-dense as kitchen and cooking, the issue becomes, how do you organize things to make them accessible to people who want to shop," says Mary Brett Whitfield, senior vice president of consultants Retail Forward Inc. "The site does an excellent job. Once you're in a category like bakeware, there are very intuitive subcategories. Once you're in a subcategory, they make it easy for you to move to the next item. They've found a way to make an almost unmanageable number of items manageable by the way they classify them online," she says.

The ability to search recipes and to keep recipe files online gives customers more reasons to keep coming back. This year, the brand has continued to add to its online presence with easier navigation, and more content and product categories, including web and catalog-only products, to make the online experience even richer. "The merchandising has to constantly evolve and surprise and delight the customer with things they expect to see and things they don't," says Miller.

Williams-Sonoma Inc.
3250 Van Ness Ave. San Francisco, CA 94109
Date Launched
June 1999
Unique visitors (monthly)
1,000,000+
Vendor Relationships
Site Design
Silverlign, In-House
E-Commerce Platform
Macromedia Coldfusion
Web Hosting
In-house
Site Search
Mercado Software

Content Management
In-house
Order Management
In-house
Payment Processor
NA
Fulfillment
In-house
Affiliate Marketing Management
In-house
Search Engine Management
Performics
E-Mail Marketing
In-house
CRM
In-house
Web Analytics
Coremetrics

Content Delivery Network
Akamai Technologies
Rich Media
RichFX