More paper drives more e-commerce sales at Fossil
The launch of a catalog two years ago to drive more web sales and build brand awareness is paying dividends for consumer brand manufacturer Fossil Inc.
In 2005 Fossil, No. 189 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, launched a single catalog to promote the nearly 5,000 SKUs the company carries online.
Now Fossil is expanding its catalog program to include six different editions, encompassing 10 million copies. “The purpose of publishing a catalog is generating web sales, supporting multi-channel retailing and building our brand awareness,” says Fossil vice president of e-commerce John DeCaprio. "What`s unique for us is that we can use increased traffic to the web to pay for these initiatives."
Today Fossil operates six e-commerce sites, including Fossil.com, and credits the launch of more catalogs with growing web sales by about 20% in 2006 to $43 million. Catalogs also have been a factor in generating bigger orders. The average order now has about 1.5 items in the shopping cart at check-out compared with a previous average of only about 1.2 items. “The catalog is helping to purify the brand,” DeCaprio says.
Fossil, which offers a line of watches under its proprietary Fossil, Relic, MW, MW Michele, Wrist Net, Wrist PDA and Zodicac brands and other licensed arrangements, also is expanding its overseas e-commerce operations with the launch of a new site in Germany later this year. “It’s a bigger European market with less penetration than other countries,” says DeCaprio.
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