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As the company sought to transform the online shopping experience for customers, Home Hardware faced the challenge of providing customer-centric fulfillment without creating direct competition among its nearly 1,100 stores across Canada. The company wanted to scale its e-commerce shopping platform while maintaining the unique characteristics of each individual store. Hardware Retailing talked with Danny Valentino, Home Hardware director of IT and e-commerce, who shared the company’s strategy for improving e-commerce across the board.
Home Hardware landed with Kibo Commerce, which was able to bolster the wholesaler’s online presence without restricting customers to the product assortment available in local stores. The e-commerce solution from Kibo Commerce supported Home Hardware’s co-op model and distinctive inventory and pricing of each store by providing an array of fulfillment options, Valentino says.
“We wanted to strike a balance between supporting our co-op model and providing robust online support for shoppers,” Valentino says. “So we looked for a solution that would offer various fulfillment options based on the distinctive inventory and pricing of each store.”
With the new platform, customers can easily search for their preferred store, access real-time inventory availability and explore multiple fulfillment options within seconds. Customers can browse a wide range of inventory online, and if a particular item isn’t available in their local store, they can have it shipped from the distribution center to their preferred store or to their home with just a few clicks. The integration also ensured that customers enjoyed consistent prices, both online and at the distribution center, elevating their overall shopping experience.
“The scalable and flexible nature of Kibo’s technology allowed for quick application deployment and supported the growth of our online operations,” Valentino says.
Home Hardware also integrated Kibo Order Management, which allows store employees to locate inventory and place orders for customers right there in the store. Any revenues from those sales are attributed to the originating store, assuring cooperation among all the stores.
Other features Home Hardware is leveraging include boost and bury, where specific products are strategically showcased to coincide with current promotions and type-ahead suggestions in the search feature, allowing customers to more easily find what they need.
Since implementation, Home Hardware has seen a 459% increase in online sales revenue, a 128% increase in online conversion rates and a 398% increase in the number of online transactions.
Learn more about Home Hardware’s move to headless commerce here.
