'With an online market that is growing faster than in other countries, the opportunities remain enormous'

- An interview with Alexandre Centner, Marketing Director Cameleon Group -

In 2007 Cameleon, marketleader in private sales in Belgium, launched its online channel: Snapstore. Snapstore organizes temporary internet private sales of ready-made garments for men, women and children, home- and decoration articles for the duration of 2 to 5 days. Now, four years after its launch, Snapstore has won the BeCommerce award in the category Clothing & Accessories with which it proves to be a valuable online channel for the Cameleon group. We speak with Alexandre Centner, Marketing Director at Cameleon Group about the strong growth of online, the multi-channel policy of Cameleon Group and its plans for the future.

Besides Snapstore.be there are a number of other big players on the Belgian market for private sales. Yet Snapstore.be won the BeCommerce award. What sets Snapstore.be apart from other online shopping communities such as Vente-Exclusive, Vente-Privee, 3 Suisses, etc.?

Snapstore is part of the Cameleon Group, the Belgian leader in private sales. This provides various benefits both for our members and business partners:

From the perspective of our members:

• Very good overall user experience
  A satisfaction survey among thousands of our members showed that more than 94% of our members were satisfied to very satisfied with our services and products. Moreover, over 99% of the members who have purchased something on the site, indicate they will buy again in the future.
  

• Exclusive Products
  With most partners we have such a strong relationship that they will sell their best products only through us.
  

• Faster delivery than some pure players
  (Other) private vendors order the products “bought” by their customers only after the online sale. The average delivery time may therefore increase to more than 3 weeks. For much of our sales, we take the product in stock. We therefore can send it immediately after the purchase has been made and thus reduce our delivery times to only 2 days.
  

• Friends' Actions
  Our members can win gift vouchers by getting their friends to join Snapstore. For the first purchase of each of their invited friends, we give them a voucher of 10 euros.
  

From the perspective of our business partners (brands):

• Selling overstock
  We work directly with major fashion (and accessories) brands. We offer them a solution through multiple channels. This means that they can quickly and easily sell their large overstocks to Cameleon group. The partners that entered the adventure with Cameleon and Snapstore have recognized the importance we attach to this long term relationship.

• Increase brand awareness
  Collaborating with Cameleon does not only offer our partners a solution to their problems in connection with stock sales, but also strongly increases their brand awareness among our members.
  

Cameleon, the company behind Snapstore has over 20 years experience in private sales. In 2007 Snapstore.be, the online channel, was launched by Cameleon. What made you decide to open the online channel?

The main reason for opening the online channel was to increase our market. Cameleon has three outlet stores in and around Brussels. Our market potential is thus limited geographically. Opening a new store brings more risk than a website and will also remain geographically limited in growth.
In addition, the Belgian online market then (and still is) no mature market. With an online market that is growing faster than in other countries, the opportunity remains enormous. We also saw that the online private sale were already a great success abroad, while there wasn’t really a big player on the Belgian market yet. So, as market leader "offline", it was a "no brainer"

Why did Cameleon choose to open the online channel under a new name? (And not just Cameleon.be?)

Good question ;-)
In the beginning Snapstore was launched as a separate project to reduce the risks. Furthermore there are a few (minor) differences between the concept of Snapstore and Cameleon:
In “Cameleon events" for example, sales last 3 to 4 weeks with hundreds of top brands at the same time in our outlet stores. In Snapstore, the concept is a little different: Each sale usually offers the collection of one great brand in fashion (ladies, men, children), or decorative accessories and lasts only 2-5 days. Also, the stock of the sale is limited, the most successful products can thus quickly be sold out.

So, by using two brands we wanted to avoid confusion among our members about the concepts of Cameleon and Snapstore.

When handling multiple channels it is important to have a good multi-channel strategy. How do you assure optimal alignment between the channels?

Full integration of our online and offline channels before and after sales is very important.
During the negotiations with our partners we talk about larger volumes for both offline and online. Products that are not immediately sold on Snapstore can then be offered in our outlets (and vice versa).

The differences in volumes between the online and offline channels also ask for flexible logistics. For part of the sales we take care of our own logistics. For a growing segment however, we have a logistics partner – Katoen Natie.

Is Snapstore.be also available for mobile?

The website is already easy to visit via mobile. However, to be able to offer more specific mobile functions, we plan to develop a project this year. We clearly see an evolution in the proportion of visitors using mobile phones compared to our total number of visitors. The intention is that members visiting Snapstore via their mobile phone get the best experience.

Shopping at Snapstore.be is reserved for members. How can consumers join?

The majority of our members are still invited by our existing members. As previously mentioned, we offer vouchers of 10 euros to our members when their invited friends make a first purchase on the site. Our members can invite their friends via email, Facebook or via a link on their personal blogs / sites. In addition we also use online channels like search and mailings.

Members of Cameleon (ou most loyal members) finally, can join directly.

How many members has Snapstore.be currently?

Many - but the figure for Snapstore.be itself remains secret. The entire group (Cameleon & Snapstore) now has over 500,000 members. We see it as follows: the number of members gives little information about a company if those members do not make any purchases on your site or in your outlet stores. Our turnover for 2010, ended around 40 million euros and this year we expect a turnover of more than 50 million euros. The key is to get quality members.

In which countries is Snapstore currently active?

Snapstore operates in the Benelux. Our Snapstore.nl and Snapstore.lu sites have only been launched in September 2010 and the growth is very strong in both countries.

What is your main focal point in terms of online marketing?

User experience is and will remain in the future, the key element for Snapstore. Our satisfied members are our best "ambassadors"

What are your plans for next year?

Our main objectives are:

• Further growth in the Benelux market

• Strengthen our leadership position on the Belgian market

• Further enhance the user experience: As mentioned our satisfaction survey shows that over 94% of our members are satisfied or very satisfied with our site and our products. This means however, there remains about 6% for whom we can do better. They want to see more great brands at discount prices.