Fashion Brief: The Grand Store Renovation is On.

As shoppers eagerly return to stores, even as the recession fades, brands are updating their physical retail plays. Attracting more customers and employees and adding stores as marketing and logistics tools are among the common goals. To get there, brands are prioritizing big-city flagships; Promote associates to “specialists” and “stylists”; Sharing store items with e-commerce channels; And measure a store’s success on its ability to acquire customers, in addition to making a profit.

Meanwhile, 42-year-old Express, known as the mall brand, has been in store revamp mode since early 2020, following the appointment of Tim Baxter as CEO and the launch of the ExpressWay Forward strategy. Since then, he has made great strides in store fleet rationalization and optimization plans. In the year It has met its goal of closing 100 underperforming stores by the end of 2021. While most were in “low-level malls”, according to Baxter, they also included three stores in Manhattan, leaving only the Times Square store in NYC, as well as the Michigan Avenue area in Chicago. Their lease was up for renewal at the time, Baxter said.

Since then, Express has been rolling out a new store model called Express Edit, which focuses on smaller stores in high-traffic areas. Last month, it opened two Express Edit locations in NYC, in the SoHo and Flatiron neighborhoods, and opened one on Friday in Boston’s bustling Newbury Street. By mid-November, it will add two locations on Walnut Street in Philadelphia and two in Miami, for a total of 11 Express Edit stores.

According to Baxter, Express Edit stores are located in “thoughtful locations, specifically chosen for their neighbors.” For example, the Boston store is steps from Ralph Lauren, H&M and Sephora stores, while the Soho store is surrounded by retailers including Bloomingdale’s, Lululemon and Aritzia.

“If you’re a modern man or woman, you’re buying into that. [Soho] Block,” he said.

For Express, the goal is not to bring back fewer stores, but to have better performing stores. New Express Edit stores compensate for closed stores.

“There’s been a long trend in New York to have very spacious spaces,” Baxter said. “But our new formats in New York are very small. They are going to allow us to recapture some of the sales we lost in Manhattan at no extra cost.

Instead of investing heavily in renovating storefronts and “hiring architects to create unique store designs,” as Express has done in the past, Baxter said, “I’m intentionally not spending a lot of capital” on the new stores. Each store has a consistent look and feel. It’s achieved through details such as common amenities.Furthermore, he said, making sweeping changes conflicts with the company’s desire for stores to fit the feel of their surroundings.

At 8,000 square feet, Express’s Soho store is larger than the typical 4,000 square foot Express Edit store, “still small for Manhattan,” he said.

During a taping of an episode of the Sparkle podcast last week, Untuckit founder Chris Riccobono commented on the current money-sucking nature of having a large store in a big city like New York. “In the major cities, our stores are struggling because nobody is there,” he said. “In Chicago, San Francisco, New York, Downtown Boston, the neighborhoods have changed for the worse, in many cases. And that takes time [to bounce back]He said.

But both Baxter and Riccobono emphasized their continued overall strong belief in the power of stores. “If you want to be a brand for the next 50, 100, 200 years, you need stores,” said Riccobono. “It’s not just about what they do in terms of income; We [also] Ship from stores, and they’re on the market. … I laugh every time someone says brick and mortar.

Gone are the days of viewing stores as sales channels. Baxter Retailer’s popular “four-wall profit” metric still applies to express stores, but the stores “serve a higher purpose.” This includes communicating the Express lifestyle, being the hub of the brand’s community and reaching out to customers. About 50% of Express Edit shoppers are first-time Express customers, and the majority of Express customers buy the brand in-store. “Considering the cost per purchase, [our stores] They are incredible investments,” he said. Meanwhile, the cost of getting customers online is high.

Along with being billboards, Express stores are fueling social content. At the company’s American Dream Mall, King of Prussia, Pennsylvania and Dallas stores, Instagrammers take advantage of the large banquette seating area located next to the velvet wall outside the fitting rooms. All Express stores have recently been fitted with additional seating for added convenience.

Elevating the in-store testing experience on the topic of assembling parts is a priority for Express. Fitting rooms in the newly designed stores have call buttons that alert associates when a change of style is needed. They also offer custom lighting settings, allowing shoppers to see their outfits in “daylight” or “at a club,” Baxter said. One to two large fitting rooms are installed for peer-led styling sessions if required. And where space allows, cash registers have been added to room locations, allowing shoppers to speed up their visit.

Along with providing a high level of customer service, the Express Shop staff is dedicated to providing styling support. Instead of directing each collaborator to be “generic,” Express assigns a specific role. For example, there are store “stylists”, as well as employees who are completely focused on operations. Baxter compared the company’s affiliates to influencers, noting that Express Stores has a “Kardashian-level following” of 120 million customers a year.

“You can’t operate your stores the way you’ve always operated,” agrees Tricia Smith, CEO of Anthropologie Global. For its part, Anthropologie has implemented a dedicated, rotating “Omni Fulfillment Team” in its stores. The idea is to keep employees serving customers on the sales floor from being distracted by new omnichannel tasks like shipping online orders.

According to Ricobono, with Untuckit’s omnichannel capabilities, 20% of in-store inventory is now shipped to online customers.

Other fashion companies that have recently announced store renovations include J.Jill, TJX and Victoria’s Secret.

Designer Neely Lotan said this week that her namesake brand’s only NYC store is “on fire,” just as Baxter Express reports that store revenue is back to at least pre-pandemic levels. Following the height of the epidemic, she owed it to people who wanted to “enjoy and spoil themselves”. At the same time, Baxter noted, e-commerce businesses that have fueled the pandemic are shrinking.

Baxter asks if the rush back to the store is over. Express says it will stay on track with its goal of driving e-commerce demand to $1 billion by 2024 by prioritizing digital and IRL sales. Additionally, he says, “Our best customers are our multi-channel customers.”

For the second quarter of 2022, Express reported net sales of $465,000, an increase of 2 percent year-over-year. Comparable retail sales through express stores and e-commerce were flat, with retail stores up 6% and e-commerce demand down 6%.

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