N Brown gets close to its customers

Matthew Carlton

UK fashion retailer N Brown has pivoted from its catalogue roots to become a predominantly online business, but it makes a point of talking directly to consumers.

N Brown Group, a 150-year-old British fashion business with a portfolio of brands, has transformed itself from its traditional catalogue roots into an online retailing powerhouse. “Profitable, well run, we knew how to buy merchandise, photograph range, plan products to sell for catalogues, advertise, run call centres, run logistics operations,” chief customer officer Ann Steer told the Technology for Marketing event (London, September 2018).

But by 2007, when Steer joined, the company had realised that its old business model was “running out of road”.

“We knew that we needed to change, to pivot the business to focus on online,...

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