there's a concept the UK could learn from REI in the USA. They have "all things outdoors" type large stores, I've been in 3 of them and relative to UK stores I'd say would be "huge". They grow/shrink the proportion of the store to suit the season, e.g. more skiing gear now, but all-year would have everything you needed, e.g. walk out with a tent, stove, sleeping bag, mat, jacket, trousers, boots, socks... etc.
The stores though are not big enough to hold everything, all makes, all the time, so what you can do is order online for free collection. On collecting if you don't like, full refund. So in effect if you pick the right time of month for the refund to be on your credit-card before statement, is order 2 or 3 items and return the ones you don't want.
It ends up on the shelf in the store or sent back in the next truck which is delivering stock anyway.
So the commodity stuff always there and specialist order/collect/return for the rest.
Like most physical stores, not heavily discounted, but REI also does discount schemes which if you're patient can help match the online-only stores for a few items a year. They also have their own creditcard for a little bit of discount ontop, and being a co-operative the profits become dividends annually.
So in UK instead of 3 stores selling similar crap, more of a super-store with capacity for more choice, the Asda of the outdoors concept.
I have to say, I work in a supermarket that makes a big thing of high quality customer service, and my experience of Blacks was not a good one compared to what I've been trained to give to customers myself. Stroppy, unhelpful attitude and overinflated prices. I'm not surprised they're a casualty of the recession at all. Not sure I'd go for an "outdoor Asda" though, I'd rather have keen and knowledgeable staff than a box-shifting organisation any wday...
"outdoors Asda" was more of the "everything in one store" concept, the REI store, the one near me, they all seem to know their stuff and walk around offering assistance if you do get technicall deep they answer well enough or call over a colleague.
The ideal would be that plus competitive prices but I doubt that's possible.
Nice idea - just really not sure if the Blacks/Millets stores are big enough for that (esp a lot of the Millets ones.). Go are the people who would have the store size to do something like that, but probably not the motivation.
I still think it's a good idea. Maybe if they'd got it organised as to what market they were trying to sell to and then opened some units on an almost supermarket scale, they might have captured a good percentage of the outdoor people's vote and consequent better sales. Still, it ain;t gone yet, we'll have to wait and see who takes it over.
well looking at the distribution of REI stores, how far apart they are, need about 300K population to sustain a store, but these don't particularly allow any other outdoorsy stores to survive in their vicinity, say 1 or 2 smaller specialist stores, e.g. there's one dedicated to skiing in my town. So that's one per town but major towns and obviously cities. So from north to south probably Edinburgh, Glasgow, Newcastle, etc. In the UK that would place 90% of the population within 30mins drive, or as I do a 25min bike or 2 hour walk .
You've seen in effect this happen with supermarkets, becoming larger and closing down the smaller stores.
My observation is that urban folks wanting basically warmer clothing is most of the gear choice and REI does their own-brand stuff cheaper for the commodities like fleeces, socks, but do drift up to higher-end fabrics like their own REI eVent jackets. Plus, you do get up to all the top-brand gear so if you want premium its there.
I was mentioning as they connect their online presence with their stores, so ordering the more esoteric stuff so if you don't like the fit you can return the items, without paying postage, that's different to pure online where you have to pay postage back. I think in UK Cotswolds does that?
With all the rain and wind and snow the UK gets, there's enough weather to keep such businesses afloat.
I've not walked into a Blacks for a few years, but having seen the scale of REI stores, the Blacks stores generally they were too small, even in big places like Keswick, and too much of the gear absolute crap, overlapping the stuff so many other stores sell, accepting that's due to the buyer's wishes for crap stuff, but the size of the store then precluded much higher-end stuff. So if the concept of go-large means one place you can get more broader choice, then that would work in the UK, I think.
The retailers just couldn't be arsed in the UK. Look at Cotswold order something and they won't even let you return it to a store, has to be posted back.
I'm not sure that REI would like to be regarded as the Asda/Walmart of outdoor gear -I suspect that they would say they do things very well, just on a big scale. I've never been to Go Outdoors (none near me), but possibly the 'Asda' model might be closer to their organisation - they certainly have the sort of coverage you'd want for a mass retailer.
The problem with large retailers is that although they can buy big, they often tend to suck when it comes to customer service, and settle into a very standardised model of what they should offer. I must admit that Cotswold isn't bad generally (although returning a net bought item to a store isn't difficult - Next do it), and at least it has a reasonable range.But, as has already been pointed pointed out, these kind of big box retailers basically kill everything everything else.
My local Blacks isn't huge (its city centre, unlike the local Cotswold), and is on two floors, so its a little cramped. Service varies between the pretty good and the useless (the other day, I had to explain to both a customer and an assistant what Seam Seal was).
I work for an employer who is fanatical about customer service, stock levels, etc, and Blacks/Millets doesn't come close. Hopefully a better range, more consistant service and knowledge, and a certain amount of pizazz in marketing and layout will help. Certainly kill of the concept of trying to sell you 'half-price' (but overpriced) tat at the till when you buy something. I don't like it in WH Smiths, and I hate it in Blacks.
You don't have to go big box. Get your product, range, service, net and marketing right, and you can still survive.
REI and its "sister company in Canada MEC are both Co op's owned by its members. By providing good customer service to its customers they are in effect doing no more than pleasing the owners. Both REI and MEC stores provide the sort of "shopping experence" that is not often replecated in the UK. The largest REI stores in places like Seattle WA and Portland OR are of a scale that is not replecated by anyone in the UK. I hope that the new owners of Blacks retain the outdoor theme of the stores and improve on the range of stock. It would be a shame if they turned into "own brand" outlets for Berghaus kit.
The problem for Blacks is that it is also the same business as Millets and that is a dreadful store. Blacks dont actually have that many stores but there are loads of Millets branches.
Just checked and there aren't ANY Millets Branches here in South Yorkshire.
I wandered into Blacks (Sheffield) yesterday and almost all of the stock had been removed.
