Italy leads the way in omnichannel competency, but Europe and Australia still trail North America
NewStore, a modular, mobile-first omnichannel cloud platform for retail brands worldwide, today announced the first-ever global edition of its Omnichannel Leadership Report. In this version, NewStore audited the omnichannel capabilities of 275 retail brands across six markets: Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the U.K. The company also incorporated data from its 2023 North America report, released in October 2022, to compare the progress of digital transformation initiatives across regions.
NewStore leveraged a team of third-party mystery shoppers to conduct the research, auditing each retail brand’s online, mobile app, and in-store shopping experiences. The results helped determine overall score percentages as well as score percentages for each report category. Through this process, NewStore identified the following brands as the 2023 Omnichannel Leaders across Europe and Australia:
- Marks & Spencer (U.K.)
- Calzedonia (Italy)
- Moncler (Italy)
- Gucci (Italy)
- Cotton On (Australia)
The global edition of the Omnichannel Leadership Report also assessed the overall omnichannel maturity of each region. Individual countries were assigned a score percentage reflecting the average performance of the brands in that market:
- Italy – 40%
- U.S. – 36%
- Australia – 34%
- Spain – 34%
- Canada – 32%
- France – 30%
- U.K. – 30%
- Germany – 26%
While Italy was the clear leader, earning the highest overall score percentage and three out of the top five omnichannel leaders, Europe as a whole (32%) and Australia (34%) trailed North America (36%) in omnichannel competency.
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NewStore determines omnichannel competence by looking at the adoption of specific capabilities essential to the customer journey across a brand’s online, mobile, and in-store experiences. The following data points highlight some of the cornerstone omnichannel features NewStore assessed for this report and how they differ across regions:
- Contactless Payments: 96% of global brands offer contactless payments, compared to 76% in North America.
- BORIS: 62% of global brands allow customers to return items bought online in-store, compared to 72% in North America.
- Click-and-Collect: 59% of global brands allow customers to buy products online and pick them up in-store, compared to 54% in North America
- Associate Mobility: 31% of global brands equip store associates with a mobile device, compared to 32% in North America.
- Mobile Shopping Apps: 23% of global brands provide a branded app, compared to 33% in North America.
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“Consumers don’t think about the channel they use to buy products. They simply want the experience to be consistent, regardless of when, where, and how they decide to shop,” said Stephan Schambach, Founder and CEO, NewStore. “The global edition of our Omnichannel Leadership Report shows that smart brands have woken up to the fact that multichannel strategies are no longer enough to meet this shift in expectations. Retailers should continue to focus on building seamless, omnichannel experiences that meet the needs of their customers across regions.”
In order to remove bias, NewStore excluded the 60 plus brands on its platform from the study, which by definition would be omnichannel leaders.
