Blog CPG, Retail & Luxury
Retail 4.0 : partager notre analyse et notre vision du commerce de demain
Retail 4.0 : partager notre analyse et notre vision du commerce de demain
In 2018, Decathlon in France made a significant change in its strategy to stop collaborating with major international brands like Adidas, Nike, Puma… The decision made only for the French market was taken to transform Decathlon into “THE Sport Retailer”. Why?
The strength of Decathlon is its concept, which is still relevant today, namely "sport must be accessible to all"! Indeed, its founder, Michel Leclercq, was a forerunner when he launched his first store with his six friends in 1976! His goal? To offer, under one roof, sports equipment at the best prices for beginners as well as passionate sportsmen and women! The story begins with the first store open in Englos - in the suburbs of Lille - the first self-service sports goods department store.
Decathlon nowadays is present in 57 countries and nearly 1,000 cities with more than 1,600 stores worldwide. Decathlon today represents more than 90,000 employees who achieved a turnover of 11 billion euros (69% of the turnover is achieved internationally) in 2018 (Decathlon United, n.d.).
Data is the key driver for everything, and companies are fighting for it in order to provide a seamless and personalized omnichannel journey. Nevertheless, it would be a naïve assumption to think that their intentions stop there. This raises ethical questions as well as a need for more transparency from companies and more regulations from governments.
We live in a world where Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are slowly invading our everyday tasks as consumers, suppliers and sellers. AI and ML are completely revolutionising economies, ensuring increased efficiency in production, improving profits and reducing costs. It is helping brands making better predictions and consequently more informed decisions. But what are ML and AI concretely? Therefore, in this article, we will try to answer the following questions: Do the benefits of AI and ML for retailers counterbalance their disadvantages concerning data protection?
