Loblaw, Breuninger support online shift with cloud technology
A Canadian grocer and German department store retailer are leveraging Google Cloud resources on the front and back ends of the enterprise.
As the global COVID-19 pandemic moves both shopping and the corporate workplace online, retailers are dealing with increased strain on their networks. Loblaw Companies Ltd., a Canadian supermarket chain, obtained assistance from Google Cloud to support an increase in traffic to its PC Express grocery delivery and pickup platform.
Loblaw utilized Google Cloud resources to ensure it could scale, ensuring it could keep up with customer demand for food and other critical goods during the pandemic.
“The Google Cloud team has been a fantastic partner during this ever-changing time,” said Hesham Fahmy, GM at Loblaw Companies Ltd. “We truly appreciate the level of ownership, care and help Google has been providing. It is for a great cause, to make sure Canadians don’t have to stress about their essential needs in these uncertain times.”
In addition, German luxury fashion retailer Breuninger decided to temporarily close its 11 department stores and focus on e-commerce only. Breuninger’s existing video conferencing collaboration tools proved unable to deal with that sudden increase of usage. Google Cloud assisted the retailer in getting more than 1,100 employees live on the G Suite collaboration platform within 48 hours—with more employees to be added over the next few days. In addition to this, Breuninger is exploring how to interact with customers through new digital services enabled by G Suite.
In a corporate blog post, Thomas Kurian, CEO, Google Cloud, described some general steps the cloud services platform is taking to aid businesses during the pandemic. Google Cloud has activated remote customer service agents and its enhanced support protocol for peak periods, as well as detailed plans to manage its capacity and supply chain and tested the resilience of its infrastructure and processes.
In addition, Google Cloud is making the Google Meet teleconferencing tool free to all G Suite and G Suite for Education customers globally. The company is also offering its portfolio of Google Cloud learning resources, including its catalog of training courses, hands-on labs on Qwiklabs, and interactive Cloud OnAir webinars, at no cost until April 30. Other temporarily free learning resources include on-demand courses on Pluralsight and Coursera, as well as learning paths including Cloud Architecture and Data Engineering.
“We’re all in the midst of an extraordinary moment—not only for our teams, colleagues, and customers, but for the world at large,” Kurian said in the blog post. “The impact of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has created many new challenges, and for many of us, has required that we adopt new ways of working.”