Specialty footwear brand enhances store operations with new platform
U.S. footwear brand Johnston & Murphy is enhancing merchandising, workforce management, and customer experience at its corporate stores.
A division of footwear retailer Genesco, Johnston & Murphy is deploying the Yoobic all-in-one digital workplace platform across its 168 company-owned retail locations. The retailer intends to modernize operations, improve the employee experience using digital technology, and deliver quality customer experiences across its entire retail footprint.
Previously, Johnston & Murphy had previously relied on mass emails and PDFs to communicate with employees. After implementing the Yoobic platform companywide in three months, the retailer is now utilizing the Yoobic purpose-built app to manage two-way employee communication, keep track of tasks, and enable its hundreds of associates to provide best-in-class customer service.
Johnston & Murphy will also leverage the Yoobic platform to support its visual merchandising, by packaging merchandising instructions in videos and bite-size content that are accessible via the Yoobic app. This will enable store associates to quickly obtain the information they need, take pictures of displays for reporting purposes, and receive real-time updates as campaigns or promotions change across the course of their workday.
Store supervisors and managers based at corporate offices can also provide targeted directives to specific categories of associates. Using a streamlined mobile interface, the Yoobic platform also enables information to flow in real-time from store associates back to regional teams and corporate offices, with clear performance tracking and effortless data-driven reporting. Underperforming stores can be flagged promptly, and findings from store visits can easily be shared both with store managers and with corporate offices to drive compliance and promote continuous improvement.
Regional furniture chain City Furniture has also been improving store operations with mobile communications. The retailer is piloting a new mobile communications solution at select locations using a combination of iPads, the Zello instant voice messaging app, and wireless push-to-talk buttons from Pryme.
By clicking the push-to-talk button, sales associates can quickly activate Zello and respond to messages or gain access to the iPad’s suite of technology. According to City Furniture, the new mobile communications solution also helps it to incentivize performance and train new associates.
“At Johnston & Murphy, we’re proud of our brand history and we want our retail associates to become part of the legend. That starts with prioritizing our retail associates, and empowering them to become ambassadors for the Johnston & Murphy brand and deliver unrivaled experiences wherever customers meet us,” said Heather Marsh, VP of customer experience at Johnston & Murphy.
“Johnston & Murphy is a beloved American brand, and we’re thrilled to be helping them to continue delivering amazing experiences and live up to their legend in the modern era,” said Yoobic CEO Fabrice Haiat. “By investing in its employees and giving them cutting-edge mobile tools, Johnston & Murphy is building out the retail infrastructure needed to drive continuing success for many decades to come.”
A division of Nashville-based Genesco Inc., Johnston & Murphy was founded in 1850 and is headquartered in Nashville. Johnston & Murphy products are available in more than 2,000 global retail and wholesale locations, as well as in its corporate stores and at johnstonmurphy.com.