ActivInstinct has been offering to take orders from outside the U.K. for the past 12 months. The demand for its products from French customers has been so high that the fast-growing British online sports retailer has decided to open a dedicated website in French and to hire French-speaking customer service people at its head office. A web store in German should follow within the next couple of months.
All the purchasing, administration and logistics will remain in the U.K., where the former Millet Sports e-commerce operation was launched in 2000 by Simon Millet, who had already opened his own brick-and-mortar store in northeast London in the early 1980s. The website was relaunched under the ActivInstinct name in 2008.
Under the management of Mike Thornhill, ActivInstict's sales have grown dramatically. From £2.1 million in 2006, they are expected to reach the level of £10 million (€11.4mm-$16.2m) for the full year ending in August. They rose by 27 percent rise in the six months ended Feb. 28, accompanied by a 44 percent jump in operating profits. Without any investments in marketing, some 22 percent of the turnover is now generated outside the U.K.
Reaching the website in some cases by word of mouth or through Google, Facebook and Twitter, foreign customers have been apparently attracted by ActivInstinct's large choice of products and its promotions, compounded by the price advantage related to the recent depreciation of the British pound, although this retailer is not as price-aggressive as Sports Direct. Several brands use ActivInstict to promote specific products, capitalizing on its huge database of 6 million customers.
ActivInstinct stocks some 20,000 different SKUs, but it often runs out of specific styles later in the season. Running is its biggest category, led by Asics and Nike. Other important categories are triathlon, cricket, racquet sports and hockey. The company is considering branching out into football, golf or outdoor, but its priority is to improve logistics, service levels and the shopping experience.
ActivInstinct is going to get a lot of visibility from next October through the numerous bookstores of W.H. Smith, which are going to sell a printed version of its magazine at £9.99 (€11.4-$16.2) a copy, coming out every four months. The first issue will have about 160 pages. An electronic version of the magazine has already been read by 185,000 people who have registered to receive it in the U.K., partly through the social media.
