Provided that they have sufficient staff at their warehouses, brands are still able to sell products online that cannot be sold by retailers whose stores are closed because of national coronavirus lockdowns. In a nice gesture of solidarity, brands like Ortovox and Leki in Germany are giving a portion of the proceeds to their retail clients.
Ortovox said it is going to give 25 percent of the proceeds from the sale of its mountain safety products to local retail partners in Germany, Austria, France and the U.K. who would have benefitted from the customers’ purchases. The customers themselves choose the store where they would have made the purchase. Focusing on Nordic walking poles, Leki is giving its retail partners a budget to encourage customers to buy its products through the social media, letting than have 35 percent of the purchase price in case of a sale.
As the brands normally generate good margins on their direct online sales, some of them offer temporary discounts to stimulate action over the internet. In France and other European countries, for example, Oakley is offering customers a rebate of 30 percent on all its sports and lifestyle eyewear bought by them over the internet.
In the U.S., Nike has placed a discount of 25 percent on all its footwear styles – except a few high-end Jordan models – sold through its website and shopping app. Our sister publication, the American edition of SGI, sees this less as a reaction to Covid-19 quarantines than as “an offensive move to accelerate its Consumer Direct Offense” – that is, a way to expand its DTC database of consumer names and bolster its position with respect to wholesale accounts in preparation for a return to normal.
However, orders generated by the promotion may be held up momentarily by the weekend closure of the company’s North America Logistics Campus in Frayser, Tennessee, the company’s largest one in the U.S. An employee at this distribution hub recently tested positive for Covid-19, and the hub had to shut down for cleaning.
Only some products are in demand online
In a recent interview with Tradesport, Xavier Pladellorens, the co-founder and chief executive of Deporvillage, one of the major Spanish online retailers of sporting goods, declared that his company has sufficient general inventory to ride out the Covid-19 pandemic. Like the competition, however, the Spanish online retailer has had trouble meeting demand for home fitness and indoor cycling categories that have received a considerable boost from quarantines. Items such as foam rollers and cardio gear are particularly scarce, and the company has never shipped so many of them in so short a time.
Meanwhile, inventories of products for the cycling, running and outdoor sectors are running high. The year began in stellar fashion for Deporvillage, with revenues up by 30 and 40 percent in January and February, respectively. Since then, revenues have been flat as compared to 2019. The company’s office staff of 80 is now working from home but keeping in touch with suppliers and brands. Pladellorens believes that the quarantine could “establish new habits among consumers,” who are “growing more accustomed” to online shopping and might remain loyal once the pandemic tapers off.
