The beauty category has ever-changing selling models with both Sephora and Ulta partnering with retailers (Kohl’s and Target, respectively). At the same time, brands often go direct to the consumer with physical stores or online, and can be absorbed into larger brand entities.

The products have evolved, the merchandising is more sophisticated and that leads to better decision making on the part of the customer. The community plays an important role when it comes to engaging the customer as social tools introduce the consumer perspective from in real life moments to influencers.

Beauty retailers detail what we stand for 

Just like there are foundational products, there are fundamental merchandising techniques to expect in the health and beauty category. It’s instructive to begin with brand. Shoppers have taken a stand and increasingly they want to know what the brands they buy from represent. As part of the site experience, BH Cosmetics gives shoppers a quick snapshot covering everything from diversity and inclusion to sustainability.

BH Cosmetics shares what it stands for on its homepage.

Efficiencies assist time-starved shoppers

Replenishment is core to the beauty business, and retailers and shoppers alike look for tools that deliver that efficiency. In a Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights of 718 online beauty buyers in August 2020, 40% said most of their beauty purchases online are replenishment-focused.

Swanson has put in place an easy refill tool so shoppers can efficiently order their favorite vitamins and supplements. The retailer’s “how it works” approach is helpful for shoppers and reinforces savings.

Swanson details its EasyRefill program.

Another efficiency that has proven to be important is the subscription model, which is also intrinsic to this category and featured on Scentbird. 20% of shoppers in the above-mentioned beauty survey find subscription services influential to their selection of beauty products online. This is powerful.

Scentbird shares how its subscription model works.

Beyond some of the efficiencies is calling out products that are new and top rated. Glossier is just one example of a brand that keeps those products front and center via merchandising.

Glossier merchandises top rated and new products.

Awards, mostly emanating from print media, propel both products and businesses. Beauty magazine Allure cited eSalon seven times as the best home hair color winner and the brand positions this award prominently on its website.

eSalon touts Allure’s Best of Beauty award.

Lastly, more retailers are integrating financing options. The Vitamin Shoppe features messaging in its search results for Klarna’s shop now, pay later. When asked about the top five most important factors in selecting a retailer for the holidays, 11% included this capability. Though lesser in importance than others, many shoppers have nonetheless come to rely on such financing options.

The Vitamin Shoppe offers its customers financing options.

Information ignites shopper decision-making

This is a category like many where information is valuable. In October 2022, Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights conducted a web design survey of 1,107 online shoppers. The survey looked at well-designed and functional online shopper experiences. Videos (21%), how-to guides (17%), the ability to profile one’s shopping needs (13%) as well as virtual try-on tools (11%) show varying importance from a design and functionality point-of-view. Despite their lower penetration numbers relative to other features, they remain important to a truly robust and engaging shopping experience, particularly in the beauty category.

Quizzes are particularly valuable in the health and beauty arena. LiquidI.V. wants to help and seeks information about your lifestyle. The retailer starts with age and moves right into your wellness routine (from nonexistent to carefully curated). Of course, it wants to know what’s important, and that includes everything from staying hydrated to digestive support. It covers beverage intake, including when you crave caffeine. The retailer rounds it out with your flavor preference to make a personalized suggestion.

LiquidI.V. profiles customers to find their Multiplier Must-Haves.

These initiatives also were reinforced in our beauty survey, where 26% cited the ability to profile beauty needs. 18% cited how-to guides or video tutorials, and 8% noted virtual try-on tools as important.

Beautylish is just one example of a site that takes its tutorials seriously. Its editorial section is quite robust and visitors can find everything from news to tips & tricks, stories and product information, making it one to visit often.

Beautylish has a comprehensive set of tutorials to educate shoppers.

Education comes in many formats, and ingredients are an integral part of selling the beauty experience. The Bliss glossary highlights some of those ingredients and where they can be most effective.

Bliss’ ingredients glossary.

Estee Lauder had just finished up a livestream and has embraced the Netflix model and binge watching, encouraging its customers to take advantage of its livestreaming initiatives.

Livestreaming is in play for Estee Lauder.

It’s instructive to see the range of tools and capabilities that online shoppers have leveraged to guide their beauty selections.

Elf’s virtual try-on is easy to use and assists the shopper in making a better selection. Shoppers have the option to select live makeup providing access to the camera, selecting a model or uploading a photo. The experience is valuable for decision-making, though personally, I still may seek out the advice of an associate as the choices are abundant.

Elf’s virtual try-on leads to more informed choices.

Consumers embrace the personalized and customized

Retailers offering personalization and customization continue to see growing interest among shoppers in this category and many others. Madison Reed offers free video consultations to help its customers find the perfect shade and get personalized recommendations. The retailer also provides live color-application assistance. It would be interesting to know who uses these services and if it’s those looking to save money at the salon, but still appreciating there’s someone to help. 16% of our beauty survey respondents had chatted with a beauty expert. I can only expect that to have grown post-COVID-19.

Madison Reed uses video consultations to customize shopper experiences.

Community central to beauty experience

If ever there were a category ripe to embrace community, it certainly is beauty.

Beauty Blender lets its fans see it in real life. Social media allows community members to showcase products in action and to share their love with fellow beauty lovers.

Beauty Blender gives viewers the real-life perspective.

Community also means putting an ambassador program in place. For Miss A, they serve as a representative of the brand. The ambassador’s role consists of creating content including photos and videos for social platforms and more. The benefits include free products, money and personality exposure.

Miss A’s ambassador program leverages beauty lovers to tell its story.

Sephora highlights the community as well. Its robust beauty community allows members to get recommendations, ask questions and join challenges. The array of topics the retailer covers is impressive.

Sephora’s Beauty Insider community fosters interaction from members.

The store takes a prominent role in beauty business

The store has an interesting role to play in beauty. Taking a look at our pre-holiday survey once again shows how important it is to check which products are available for both delivery (57%) and for pickup at the store (30%).

When perusing some of the beauty sites, I was impressed that I could get a view into the store experience from the Ulta site.

Ulta’s in-store preview encourages visits.

Same-day delivery sees traction

Online shoppers are increasingly interested in same-day delivery. Sally Beauty takes advantage of this trend and offers shoppers two-hour delivery over the December time frame. Our Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights beauty survey showed that 51% go to the physical store to get products fast. Sally Beauty smartly turns the tables and extends this convenience for its customers.

Sally Beauty delivers in two hours during December.

Beauty retailers have made great strides elevating the online shopping experience. The combination of shopping efficiencies that drive purchasing and online merchandising that inspires and optimizes decision-making is impressive. At the same time, building out communities makes for a complete customer package.

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Online sales fell 21% year over year. That drop included a 27% decline for digital sales under the Bed Bath & Beyond banner and a mid single-digits decline for the Buybuy Baby banner, the company said.

The omnichannel retailer said Sue Gove, an independent director on the board, has stepped in as interim chief executive. She replaces Mark Tritton, who took the helm in 2019 with a mandate to turn around sales at the company. First quarter 2022 earnings show that Tritton was unable to do so.

Fiscal first quarter by the numbers

Sales fell to $1.46 billion in the quarter ended May 28, 2022. That’s down 25.12% from the $1.95 billion in sales a year earlier. Wall Street had expected sales of $1.51 billion.

Same-store sales, a key retail metric, plummeted 24% in the quarter compared with a year ago. Analysts had expected a 20.1% drop, according to StreetAccount.

“Our results are not up to our expectations,” Gove said on a call with analysts. She is the former president and CEO of Golfsmith, a now-defunct specialty retailer that filed for bankruptcy in 2016. “Nor are they reflective of our potential.”

Analysts were unforgiving about Bed Bath & Beyond’s performance.

“We are looking at a situation in which this company is probably not going to be around. But no, it’s not going to take years. We could be talking about months at this point,” Anthony Chukumba said in an interview with Yahoo Finance. Chukumba is managing director of Loop Capital and a long-time critic of the retailer. “We are in the end days.”

Also stepping down is chief merchandising officer Joe Hartsig. The company announced Mara Sirhal, general manager of its Harmon health and beauty stores, is replacing him.

Bed Bath & Beyond ranks No. 30 in the 2022 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000.

Searching for a CEO and possibly for buyers

Bed Bath & Beyond said it has hired national search firm Russell Reynolds to look for a permanent CEO. Significantly, the retailer said it has retail advisory firm Berkeley Research Group to help it address ongoing problems with inventory management and a less-than-stellar balance sheet. Berkeley Research Group also acts as an advisor in mergers and acquisitions.

The poor earnings results led analysts to raise questions — again — about a possible sale of the Buybuy Baby business. Activist investor Ryan Cohen, who founded Chewy, earlier this year called for a sale or spinoff of the unit.

After Tritton’s departure was announced, Cohen shared his thoughts on Twitter.

I’m sick of seeing failed executives make millions in risk free compensation while shareholders are left holding the bag

— Ryan Cohen (@ryancohen) June 29, 2022

Looking ahead

In today’s earnings call, Gove did not rule out selling off Buybuy Baby.

“The Strategy Committee has done a great deal of work to date on evaluating the potential as a business,” she said. “We’re going to continue to build on that work and evaluate the options to unlocking the future potential. It’s still a work in process but, as I said, we know there’s interest.”

As it did following disappointing earnings in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2021, the retailer blamed inventory and supply-chain woes for the sales decline.

Gustavo Arnal, executive vice president and chief financial officer, told analysts that Bed Bath & Beyond would reevaluate its store count.

“We need to right-size the business according to our recent sales trends,” he said. “It’s all about not leaving any stone unturned.

“We continue to see our business as an omnichannel business. There’s complements between those stores and our digital business, and we’re happy with our digital business. We have significantly improved our capabilities in digital, and today, it’s 40% of the revenue. What we will continue doing now, even on an accelerated basis, is look at the overall profitability of the stores and look at the geographic dispersion to see where they complement buy online, pick up in store.”

Arnal also told analysts that in the present quarter, “comp sales continue to trend in the negative 20% range.” As part of the effort to improve performance, Arnal said the retailer would take “aggressive actions to align cost structure to sales” and would cut some $100 million from a previously announced capital expenditure plan of $400 million.

For the quarter ended May 28, Bed Bath & Beyond reported:

• A net loss of $357.66 million, a widening of 85.77% from the $50.87 million loss a year earlier.
• An operating loss of $339.16 million, a widening of 78.8% from the $88.13 million loss a year earlier.
• An adjusted gross margin of 23.8%, down 1,1,00 basis points from 34.9% in the year-earlier period.

Percentage changes may not align exactly with dollar figures due to rounding.

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“The big opportunity is what we call selling the backyard,” says Justin Petersen, who recently joined the retailer as chief merchandising officer.

Founded in 1998 as The Grill Store & More, BBQGuys sells its own lines of grills and accessories and products from the Napoleon Weber Grills and Traeger brands. Its inventory includes components used to build outdoor kitchens. Like indoor kitchens, the outdoor variety can include amenities like built-in storage cabinets, refrigeration, ice bins and warming drawers.

In addition to its online operation, BBQGuys operates a showroom in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and plans to open a second this year near Atlanta, Georgia.

Product line expansion

BBQGuys (No. 242 in the Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000 ranking) already sells patio furniture and outdoor accessories like fire pits and patio heaters, Petersen says. But those product lines are “under-penetrated” segments that offer significant growth potential, he adds. Without providing specifics, he says diversifying its outdoor living product offerings would build on the retailer’s category expansion under Brand Velocity Group’s (BVG) ownership. The private-equity firm bought BBQGuys in September 2020.

In the summer of 2021, BBQGuys launched its “entry-level” Victory line of grills.

In January, BBQGuys became the exclusive seller of Magma Products’ Crossover Series, portable cooking products made for travelers, recreational vehicle owners and tailgaters. Magma, which Brand Velocity Group also owns, is best known for marine grills and other boating accessories.

In the summer of 2021, BBQGuys launched its “entry-level” Victory line of grills, with prices in the $700 to $800 range. BBQGuys sells the Victory line directly to consumers on its website and in Costco Wholesale Corp. stores. Costco ranks No. 9 in the Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000.

The merchant sells its upscale Blaze grill line online and through authorized dealers. Freestanding Blaze grills start at about $1,600 and can cost more than $6,800, according to the BBQGuys website.

Petersen declined to discuss sales figures, but he described BBQGuys’ product expansion as “so far, so good.” Overall, he says sales growth will continue in 2022. And average order values are up year over year, though some of the AOV growth is attributable to inflation. Despite rising prices on food, energy and other consumer goods, BBQGuys continues to see strong demand for its products, Petersen says.

Content creation

Petersen says the quality of BBQGuys’ online experience is essential to the brand. He says BBQGuys strives to offer a “premium experience” to shoppers.  Having an in-house creative team means the brand can produce its own content and never needs to use manufacturer-generated images on its product pages. That includes creating videos demonstrating grilling recipes and many other instructional videos.

The retailer also can bring some star power to its advertising. BVG’s partners include former National Football League quarterback Eli Manning, who joined the firm in 2021. Eli Manning, his father, Archie, and brothers Peyton (another former NFL star) and Cooper are BVG investors. The Manning family also serves as BBQGuys’ “chief commercial makin’ guys.”

For an example of their work, see the video embedded below.

Supply chain problems scuttle a plan to go public

In July 2021, BBQGuys reached an agreement to go public by merging with Velocity Acquisition Corp., a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) launched by &vest in a deal valued at $963 million. But, by November 2021, the two parties had canceled the deal, citing supply chain problems affecting BBQGuys’ business and the timing of the transaction.

Petersen, who came to BBQGuys earlier this year from Wayfair Inc. (No. 7 in the Top 1000), where he served as the general manager of accent, entertainment and office furniture, says plans for an initial public offering, a merger with a SPAC, or other structural or ownership changes are unsettled. For now, he says, BBQGuys is focusing on building the operation.

“The future is bright for BBQGuys,” Petersen added.

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“The injection of humor—as appropriate—is for people to kind of get a warm and fuzzy feeling whenever they’re interacting with us, so they’ll think of us as not only a provider of goods to help them run their business, but as likeable and memorable people.”

The company’s marketing strategy has helped it to surpass $1 billion in sales, reaching $1.03 billion in 2020. More than half of its customer orders are transacted through ecommerce, and executives say Global Industrial’s multichannel sales and marketing strategy is key to its ongoing growth.

Global Industrial has yet to break out its full 2021 sales, which the company typically does in the third week of February. But for the nine months ended Sept. 30, sales for Global Industrial totaled $801.1 million, an increase of about 6.1% from sales of $755.1 million in the prior year. Net income was $49.8 million compared with $47.7 million for the first nine months of 2020.

Global Industrial is increasing its investment in driving brand awareness, a move that will strengthen ties with customers and grow sales. “It’s less about us and more about building a relationship between the customer and Global Industrial,” Werner says.

NASCAR fits with customer demographic

Klaus Werner, chief marketing officer, Global Industrial Co.

Sports marketing is another opportunity to spread brand awareness, he says. After looking into a variety of sports, NASCAR proved to be a good fit. Global Industrial sponsored a NASCAR race car for the Xfinity Series race at the Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, Arizona, in November.

Exposure on a national level and the opportunity to interact with customers and vendors proved invaluable to Global Industrial, Werner says. Businesses have asked Global Industrial about co-sponsoring the NASCAR vehicle.

“We were very pleased with our sponsorship of Sheldon Creed (race car driver) and the No. 78 Global Industrial Chevrolet in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Phoenix Raceway,” Werner says. “The partnership provided numerous digital and in person marketing opportunities both before, during and after the race that allow us to highlight the Global Industrial brand and the value we provide our customers.”

Global Industrial announced Feb. 1 that it will be one of the sponsors for RCR’s No. 21 car in the upcoming season and will be the main sponsor for several races.

Each race brings a different set of businesses together, he says. “And they collaborate with each other—we’ve had businesses use the event as an opportunity to discuss private label deals with us.”

Global Industrial is actively exploring other sports, including baseball, hockey and football. “But right now, NASCAR is one of the sports that fit our customer demographic the most,” he says.

Knowledge Center as a tool to build customer relationships

Customers expect an extensive variety of industrial products from Global Industrial, Werner says. But as a brand, the company wants to go beyond being a supplier and become a go-to resource. “We want to be a destination for information that goes beyond price items,” he says.

The Knowledge Center, an educational content section on GlobalIndustrial.com, contains online articles that appeal to the distributor’s customers. Subject matter experts and vendors write articles to educate and inform customers in search of solutions. For example, during the beginning of the pandemic, customers searched for such topics as sanitation and maintenance. Other articles address such subjects as trucking industry challenges or offer takeaways on digital innovation from Walmart’s chief technology officer Suresh Kumar.

Global Industrial also ran a marketing campaign toward the beginning of the pandemic called: Restore, Return, Rebound.

“We have a lot of thought leadership about how to restore your environment so that your customers and employees can return in person, and you can rebound along with the economy,” Werner says.

Topic interest shifts with the seasons. When the weather turns cold, people want to learn about heating, and when the summer arrives, customers begin searching for refrigeration and cooling fans. Storms prompt disaster recovery searches, and as the holiday season approached, customers searched for content about how to increase warehouse capacity and ways to double or triple inventory volume.

As COVID-19 vaccinations rolled out, Global Industrial evolved its campaign to: Ready, Set, Ready, Perfect. Each campaign reflected the changing economic landscape as customers moved from damage control measures to growth.

In early 2021, Global Industrial planned for COVID-19 vaccine approval. “We knew vaccines were on the shelf just waiting to be approved,” Werner says. “So, we made sure that once they were approved, we had all the collateral and marketing materials ready to go.”

The ready-to-go materials included information about how to set up a mobile clinic at a facility as well as information on products like sharps containers, which store needles, and low temperature freezers needed to keep vaccines viable.

“We had all that product assortment ready to go,” Werner says. “We need to anticipate what’s going to happen.”

Sometimes that anticipation leads to products sitting on the shelf indefinitely. “But it’s about being relevant and quick in case what we anticipated does happen,” he says.

QR codes give easy access to product assortment

Global Industrial customers expect traditional paper catalogs, which offer an extensive library of products and ordering information. Werner says that the physical catalog is valuable to customers.

“The end users of our catalog are often maintenance people who refer to our paper catalogs as they go up and down the aisles of their facility,” he says. “They place post-it notes for products they purchase most frequently for easy access.”

But there are benefits to coupling the traditional paper product catalog with an easy-to-use digital accompaniment, Werner says. Customers can still flip through a physical catalog but also scan a QR code with their smartphone camera and be directed to the product’s webpage to view more details.

As a result, Global Industrial has condensed its 600-page product catalog to a more manageable 200 pages, he says.

The QR code comes into play when a customer wants to see a full product range or search for a recommendation or alternative option.

Global Industrial can make adjustments in the back end of the software. The URL links to the QR codes so customers are directed to the product they’re looking for.

“As our ecommerce technology evolves, we’re spending a lot of time learning about QR codes and the different tracking capabilities that are emerging,” he says.

Global Industrial continues to test different paper and digital catalog variations to offer customers a convenient way to access what they need. “We’re going to do a handful of catalogs of different products next year. We plan on running experiments every quarter,” Werner says.

Going viral

In 2022, Werner says he wants to “double down” on Global Industrial’s content strategy, which it calls Prime the Pump. “Social is a platform for businesses that, if you want to play, you’ve got to pay,” he says. “So, I’m looking to respond with more investment.”

Social media is yet another venue to introduce people to Global Industrial’s brand. Global Industrial is active on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn and plans to explore Twitter and TikTok in the coming year.

In 2021, Global Industrial collaborated for six months with Terrill Haigler, known on Instagram as “your favorite trash man,” a Philadelphia-based former sanitation worker who organizes community clean-up efforts.

With Haigler having about 29,000 Instagram followers and a growing following on TikTok, Werner says, the popularity of the “trash man” videos were a pleasant surprise.

“These fun and serious videos can turn into new outreach opportunities,” Werner says, without specifying web traffic statistics or conversion rates.

“Sanitation is a big category of ours,” he adds. “We’re exploring more influencers and brand ambassadors and are in current negotiations with them for 2022.”

Navigating social media is a test-and-learn scenario, Werner says, but it is worth the effort. “Learn fast, fail fast, fail forward,” he says. “Some things work, and some things don’t. When something works, we double down on them and when it doesn’t, we learn from them and make it better.”

Werner will speak on Global Industrial’ B2B marketing strategy on June 10 at EnvisionB2B, a conference that will be hosted by Digital Commerce 360.

Sign up for a complimentary subscription to Digital Commerce 360 B2B News, published 4x/week, covering technology and business trends in the growing B2B ecommerce industry. Contact senior editor Gretchen Salois at Gretchen@digitalcommerce360.com. or follow her on at Twitter @GretchenDC360.

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This is a 10% increase in out-of-stock messages compared with the 2020 holiday season and a 253% increase in 2019. Adobe Analytics generates its data based on more than one trillion visits to U.S. retail sites, 100 million SKUs, and 18 product categories during November and December.

Supply chain issues, including periodic manufacturing facility closures, congested ports and cargo delays, have disrupted retail operations throughout 2021. And these issues crept into the holiday season, as seen by the out-of-stock products.

And most online holiday shoppers noticed, according to a Digital Commerce 360 and Bizrate Insights survey of 1,033 online shoppers in January 2021. 25% of consumers said they noticed many products out of stock and 37% said they noticed some.

Compared with the 2020 holiday season, 30% of shoppers said they encountered more out-of-stock messages this year. Plus, 25% of consumers said they paid greater attention to retailers that had products in stock and ready to ship during the 2021 holiday season, compared with their shopping behavior last year, according to the Digital Commerce 360/Bizrate Insights survey.

While out-of-stock messages did increase, Brendan Witcher, principal analyst at firm Forrester Research notes that many retailers did proactively try to mitigate supply issues and get their product orders to suppliers early in the season. For example, Fat Brain Toys put its holiday purchase order in with suppliers in July, about two months before it usually does, in the hopes of having its order at the front of the line, says president and co-founder Mark Carson.

And even if shoppers encountered out-of-stock messages online, ecommerce sales for the 2021 holiday still increased 8.6% year over year, according to Adobe.

“The thing to remember every year, we are going to have shortages on certain items, whether that’s for an Xbox or the latest Furby or whatever,” Witcher says.  “For all the talk and worry about supply chain, it didn’t come to fruition.”

Shallow discounts and higher prices

Another trend this holiday season was online retailers offering smaller discounts on products and higher online prices, according to Adobe.

In terms of promotions, online retailers did not discount their products as heavily during the 2021 holiday season compared with last year, according to Adobe. Online retailers offered weaker discounts in five categories, while two categories—apparel and toys—offered deeper discounts this holiday season compared with last year.

Again, shoppers noticed. In the Digital Commerce 360/Bizrate Insights survey, only 29% of consumers said they did not think promotions were more limited this year. In fact, 18% of consumers said they paid full price for products and 17% said they bought less merchandise than they had planned because of the lack of promotions.

Regardless of how much online retailers discounted products during the holiday season, online prices increased 3.1% in December 2021 compared with December 2020, according to the Adobe Digital Price Index. December was the 19th consecutive month of year over year online inflation, Adobe says.

13 of the 18 categories that Adobe tracked in December had price increases. Categories that had the larger year-over-year price increases in December include apparel (up 16.6% year over year), tools/home improvement (up 7.1% year over year), grocery (up 4.9%) and appliances (up 4.1%).

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Topps, co-owned by former Walt Disney Co. boss Michael Eisner, is selling its cards and entertainment division but will keep other businesses such as candy and gift cards. About 350 Topps employees will join Fanatics as part of the arrangement, with its top executives remaining in charge of Topps within the Fanatics trading card business, the companies said in a statement on Tuesday.

Terms of the agreement weren’t disclosed. A person familiar with the matter said the acquisition price was about $500 million, asking not to be identified because the information is private.

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Fanatics Inc. is No. 36 in the 2021 Digital Commerce 360’s Top 1000. Topps is No. 1036 the 2021 Digital Commerce 360 Next 1000, with 2020 web sales just shy of $30 million, according to Digital Commerce 360 research estimates.

“With trading cards and collectibles being a significant pillar of our long-term plans to become the leading digital sports platform, we are excited to add a leading trading cards company to build out our business,” Fanatics Chief Executive Michael Rubin said in the statement.

A deal for Topps cements Fanatics’ aggressive move over the past year into trading cards from its roots in sports apparel and other collectibles. Topps had planned to go public early last year through a merger, but the loss of the MLB contract to Fanatics derailed the move.

Fanatics Trading Cards will take over as the licensee for MLB cards years earlier than planned. The company, which is controlled by Fanatics Inc. but has outside investors, was valued at $10.4 billion in a funding round in September. It also has deals with the players’ unions of the National Basketball Association and the National Football League.

Rubin has been swiftly creating a sports empire around the company, with plans to get into adjacent sectors such as online gambling, ticketing and media. Sports collectibles have surged in value and popularity over the past year along with non-fungible tokens, sneakers and other alternative asset classes.

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“Gift card sales are an important focus for us in December,” says Drew Green, CEO at men’s custom suit merchant Indochino. “We sell an experience—you can’t just pick up an Indochino suit from the store, wrap it up and put it under the tree. This makes Indochino a special gift for someone who is perhaps getting married, starting a new job, or just loves to dress well.”

Typically, about 40%, of Indochino’s annual gift cards are in November and December, Green says. Indochino is No. 399 in the 2021 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000.

Overall for retailers, gift card sales are higher this holiday season than last year, says Saumil Mehta, head of customer solutions at payments technology vendor Square Inc. Gift card sales have increased 114% from November through mid-December, compared with this same time period last year, according to Square’s data which is based on both physical and e-gift card sales from 10s of thousands of U.S. retailers.

“This holiday season is shaping up to be the biggest year of the gift card yet,” Mehta says. “With inventory tied up due to supply chain issues, consumers are more likely to turn to gift cards than ever before to secure gifts on time. As out-of-stock notifications become more common and items become harder to find, gift cards sales will continue to rise.”

Jay Klauminzer, CEO of gift card marketplace Raise, agrees, and says gift card sales in November were stronger than in previous years because of more consumers shopping early and wanting to get all of their shopping done. Overall, gift cards sales have increased 25-30% year over year, Klauminzer says.

Similarly, Indochino says entering into the holiday season, its year-to-date gift card sales were already higher than all of 2020’s gift card sales. Its goal is to have its 2021 gift card sales on par with 2019, which was “an amazing year for gift card sales,” Green says without revealing more.

“Interestingly, we’re seeing that people are being more generous in 2021, with the value added to gift cards, increasing from $220 on average to $250,” he adds.

Overall, during the holiday season, 34% of consumers said they planned to buy a physical gift card and 20% said they planned to purchase a digital gift card, according to a pre-holiday survey of 938 online holiday buyers conducted by Digital Commerce 360/Bizrate Insights in September 2021.

How merchants promote gift cards

Within Digital Commerce 360’s Top 100 online retailers, 58 of them mentioned gift cards on their homepages on Dec. 15, according to a check by Digital Commerce 360 editors. Of these merchants, 37 prominently featured the product on the homepage, such as its own feature product tile, in a rotating produce image or as a navigation option. (The remaining 21 merchants that mentioned gift cards on their homepage either had it buried at the bottom of the page or within a navigation menu.)

Mass merchant Walmart Inc. (No. 2 in the Top 1000), for example, promoted buying gift cards as a top image on its homepage on Dec. 15.

Walmart.com promotes gift cards at the top of its homepage on Dec. 15.

Apparel retail chain Macy’s Inc. (No. 13) also promoted its digital gift cards both at the top of its homepage and within its homepage, encouraging shoppers to give a gift with one click and e-gift cards will provide instant “merry-ment.”

Macys.com’s promotes digital gift cards at the top of its homepage.

Within emails, some merchants have promoted gift cards for a while. For example, on Dec. 1, Gap Inc. (No. 19) sent an email to shoppers promoting gift cards because “They always fit.” Plus, it promoted its e-gift cards for last-minute shoppers. Victoria’s Secret (owned by L Brands Inc., No. 27) also used the same message—gift cards always fit—in an email on Dec. 15.

Victoria’s Secret (top) and Gap send emails in December promoting gift cards because “They always fit.”

Some retailers, such as apparel merchant Lands’ End (No. 68), leave the urgency and marketing language behind and encourage shoppers to purchase gift cards with an incentive. In an email, Lands’ End promoted that in-store shoppers who purchase a $50 gift card between Dec. 16-22 would receive a $10 bonus gift card.

Land’s End sends an email about its gift card bonus on Dec. 20.

In an email check conducted by Digital Commerce 360 editors, 13 of the Top 50 online retailers promoted gift cards between Dec. 1-15 via email. Only three of the top 50 retailers in the Next 1000 (online retailers ranked 1,001-1,050) promoted gift cards Dec. 1-15 via email.

For this final stretch before Christmas, retailers should be promoting digital gift cards to cater to last-minute shoppers, says Square’s Mehta says. Raise’s Klauminzer says Dec. 22-24 is when the final gift card sales spike typically occurs.

“Last-minute shoppers who can’t find those tricky items will be drawn to gift cards instead of risking delayed present arrivals,” Mehta says.

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MVMT’s collaborations with brands such as boot manufacturer Taft, or athletes like U.S. Olympic skateboarder Nyjah Huston, and sustainability-focused lines like its Ocean Plastic Designs, have customers spending about 21% more in average order value year over year (as of October 2021), Stumbaugh says.

Spencer Stumbaugh, chief brand officer, MVMT

Collaborations are driving revenue, he says. “We’re seeing these more special, higher price point items be the trend,” Stumbaugh says. “Whereas last year it was more about what’s functional. I think things are getting a little bit more back to normal.”

Back to normal means customers are buying more sunglasses and other accessories that indicate people are getting out of their homes as they resume some parts of pre-pandemic life, he says.

Responding to supply chain hiccups

An effective holiday strategy is integral to the giftable brand, as Q4 typically brings in about 50% of MVMT’s total yearly revenue.

In response to supply chain disruptions, MVMT once again expanded the time period in which it offers “Black Friday” discounts to several weeks as it did last year. MVMT is offering a site-wide pre-Black Friday 25% discount code for all shoppers Nov. 1–21.

“It’s something we did last year and has carried over to this year,” he says. “I remember six years ago when Black Friday was three days, not anymore. Shipping concerns certainly seem to have played a role in brands pulling up promotions a bit earlier in November this year.”

The longer promotional period is also an attempt to grab more sales, as MVMT anticipates stronger competition from other accessory brands. “I think you’re going to see steeper discounts across the board [from other brands] and a wider timeframe to really allow a global audience to get their gifts on time and have their expectations met,” Stumbaugh says.

MVMT still offers free shipping worldwide and processes orders within 24 hours of placing an order during business hours (excluding weekends and holidays). It also offers free worldwide returns on orders over $50. MVMT is owned by Movado Group Inc., No. 316 on Digital Commerce 360’s Top 1000 list.

MVMT’s merchandise planner keeps track of shipments, plans around delays and the person in this role works closely with the brand’s marketing team to keep everyone informed of inventory delays, says Allison Duda, director of brand partnerships.

“MVMT has a smaller core team with access to the Movado infrastructure, which is really supportive, but we still have autonomy, which has allowed us to be as flexible as we need to be,” Duda says. “We are able to pivot our strategy to whatever is going to work and get us through our busiest time of year.”

Operating within its parent company’s supply chain, MVMT can tap into Movado’s established network of legacy relationships with suppliers—which has aided in alleviating shipping-related headaches.

“We are seeing delays. We have boxes caught up in shipping yards and we’ve had to make adjustments and bear things over and be more thoughtful,” Stumbaugh says.

Sustainability and social strategy: social first, mobile first

The accessories retailer established itself as an international brand when it launched in 2013 as a crowdfunded endeavor geared toward a younger professional demographic. Since then, MVMT has gained popularity in the U.S. due in large part to its storytelling through social media platforms, Stumbaugh says.

“This was back when our marketing team consisted of three or four of us working out of a kitchen,” Stumbaugh says. “At that time, Instagram was still being figured out—there wasn’t a term called an ‘influencer.’”

Instead, MVMT was working with adventure-minded “ambassadors,” who appealed to MVMT’s target customers. MVMT’s presence on Instagram grew as its ambassadors traveled and posted adventurous photos with MVMT products.

Currently, MVMT integrates its products on Instagram by tagging them, allowing consumers to tap and be re-directed to buy from MVMT’s website without leaving the Instagram app. MVMT has a “fair amount of conversions” on social platforms, Stumbaugh says without revealing more.

Social media continues to be a driver for MVMT, and the brand is now focused on creating its marketing materials for social media and mobile devices. This is a switch from just six years ago, as back in 2015, 75% of MVMT’s orders were placed by customers using desktop computers, Stumbaugh says.

“We were optimizing our website and all our experiences for desktop,” he says. “Now it’s completely the other way around. The majority of our sales now come from mobile. We’re now thinking, social first, mobile first.”

Currently, MVMT is working on how to best market to consumers on TikTok.

“It’s a lot harder to have these grassroots, organic movements because everyone is fully integrated with social media,” Stumbaugh says. “So, when TikTok came along, we saw it as a huge opportunity to be a little less polished.”

Stumbaugh says it’s the story behind MVMT’s products that appeal to shoppers. “We don’t want to just flip flop discounts to manage inventory,” he says. “We want to showcase products instead of being super promotional. We want to show the why behind why you should buy our beautiful ceramic watch made from high-tech ceramic.”

Showcasing products ranges from high production value videos complete with CGI technology, to point-and-shoot demonstrations filmed by someone using an iPhone, which has been particularly popular on TikTok.

“Our strategy this year has been to go to both ends of the spectrum and that’s what we’ve been seeing sell on TikTok from a marketing standpoint,” Stumbaugh says. “Can you really sell on TikTok? Is that really brand building? And we found that yes, it is.”

Sustainability is also a pillar to it products lines, and MVMT also works to showcase these elements of its products. For example, MVMT’s new Ocean Plastic Line—which is helping to drive holiday sales this year—is a collaboration with Tide Ocean SA (#Tide), which upcycles plastic from the shores of South East Asia. Upcycling is defined as creative reuse, the process of transforming byproducts, waste materials, or otherwise unwanted products into new materials recognized as having higher artistic or environmental value.

#Tide is a Switzerland-based vendor that creates premium raw materials from ocean-bound plastic. The watches are solar powered and 1% of all revenue MVMT makes from these products goes to the Surfer Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to protecting the world’s oceans, beaches and waves, according to MVMT’s website.

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