Sears Holdings is confident that focusing on its best customers will reap future brand loyalty and profitability.
During Monday’s first-quarter earnings conference call, Sears Holdings Executive Vice President and CFO Rob Schriesheim stressed that the company’s focus is on its best customers and most of them are members of the Shop Your Way loyalty program.
“We are in the process of transforming our company from a Traditional Store Network Model into one which we describe as a Member-Centric Integrated Retail model,” Schriesheim said during the call, according to Seeking Alpha. “At the core of this transformation is a change in perspective. We are shifting from being product-centric to member-centric, from transacting with customers to building relationships with our members, from focused on driving our customers to our store network to building integrated retail capabilities that leverage the store network to create solutions that allow us to better serve our members.”
More than 70% of sales are derived from Shop Your Way members, Schriesheim said. First-quarter domestic same-store sales fell nearly 11%.
“We are applying our resources toward better understanding the wants and needs of Our Best Members so that we can apply these learnings toward increasing engagement and strengthening our relationships with all of our existing members,” Schriesheim explained. “As we shift from a Traditional Store Network Model to our Member-Centric Integrated Retail Model, we will focus on Our Best Stores and will continue to optimize the productivity of our space as we right-size, redeploy and highlight the value of our assets, including our substantial real estate portfolio.”
Personalizing interactions is a crucial step for Sears.
“In the first quarter, approximately 50% of our total interactions were personalized,” Schriesheim explained. “Personalizing our interactions allows us to increase relevance, driving higher retention and engagement which we believe, over time, will yield increased visit frequency and a higher share of our members’ wallets.”