Read below for Retail TouchPoint's coverage on how Newmine partner and premium handmade shoemaker Viscata are paving the road for footwear brands and retailers as they prevent and reduce returns, rather than just manage them. Read below to find out how Viscata is embedding insights from returns data throughout their business:
“Research has shown that around 70% of returns can be controlled by the retailer,” said Navjit Bhasin, Founder and CEO of retail technology company Newmine in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean that all 70% can be prevented, but retailers can take proactive measures to ensure that product is being kept. Product descriptions, consumer education, product quality, customer service — these are all tangibles that retailers can control.”
With supply chain and manufacturing disruptions set to continue well into 2022, Barcelona-based shoemaker Viscata is working with Newmine to offset the impact of some of these uncontrollable challenges by reducing the amount of product that gets returned...for a digital brand like Viscata, reducing returns can have a substantial impact on the bottom line.
“We are living in a period where there are a lot of uncertainties, both in terms of demand and in terms of cost,” said Guillaume Benoit, Global Supply Chain Manager at Viscata in an interview with Retail TouchPoints. “I hear a lot about how to optimize the return process to make it easier for customers, how to consolidate returns to reduce the carbon footprint, but I don’t hear much about preventing returns. At the end of the day though, what’s a more sustainable way of handling returns than not having to handle them?”
Since June 2021, Viscata has been able to use the Chief Returns Officer to identify product design issues and improve their product. For example, there was one particular shoe that the Newmine platform flagged as being too large. When the Viscata team dove into the customer comments they realized that everyone was saying the same thing — the shoe straps were too loose. They realized this was because of a combination of a heavy sole and elastic straps that were being stretched when worn. “With this insight we actually went back to the factory and said, ‘Okay, we need to change this product to make it more solid, more robust,’” recounted Benoit.