Zalando’s pilot delivery service – the future?

A few months ago, the Digital Tipping Point report suggested that online purchases will make up 50% of all retail sales by 2028. At the current trajectory, it’s hard to bet against it.

But here’s the problem

With the growing ecomm market, fashion retailers are facing tougher consumer challenges especially around deliveries and returns. Many businesses now build free delivery and returns into their strategy, but can they meet expectations from customer demand?

This is made all the more pressing, not least because 67% of customers now check the returns policy before purchasing.

Zalando’s trial solution

Fashion platform Zalando, a key integration of i.LEVEL with 29M active users, has struck on a novel fashion delivery solution it’s been testing in Denmark. Dubbed ‘Din Nabo’ (‘My Neighbour’), the new pick-up-drop-off service in Denmark has been championed by local communities where residents themselves become the service points for fashion deliveries.

The result of the trial? Zalando has seen a “strong response” from the pilot scheme with 95% of the customers rating the facility as “excellent”.

Zalando’s Remko Bakker, the company’s head of Logistics Platform Services, told Fashion Network that “feedback from customers is very much in line with our preliminary market research, which predicted that proximity, opening hours and accessibility are the most important criteria when deciding on a specific pick-up point.”

The new trial is also thought to have been most successful in rural areas where there are fewer stores and shorter opening hours. Homerr, the courier company Zalando has collaborated with, has also stressed the impact the trial has had on the environment. Fewer journeys and more efficient delivery routes has seen a thumbs up from all stakeholders. As Bakker adds, “the service seems to be appealing to Danes because of the sustainability element.”

The company will continue to test the fashion delivery solution until the tail end of 2019 and will then assess how to proceed. Watch this space…

Zalando is one of 40 platforms and retail hosts that i.LEVEL are integrated with, and this integration allows our fashion brands to trade directly with Europe’s largest online fashion retailer. If you would like to know more about our integration with Zalando, please call us on 01234 761757 or email info@ilevelsoftware.co.uk for further info.