On the back of the US retail lull, major brands such as Columbia Sportswear and The North Face are looking for better ways to access their consumers directly. This involves both international branded bricks and mortar store expansion as well as new e-commerce online consumer channels.
Columbia recently chose Demandware, an on-demand e-commerce solution platform provider, to power their new direct to consumer online channel. The new site will display the breadth of the Columbia brand as well as the technology behind their products. The company plans to integrate the e-commerce experience into their bricks and mortar stores in order to improve the consumer shopping experience.
The North Face recently chose IBM to implement their e-commerce website that includes ratings and reviews, RSS feeds, videos and publicity for dozens of their sponsored athletes.
Retailer Moosejaw Mountaineering, has taken it one step further and deployed two mobile commerce sites: m.Moosejaw.com, for those consumers with smartphones and Moosejaw.mobi, for those with regular phones.