What: Former Galeries Lafayette Champs-Élysées’ managing director Nadia Dhouib shares experience and advice.

Why is it important: The shift to virtual communications during lockdown presents an opportunity for retailers to deepen their customer relationships, Dhouib says.

When Galeries Lafayette opened in 2019, many features it introduced were fairly new to French retail. The store was designed to reflect the way people shop online, with products grouped by styles and trends, instead of brands, and a staff of 300 “personal stylists,” recruited via Instagram, acting as a mixture of style and trend experts, cultural influencers and high-end hotel concierges.

Since leaving her job as managing director of Galeries Lafayette Champs-Élysées in May 2020, after a 15-year career at Galeries Lafayette Group, she has founded her own retail consultancy, Rethinkretail Advisory, which helps brands, investors and start-ups in the retail and fashion industries to transform and develop new business models.

As repeated store closures have accelerated the migration of customers online, she recommends that retailers capitalize on the virtual customer relationships they were forced to develop during lockdown and double down on memorable experiences. Retail today is competing with: ‘Do I go to a restaurant or an art gallery, or hang out with friends?’” Dhouib says. “The stores that succeed are the ones that can recreate that feeling.”

She’s a little over ready-made Instagram corners. “I think people are past that now. They’ve become so expert at getting the shot, they don’t need you to set it up for them,” Dhouib reasoned.

One thing she doesn’t see going away is the trend for sales associates to act as personal shoppers. “A couple of years ago, people thought that if a sales adviser sent them a message, it was intrusive. Today, it’s become the norm. So the question is, how do you transform that and professionalize it so that this trend doesn’t fade away?” she asked. “This might also be an opportunity for retailers to give their teams both a framework, but also a certain amount of freedom,” she added. “It’s important to empower sales associates to make them enjoy what they do.”

It’s important to tailor the content and frequency of the messages to the target audience. “Knowing how often to contact your customer is a real balancing act. I would try to work on software that helps you to calculate how many messages on average a person is willing to receive.”

Going forward, Dhouib sees technology playing an ever bigger role in stores. She foresees more cashier-less stores where you scan your card at the entrance, and items are automatically deducted. Dhouib also expects growing use of facial recognition to secure payments and forecast foot traffic in stores.

A department store veteran shares vision and advice