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Anna Cole
Director, e-Commerce, Carhartt
Supernova Award Category:
Artificial Intelligence and Augmented Humanity
The Company:
Headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, Carhartt manufactures premium clothing known for its durability, comfort, quality of construction and fit. Established in 1889, Carhartt operates company-owned retail locations throughout the USA and employs more than 4,700 people worldwide.
The Problem:
Sales take off, analystics lags behind. In the world of fashion, trends can surge up and subside in a matter of days. For leading retailers like Carhartt, the challenge is to connect every customer with the products they’re looking for. Anna Cole, Director of E-Commerce at Carhartt, explains: “To drive conversions, our goal is to get the right product to the right customer at the right time. Superficially, that sounds easy, but in practice it’s extremely difficult.“In the past, we relied heavily on a spreadsheet-based approach to determine how our digital merchandising strategies were performing. However, because we had to pivot between so many different systems to collect the data we needed, it took at least a full working week to build our reports. If we needed to dive deeper into one of our categories, creating a granular view could take even longer.
The Solution:
Shorter time to insight with AI, Carhartt augmented its IBM WebSphere® Commerce platform with IBM Watson Commerce Insights—an AI-poweredsolutionthatdeliversreal-time informationo businessperformancetomerchandisersandmarketers.“Ratherthanspendinghoursorevendays pullingindatafrommultipledifferentsystemstoidentifychangesinproductdemandourmerchandisersnowhaveasingleanalyticshubthatcontainsalltheinformation theyneed.Betterstilleachofourteammembercancustomizetheirworkspacetoshowonlytheproductandcategoriestheymanageenablingthemtoseeataglance which of their strategies are working and which aren’t.”Working together with IBM, Carhartt has integrated IBM Watson CommerceInsights with data from its ERP, planning and e-commerce platforms.“We can now see where people are clicking on our site, and the points where people are cutting short their journeys,” says Cole. “These insights are enabling us to make adjustments that help lift conversion."
The Results:
Making sales driving decisions faster, With an AI platform constantly monitoring its business data for emerging trends, Carhartt can act faster than ever to capitalize on new opportunities.“The next time that one of our products goes viral, Watson Commerce Insights will be able to spot that trend and point it out to our merchandisers,” explains Cole. “Our team can then quickly identify the source of a surge in our website traffic, and quickly adapt our marketing and merchandising strategies. By taking timely actions like making the in-demand product the hero image on our homepage and purchasing related search terms, we can make it as easy as possible for customers to buy—driving our revenues.”
Metrics:
“We started using Watson Commerce Insights a few months before our peak winter season, and the results have been exceptional. Using the solution’s intelligent sequencing capability, we designed rules to automatically move products that are trending to the top of their page and reposition products where inventory is running low further down their page—saving valuable time that we can spend on deeper analytics. We measured record-breaking conversion rates during the holiday period, and IBM Watson Commerce Insights played a key role in that success.” Deeper insight into inventory is helping Carhartt to deliver better experiences to its customers.
The Technology:
IBM Watson Commerce and IBM Watson Commerce Insights
Disruptive Factor:
“In the past, we relied heavily on a spreadsheet-based approach to determine how our digital merchandising strategies were performing. However, because we had to pivot between so many different systems to collect the data we needed, it took at least a full working week to build our reports. If we needed to dive deeper into one of our categories, creating a granular view could take even longer.” “We knew that Watson Commerce Insights would bring about a tremendous change to the way we work—particularly for our merchandising teams,” recalls Cole. “
Shining Moment:
AI indentifies trends and delivers actionable mechandising insights, If one of the world’s best-known celebrities wears your brand, (Matthew McConaughey wore Carhartt jacket in the Academy Award winning film Interstellar) sales can skyrocket—but only if you move fast to make that product easy to find. To jump on these opportunities,Carhartt uses artificial intelligence(AI) from IBM® Watson® Commerce Insights.