Kingfisher, the owner of the B&Q and Screwfix chains, has agreed a five-year deal with Google Cloud, a move it hopes will provide customers with more intuitive searches and better tailor product ranges.
The company saw online sales soar during the pandemic when consumers spent more on home improvements. E-commerce sales were up 138% over three years in its third quarter, it said last month.
However, Chief digital and technology officer JJ Van Oosten said yesterday that the company felt it needed to accelerate its digital focus, and the move to the cloud was key.
“It will give us more freedom, more speed and allow us to get much closer to our customers, particularly in data,” he said.
Kingfisher had started moving its legacy data to Google Cloud, where it could be used to test new online concepts and improve the efficiency of deliveries, such as its less-than-one-hour Screwfix ‘Sprint’ service.
The partnership is also expected to help B&Q expand its marketplace platform which launched earlier this year. It allows third-party retailers to sell products via the B&Q website.
Van Oosten stated that improved search, underpinned by Google’s machine learning, would enable customers to navigate an online range that could increase to as much as 4 million in the coming years from around 300,000 today.
Google Cloud Chief Executive Thomas Kurian noted that its technology was helping customers identify products using image search, or by answering questions posed in imprecise terms. “We have a lot of history in search of making inexact queries work really well,” he said.
NAM Implications:
- Google search collaboration could help shoppers navigate an online range that could increase to as much as 4 million in the coming years from around 300,000 today.
- An indication of where Kingfisher is heading, portfolio-wise.
- i.e. Opportunities for suppliers to secure listings…
