By Thomas J. Ryan
Sweaty Betty, often described as the U.K.’s version of Lululemon, has ambitious plans to expand quickly in the U.S., but it’s taking a slow-build approach with consumers by focusing on one-on-one engagement.
Speaking earlier this week at NRF Big Show 2017 at a session entitled, “Move Over, Globalization: Community Retail Has Arrived,” Erika Serow, president and U.S. CEO of Sweaty Betty, said she has a strong belief that brands are global in reach, but retail is local. Serow elaborated, “It doesn’t matter what we do in the U.K. on a retail basis because we have different customers. And frankly it doesn’t matter what we do in London if we’re sitting in Leeds and what we’re doing in New York if we’re sitting in Santa Monica. Retail is very much a local need.”
As such, one of the unique ways Sweaty Betty aims to “think locally” is by measuring performance based on “markets” instead of individual stores. For example, the company will measure the sales performance of customers online and offline across Fairfield County in Connecticut rather than just its Westchester location. The physical store is taking on many functions, including returns, pick-ups and browsing, that supports online purchases. Said Serow, “If you think about four-wall profitability, you start killing the value of that physical point of your customer coming in and touching your product as you’re seeing more and more volume shifting online.”
But Serow, who joined Sweaty Betty after a 20-year career at consultancy Bain & Co., said Sweaty Betty’s main focus in the U.S. is on “building individual relationships with individual women in the community.” She said this more social marketing approach runs counter to her past work done for retailers that focused on “how every dollar scales” in marketing as they expand. Community marketing, or developing individual touchpoints with consumers, she said, “doesn’t scale.”
Serow said her team often has to “take a flyer and hope what we’re doing actually is having an impact” in its engagement approach, but some insights come by talking to its front-line sales staff. She offered a few examples of some customers spreading their love on social media following a positive encounter with a sales associate.
Said Serow, “The reason we’re not trying to worry about scale marketing — which is very different from the ROI that we’re getting on digital and what’s the ROI we’re getting on social — is that this is also about building these individual relationships. You can’t build these relationships in a ‘one-to-many’ touchpoint. You can only build them in a ‘one-to-one’ touchpoint.”
The company has learned a few things since first entering the U.S. market two years ago. The first is a continuing reminder of the challenges of bringing a largely unknown brand to a new market. “We can’t be the 800-pound gorilla. We have to be the cute little orangutan that attaches to the back of your neck and follows you around and tries really, really hard to get your attention.”
She also said Sweaty Betty has learned the importance of linking campaigns, such as one focused on yoga bags, across social, direct mail, displays, etc. Finally, she said that while other stores in the fitness apparel space see instructors as the core influencers, Sweaty Betty focuses on end customers who are vocal and who have lots of friends. She added, “The value of those relationships is worth much more than what any instructor who may or may not be a customer could be.”
Overall, Sweaty Betty has been aggressively expanding. Founded in 1998, it only had three locations in 2000, but now has 44 in the U.K. and eight in the U.S. It plans to open 10 locations in the U.S. this year. With a goal to open an additional 10 U.S. locations annually in the years ahead, it expects to have an equal amount of stores in the U.S. as the U.K. by 2020. By that point, it also expects to conduct about half of its business online, up from 35 percent currently.
Compared to other U.S. athleisure brands, Sweaty Betty is “proudly from London” with a “quirky sense of humor,” Serow said. Relatedly, “we don’t take ourselves too seriously.” Serow noted that the women’s fitness market has become “very preachy” around empowerment, life/balance and other issues, but Sweaty Betty believes most women are just too busy to take their health and wellness commitment that seriously. Said Serow, “This has to be fun or we’re not going to do it.”
Photo courtesy Sweaty Betty
