Case Study: Myer

Myer eventually elected to go with Akeneo PIM, thanks in large part to the company’s open-source platform and API offerings. Myer was eager to find a solution that offered customization, but didn’t force them to start from scratch — enter Akeneo PIM and its open source design.

After implementing Akeneo PIM, Myer quickly went to work teaching suppliers on how to use the solution to enrich their own product information. The company instituted a new grading and scoring system for product information and assets, which gave suppliers more transparency into the process, and helped them understand not only what information and assets they had already been provided but also which were still needed, thereby improving time-tomarket. The company also customized the solution to meet its specific and unique needs — namely a vast diversity in the number and variants of products it sells.

Myer is now using Akeneo to help suppliers upload data directly to the PIM, resulting in more compelling, consistent and accurate product information, an even more extensive and diverse product catalog, while significantly reducing time-to-market, among other benefits.

Faster time-to-market

Myer has significantly reduced their time-to-market, cutting the average enrichment time from more than 28 days down to less than seven. What’s more, the average product information enrichment process for one product has dropped from approximately 20 minutes before implementing PIM to nearly no time at all, thanks to Akeneo’s automated features. Suppliers are also now adding and enriching new products into the system — on average, around 30 percent of product information was enriched before Akeneo PIM was implemented, however, that figure has since grown to reach an average of 60 percent of product information.

Higher information quality

As enrichment speeds have improved, so has the quality of product information. Before implementing Akeneo PIM, Myer offered suppliers a style guide, but this was largely being ignored by suppliers and offered no visibility into what information still needed to be provided in order to complete the product enrichment process. Today, suppliers can easily see what information needs to be added or improved before a product can go live on Myer’s website, raising the quality of product information and assets and providing customers with a better shopping experience.

Stronger supplier relationships

Thanks to this increased speed and improved visibility into the enrichment process, Myer’s relationships with its suppliers have never been stronger. The company’s suppliers have said “that they are far happier with the enrichment process.” Myer has even found that suppliers actually enjoy the process of directly enriching their products, and appreciate being able to do so themselves, rather than waiting for the company to do it for them.