Source: Foot Locker (FL) Q4 2016 Results – Earnings Call Transcript
Yesterday Wall Street analysts and people in the sneaker community were astonished by $FL ability to pull off growth in a soft retail market.
I wasn’t.
Here are two articles from last year that discuss why Foot Locker has been able to adapt to a shifting retail environment.
Foot Locker remains one of the few stores to be able to make it even in dying malls. They are a destination business that has taken their ability to overlap their e-commerce with programs in store named Stock Locator and with the standard Price Match. These programs are bolstered by the ability for customers to purchase a product online, and return the product to a brick and mortar. The Stock Locator program is something that any store can implement. The difference with Foot Locker is that they have made it into a measurable metric where store managers and sales associates can gain higher ratings for completing Stock Locators.
Literally as long as Foot Locker has a shoe somewhere in their system, you can order it while you are in store and it will reach your doorstep in 3-5 days.
Foot Locker remains a constant storyteller and they excel at merchandising which has become a lost art in retail. Most of the chains that are dying have lived by the “dump it all in the room and go” method of merchandising. The customer experience is minimal. This is not a problem in a Foot Locker. The segmented walls and branding form a narrative around each brand. When one brand becomes “hot” that brand is shifted in the store to become the focal point when a customer is walking by.
The most important thing everyone looking at $FL success has to remember is that they have 3000+ stores. Their nearest mall competitor Finish Line only has 600. As much as every brand is building DTC a relationship with Foot Locker is critical to the success of every brand. The Source link has an abbreviated version of the conference call, you will have to register on Seeking Alpha to read it all.
