Online footwear retailer Shoes.com plans to open stores nationally, complimenting its booming online business. We spoke with company Vice President of Brand and Retail, Geoff Henshaw, who explained why the pure play online retailer decided to move into physical stores, and why its locations will be unique and customizable.

Shoes.com was founded in 1996 and now carries over 500 designer brands, boasting annual online sales in excess of $300 million. The company is now headquartered in Vancouver, after being bought last year by Coastal Contacts founder, Roger Hardy. The company also recently bought a popular sock brand called Richer, Poorer to compliment its footwear business. 

Shoes.com’s first location opened last month on Toronto’s trendy Queen Street West. The boutique was originally intended to be a temporary pop-up, but the company has since decided that physical stores are part of its long-term game plan. Mr. Henshaw explained how only 3% of all footwear purchases are made online and if a retailer does brick-and-mortar in a ‘purposeful way’, there’s room to gain market share. The Queen Street store will revert to a long-term lease in March of 2016. 

Mr. Henshaw says that the retailer decided to open physical stores to connect with customers face-to-face, and that the company is looking to grow through omni-channel. Owner Roger Hardy used a similar strategy when his online retailer Coastal Contacts opened brick-and-mortar stores in Canada in the spring of 2013, and within the first year these stores saw sales in excess of $2,000 per square foot. 

Mr. Henshaw says that in 2016, Shoes.com will look to open physical stores in all major Canadian markets. Targeted cities include Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Montreal and others. Although its first physical store is on a retail high street in Toronto, Shoes.com will consider opening in mall locations as well, particularly given Canada’s weather. Shoes.com Stores will ideally be in the 2,000 square foot range, he said – about twice the size of the existing Queen Street store.

The Toronto Queen Street store is unique in how its interior is customizable. Photos in this article show the store featuring a ‘forest’ backdrop. Mr. Henshaw explained that backdrops are easily customizable and interchangeable and that this backdrop may soon change to reflect January’s push to promote Canadian brands. Every six weeks, the store will see a new theme. Product is also customizable, and individual Shoes.com stores may curate brands and styles to cater to local markets, as well as for various promotions.

In some respects, Shoes.com’s brick-and-mortar expansion is an experiment, and the company will continue to evaluate its operations. It’s testing two-hour home delivery in Toronto and if it proves popular, new store locations might require less backroom storage space. Once there’s proof that its stores are a winning concept, Shoes.com will look to roll them out not only in Canada, but in the United States as well. Mr. Henshaw revealed that an American store expansion is in the works for the second half of 2016. 

This is the second part to last week’s list of retailers opening and expanding in Canada. We’re seeing remarkable growth in both new retailers entering the country as well as those expanding existing operations, despite reports of a softening economy. The list below is by no means comprehensive, and many of those listed below have not been revealed to the general public until now. 

The following list of 35 retailers that are either entering the Canadian market, or are expanding their operations, is sponsored by Vancouver-based Peregrine, which custom designs and fabricates retail, display, furniture and architectural features for some of the country’s top retailers.

Our next Peregrine-sponsored List of Retailers Opening and Expanding in Canada will be published early next month. We’ll also discuss what new retailers entered Canada in 2015. 

In early 2016, the University of Alberta School of Retailing’s Department of Applied Research will release a study revealing and discussing new brands confirmed to be entering Canada. We’ll   discuss the study once released. The research department is also available for hire, for companies/entities looking to conduct retail industry research. 

As Canadian brands and retailers become increasingly international, their products are being purchased by those who speak different languages. Besides potential confusion and mistranslation, individual country-by-country labelling standards are costing those in the industry who do business internationally, according to David Ceausu, President of leading Canadian based global apparel labelling company, Accent Labels. 
 
Mr. Ceausu noted that if a label reads differently in one country versus another, moving that product to another region could become complicated. Removing the label and replacing it with another takes time and money, not to mention that it could damage the product. Mr. Ceausu explained how international labelling standards and  utilizing symbols instead of words, could eliminate confusion and costs associated with multi-lingual labelling. A hybrid solution could also be acceptable, he said, utilizing localized labelling standards with an international label with easy-to-understand symbols. 

For example, if a Canadian company wanted to sell its wares internationally and a particular style didn’t sell in one country, moving it to another would require replacing labels and tags marked in the local language. Standardized labelling would allow the company to more easily move merchandise internationally, without the inconvenience of relabelling. This applies more to brick-and-mortar retailing,though standardization would also benefit e-commerce, according to Mr. Ceausu,to create consistency. 
 
Furthermore, Mr. Ceausu noted that standardized labelling could potentially eliminate confusion surrounding certain fabrics and other quality indicators. Although Canada’s Textile Labelling Act and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission may be of benefit to Canadians and Americans, countries such as India currently lack similar standardizing regulations. Standardized international labelling would provide consumers with insight into the fabric and care instructions, without the need for translation or for multiple/replacement tagging.

A recent study noted considerable differences among labelling standards, providing suggestions on how to streamline labelling standards for better international product movement. The study provided several potential solutions to try to create some uniformity, including ample use of percentages where appropriate, ASTM and ISO care symbols when possible, and even multiple tags for different country groups. The same study determined that ease of understanding and uniformity would be optimal and where possible, uniform labelling standards should be encouraged.  

Vancouver-based lawyer Ritchie Po noted that there could even be legal implications if mistranslation leads to false advertising or worse, someone is injured as a result of mislabelling. At the very least, mistranslation can lead to embarrassing situations — for example, translating ‘Made in Turkey’ into French could become humorous, if the translation results in the country being identified as a bird (dinde) as opposed to using its correct translation (Turquie). In the world of product labelling, however, humour and professionalism are often mutually exclusive.

As Canadian companies continue to move products internationally, at least partially standardized labelling would be of benefit. Mr. Ceausu explained that his company, Accent Labels, will adhere to any new industry practices that may involve new consistency standards.

Prada‘s only freestanding Canadian location is expanding, and updates on its landlord’s leasing site shows a two-level retail space more than twice the size of Prada’s existing store. 

Located at The Colonnade at 131 Bloor Street West, Prada will take 7,751 square feet of additional space, according to Morguard‘s website. Prada’s current ground-floor store is 5,889 square feet, according to plans, and the new store will measure 13,640 square feet. 

Prada will occupy second-floor space in part of the former Japan Foundation as well as hallway space formerly leading to Chanel. The 7,400 square foot Chanel store will vacate The Colonnade for an 8,700 square foot location on Yorkville Avenue in early 2017. 

Prada will also open its second freestanding Canadian store in Vancouver next year within The Carlyle retail complex at the southeast corner of Alberni Street and Thurlow Street. Sources say that the Vancouver store will span approximately 8,200 square feet over two floors, in the same complex as De Beers, Tory Burch and a soon-to-open Moncler store. 

Prada also currently operates several concessions within luxury retailer Holt Renfrew. Sources say that Prada may open an expanded ground-floor concession with a streetfront entrance at Holt Renfrew’s Bloor Street flagship, featuring accessories, footwear and ready-to-wear. The Prada concession within Holt Renfrew’s Vancouver store is expected to expand as the store grows and renovates, and sources at Holt Renfrew say that Prada may also open substantial locations within Holt’s Mississauga Square One location when it opens in the spring of 2016, as well as at an expanded Ogilvy/Holt’s in Montreal in 2017.