Weill, a 125-year-old fashion house keeping up with the times

5 Questions for Alexandre Weill, Director of Physical Stores, and Anaïs Vanden Berghe, E-Commerce at Weill.

Interview with Sandra Fernandes, Marketing and Communications Director at Splio.

1. How do you explain the longevity of the Weill brand?

Before being a brand, Weill is a family-owned company rich in history, supported by four generations and that celebrated its 125th-year last year. The brand was at first a garment manufacturer, specialized in upscale women's clothing, designing limited editions for haute couture, French department stores or order-based production.

In the 1950s, the family-owned company shifted from industrial production to retail launched its ready-to-wear line by developing its own brand aimed at timeless women with chic charm, aged 30 to 77. The brand’s expansion gained momentum at that time through the “Weill suits you” advertising campaign, and it opened its first store on the Champs-Élysées in the 1980s.

Today, Weill owns 28 shops in France and 7 worldwide and many other distribution channels!

2. Is it a pre-requisite to get digital for a fashion house like yours? How did it go?

Being graceful is timeless, so the digital transformation quickly became obvious! Our clients are super loyal to Weill for many years, passed on from mother to daughter for several generations. We have a loyal and reactive clientele. Our brand must evolve with them and get adapted to changes in their buying behaviors.

But these changes begin internally. The company has managed to stay relevant over the years and meet the needs of its customers by attracting talented people and strong partners to help with our transformation. We work closely with the agency Antadis, which developed our e-commerce on PrestaShop and guides us through our digital and omnichannel strategy. Proximis helps us manage our inventory, and of course, Splio assists us in creating and improving our omnichannel marketing campaigns.

The digital transformation is strategic because it also represents the opportunity to broaden our target audience and to expand internationally.

3. What is the digital strategy for Weill?

Weill is—and always has been—a modern brand. It engages with its customers on social media, particularly Facebook and Instagram, where the brand has 116,000 and 25,000 followers, respectively, as well as through its newsletter, e-commerce , and retail locations. Weill has continually adapted its communications to reflect its customers’ changing usage patterns.

Our newsletter is a great success. Our last campaign "Stripe Looks " got an opening rate of 52% with 35% of unique openers! It's a major channel for a brand like ours which aims to maintain close contact with its customers. Splio's omnichannel marketing platform allows us, via quite a few scenarios, to convert abandoned carts or inactive clients, create an efficient buyer journey and match the user experience.

We are working with a timeless and chic client who has been a fan of our collections since she was 30 and who was the one who wanted these digital changes! The website was launched 10 years ago and the e-commerce 8 years ago. Our audience knows the brand well, has a strong connection to our physical stores, and is happy to be able to access our products online and order through these four channels with complete confidence.

4. Your brand has an on and offline strategy: what is your clients' favorite channel?

Our customers are at the heart of our strategy and the store is the place where we meet them. The Internet changed our target's habits, but the store stays the first channel and answers to their need to have human contact with us. The experience in-store is unique: a warm welcome, the ability to touch the materials, the physical contact with the brand. Our customers spend a lot of time in the store. They know that we offer good quality products and that the sales associate's advice is valuable and qualified.

The store is also the place where we gather information about our clients to better know them and better guide them, thanks to the PoS software and click & collect or ship-to-store options. We are fully aware that an omnichannel strategy answers the needs of a younger audience and allows us to communicate and bring back in-store traffic.

We also enjoy helping clients who are ready to take the plunge into the e-commerce . Our goal is to make our e-commerce just as successful as our most profitable Parisian store! We want to stay connected with our customers both online and offline. There’s no secret to it: a detailed product description and an attractive photo will always be more effective at capturing our customers’ attention.

5. What is the biggest challenge for Weill today?

Weill wants to grow with its clientele from today and tomorrow. The challenge can be summarized in two words: customer experience. Our steps will be to develop our omnichannel strategy according to our values - which are our strengths: human contact, quality of our products and be a trustworthy brand. Our customers must go from the Internet to the store, from email to Customer Service, while living the same experience. We are trying to communicate the same emotions for our collections on any channel that our clients are using. These emotions can as much be felt from a shopping window to Instagram, or in our newsletter...

Weill also aims to become better known among a younger and more international clientele. Our presence on social media opens up new opportunities for us! Embracing digital technology is a huge opportunity for Weill. We know that e-commerce help us expand our target audience and make Weill available throughout France and around the world. Today, 20% of our sales—both online and offline—come from abroad, particularly in the U.S., the Middle East, Senegal, and Russia.

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