TILES & TILING TAPPING INTO


GROWING E-COMMERCE ECONOMY ENHANCES CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE


Based in Dublin, Ireland, the owners of family-run import and distribution firm Lucretia Tiles launched Tile Devil last November, an online retailer aimed squarely at the UK home improvement market. With online sales in the UK across all sectors predicted to reach £60bn for 2016, Tile Devil was hoping to tap into the growing economy. DIY Week’s Susan Deane caught up with managing director Graham Grumley to find out how the new business was shaping up


Growth has been impressive, with more retail customers now visiting our e-commerce store than enter our physical store. However, we appreciate it’s still only a fraction of what e-commerce can deliver. Google Keyword Planner reveals that there are several million searches related to floor tiles in the UK each month. Most are made by consumers considering a purchase and carrying out online research as a part of that decision process. Even the most energetic and knowledgeable sales staff could not deal with that volume. Probably the biggest seller for us online is wood-effect tiles, which is currently an on-trend product. We’ve been surprised at the size of many of the purchases. It’s clear that people are not just tiling their bathrooms or kitchens. Whole floors and living areas are being tiled, with many orders being far in excess of 50sq m.


12 DIY WEEK 16 JUNE 2017


Helping consumers visualise As Tile Devil is online we can display a much larger range than possible in a


retail


store.


Prospective customers, naturally, like to have an idea of exactly what they are purchasing beyond a photograph so they can browse our styles at their leisure and then order samples. We’ll post out two small samples for free or a box with up to 10 (about 15 kg of tiles) for £5 to cover postage. That gives them the chance to see and feel the tiles and a wide selection from which to make their choice. We have noted some interesting


trends: some customers purchase without ordering samples; others might order within hours of receiving a sample; and then again, we’ve seen lags of up to three months from sample order to purchase. Of course, many order a sample and never make a purchase;


this is just a marketing cost of doing business online. We are based just beside the Dublin M50 ring-road motorway which means


trucks can take


products from our warehouse to Dublin Porvery quickly; from there it is a three-hour sailing to Liverpool. We ship by the pallet only which is the same method by which tiles are shipped from the manufacturers in Spain or indeed from any tile manufacturer to wholesalers worldwide. Our pallets go into the UK Pallet Network and usually make it to customers’ homes within 48 hours of landing in Liverpool. Tilers


are experts


with a few broken tiles as they would always have to cut many full tiles during fitting anyway. Should it be the case that a delivery has been substantially damaged, for example by a careless forklift


operator in the network, then that is our problem. EU and UK law are on the side of the consumer. We’re delighted that this is the case to keep standards high. We will re-ship where necessary at our cost with no quibble. Trading online offers economies of scale that a high street store simply cannot match. We can display our


‘storefront to all 50


million+ consumers in the UK as opposed to just those within a 30 mile radius of our physical store. On a


at working well-designed ecommerce


store customers serve themselves which in turn, reduces costs. Improving our sales copy (product descriptions), amending prices, tweaking offers, uploading newer product photos etc. can be achieved instantly on an e-commerce store as opposed to having to print new brochures and data sheets which must be perfect first time.


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