梅西百货：购物者的最大痛点就在这里

如果大家曾经在梅西百货排长队等结账，一边跺脚一边不停看手表，请放心，以后不会了。因为梅西百货首席执行官已深刻了解顾客的痛苦。

在包含圣诞假期的季度中，梅西百货实现三年来首次可比销售额增长。为了巩固成绩，也为了改善自身业务，该公司采取的新措施之一是在部分门店试用移动结账，还计划在旗下约650家门店中的450家推广。

现在顾客可以用梅西百货购物app扫描商品，结算并付款，然后进入服务中心的快速通道。购物者向店员出示app，核对手中的商品并移除安全标签后就可以离开。

梅西百货CEO杰夫·甘内特在本周二的投资者会议上表示：“要说起目前门店的最大痛点，就是结账的过程。找收银台很让人头疼。收银员在吗？要排长队吗？我得等多长时间才能结完账？”

《财富》杂志读者、研究机构Retail Eye联合创始人丽莎·沃尔特斯给我们发来一张华盛顿州贝尔维尤市梅西百货的照片：

If you’ve ever found yourself stuck in a long checkout line at Macy’s , tapping your feet and looking at your watch every two seconds, please know the department store operator’s CEO feels your pain.

As part of Macy’s ongoing efforts to improve its business and build on its first quarter of comparable sales growth in three years over the holidays, the retailer is testing out mobile checkout at some stores, with a plan to offer the service at 450 of its 650 or so Macy’s stores.

A customer would use his or her Macy’s shopping app to scan items, ring up the bill and pay it and then go to an express line at a service center. There, the shopper would present the app to an employee, who would then count items in the bag and remove security tags on the items before sending the shopper on his or her way.

“If you want to talk about the single biggest pain point in our stores right now, it’s the checkout process,” Macy’s Inc chief executive Jeff Gennette told an investor conference on Tuesday. “It’s finding the register. Is there going to be somebody there? Is there a long line of customers and how long is it going to take me to get out?”

One reader, Lisa Walters, co-founder of research firm Retail Eye, sent us this picture of a sign at the Macy’s in Bellevue, Washington:  

甘内特一年前上任，之后一直在全面调整梅西百货的门店运作方式，移动结账就是创新举措之一。梅西百货上个月披露，在截至2月1日的假期季中，可比销售额上升1.3%，这是2014年以来该公司首次实现假期季销售增长。不过，零售行业在假期中整体表现强劲，相比之下梅西百货的增速依然缓慢，也落后于塔吉特和科尔百货等对手，梅西百货仍面临持续求变的压力。

《财富》杂志上个月率先报道，梅西百货称今年在门店和电子商务方面的资本支出将达到10.5亿美元，比去年增加1.5亿。其中很大一部分将用于移动结账等创新，还有“Growth50”项目正在测试的其他多项措施。项目目标是在今年把梅西百货在新泽西州伍德布里奇镇一家门店的测试结果推广到50家门店，从而为2019年在另外数百家门店推进创新措施奠定基础。

在甘内特主持下，梅西百货正努力重获购物者青睐，店内增加独家商品，全店层面规划和采购时更加去中心化，削减店面数量的同时让店内充满活力且整洁有序。他承认，顾客选择去别处购物非常容易，而且确实经常改去别家店。

他说：“顾客已然用脚投票。”（财富中文网）

译者：Charlie

审校：夏林

The mobile checkout is but one initiative in an overhaul to how Macy’s stores operate since Gennette took the reins a year ago. Last month, Macy’s reported comparable sales rose 1.3% in the holiday quarter that ended on Feb. 1, its first quarter of growth since late 2014. Still, that was a tepid pace in relation to the overall retail industry’s strong holiday season and below that of rival’s such as Target and Kohl’s, putting pressure on Macy’s to keep making changes.

Last month, as first reported by Fortune, Macy’s said it was spending $1.05 billion on capital expenditures this year, or $150 million more than last year, on its stores and e-commerce. Much of that will go to initiatives such as the mobile checkout and many others that Macy’s is testing as part of its “Growth50.” That project aims to roll out things Macy’s has been trying out at a store in Woodbridge, N.J. to 50 Macy’s stores this year as a launching pad for a series of initiatives it wants to roll out to hundreds more stores in 2019.

On Gennette’s watch, Macy’s is looking to win its way back into shoppers’ graces with more exclusive product, more decentralized planning and buying at the store level and fewer but more dynamic and neater stores. He acknowledged how easily Macy’s shoppers can, and often do, go elsewhere.

“Customers have put us on notice,” he said.