Thanks to its combination of expert craftsmanship and fashion-led design, Russell & Bromley’s legacy as the ‘definitive choice for the well-dressed’ has endured for more than 140 years. Keeping high-end buyers happy in the modern retail environment, however, requires an updated approach to the customer experience, which is what led the retailer to Narvar’s post-purchase solutions.

“Our customers are very demanding. They're after a luxury experience, not just a luxury product,” explains Nick Mitchell, Head of Customer Service and Online Trading at Russell & Bromley. “We have to make sure that we can provide that experience throughout the whole journey, even beyond the click of the ‘Buy’ button.”

Russell & Bromley uses carriers to deliver customer purchases, which initially limited its influence over the post-purchase experience. “Prior to partnering with Narvar, our delivery experience was not particularly efficient--and it certainly wasn't on-brand,” Nick says. “We had to rely on the carriers to provide notifications, which meant that none of it was branded. We lost all engagement with our customers at that point, and we really had no control over the experience that they were receiving.”

Extending an Iconic Experience to Modern Shoppers

As Russell & Bromley sought out solution providers for a potential partnership, Narvar quickly rose to the top of the retailer’s list. “When we were looking for somebody to partner with for our post-purchase experience, it was very important that they understood the luxury market. We looked at a number of different providers, and Narvar's solution is one of the best out there. It's certainly very strong when it comes to providing a luxury feel to the post-purchase experience,” states Nick.

If you're thinking about post-purchase solutions, Narvar should be at the top of your list. 

Nick Mitchell
Head of Customer Service & Online

Russell & Bromley initially adopted Narvar’s Engage module in August 2020, and has since added Narvar’s Care Module to its technology stack. Not only have these tools provided a better brand experience and much-needed post-purchase functionality, Nick and the team at Russell & Bromley have been impressed by how quickly they’ve been able to get up and running with Narvar. 

“I think that Narvar are very good at the whole onboarding process,” says Nick. “They were very good with us, in helping us to ensure we had a strong business case for going down this route and worked with us very well over the period of time that it took to implement the solution.” 

“What has been great about Narvar is just how easy it is to use,” continues Nick. “It's very intuitive. We can easily put together the emails that we need to build and make adjustments to our tracking pages. Upgrades that have happened to the tracking page platform mean that we've got even greater control over the content we put in it, and that's helped greatly.”

Driving Tangible Business Results with Technology  

Reflecting on Russell & Bromley’s experience so far, Nick notes that, “Having Narvar means that we've been able to address a number of issues. Firstly, we've got a smoother experience--a better experience for our customers--that encourages repeat business and better NPS scores. Because we have greater engagement, customers are going through to our website more than when we just had the courier notifications. We see a lot more traffic coming through that process.”  

Engagement with the marketing messaging embedded in the company’s tracking pages and shipment notifications has been a key post-implementation win. “With Narvar’s notification emails, we're seeing a 61% open rate, which is a lot higher than we would normally see on our marketing emails.” Nick continues, “Our tracking pages have a 13% click through rate, which we've been really happy with--that's all additional traffic to the site that we normally wouldn't get.”

Beyond engagement, adopting Narvar has helped Russell & Bromley reduce demand on its customer service team. According to Nick, “We've managed to alleviate a lot of work for the contact center with the notifications from Narvar. The calls are far fewer. Customers are coming to us in a better frame of mind because their experience has been better. 

One particularly notable contact center win came during the 2020 holiday shopping season. “As a business, we have a very fast delivery service, so traditionally, we don't have a lot of ‘Where is my order?’ calls. But in the final quarter of 2020--a time when we’re doing a lot of additional orders--we managed to reduce WISMO calls by 43%,” Nick shares. “This was right at the beginning of our relationship with Narvar, so we were getting immediate results, right from the get-go.”

To date, Russell & Bromley continues to leverage the data generated by Narvar’s solutions to make strategic decisions. “The feedback that we get through the Narvar portal from our customers means we're able to better understand the quality of service we're getting from our carriers,” Nick concludes. “That's helped steer some of our strategy for customer service, as well as how we work with our carriers going forward.”