Aurora's in-store iPad: I came, I saw, I shopped

Aurora's in-store iPad: I came, I saw, I shopped

In all the time we've been working with Aurora Fashions, one thing's remained constant: a desire to use new technology in a way that improves the experience and makes life easier for everyone – from shoppers and sales assistants to suppliers and IT staff. Our latest adventure together saw us introduce iPads to its high street brands, Coast, Oasis, Warehouse and Karen Millen. This gives staff instant access to the shops' websites anywhere in the store, so they can check product availability across the UK and place online orders if the right stock is not immediately available. Oh, and the point of sale app means they can checkout easily too...

iPads are everywhere now. Consumers love them; they look cool, and they're easy to use. But in business terms, what can you do with them? Well, if you're smart, you can use them to arm sales assistants with everything they need to sell more. That in turn will wow customers and cut queues as shoppers can browse, choose and pay for items from the comfort of a restyled changing room.

Best of all, instead of having to lug all their shopping home with them, customers can pay directly from the iPad and leave; their receipt and garments are sent on to their home within 90 minutes of ordering.

Aurora Fashions piloted iPads in eight Coast, Oasis, Warehouse and Karen Millen stores in London and Oxford. iPad transactions accounted for 20 per cent of sales at Oasis in the first week of operation and the brand will now roll out iPad shopping across its 74 stores in the UK and Ireland. Before then, we'll be helping to get iPads into 23 stores across all four brands in time for peak Christmas trading.

And it's not gone unnoticed. Since the iPad rollout was announced it's caused a bit of a stir – way beyond the usual IT and retail audience.

Both the Guardian and the Daily Mail have covered the story, both asking if this is the beginning of another retail revolution. You can read the full articles and conclusions below:

- Guardian: Oasis introduces iPad shopping in-store
- Daily Mail: Oasis set to revolutionise British High Street with iPads in changing rooms and clothes delivered at touch of  button

The Oasis Argyll Street flagship store iPad PoS launch has even been shortlisted for the Retail Technology Initiative of the Year category at this year's Oracle Retail Week Awards.

Liz Evans, managing director of Oasis, said: "Using iPads is a fun and more practical way of shopping. People don't have to queue and can buy anywhere on the shop floor. They can also look things up online and take pictures of themselves when trying on clothes. We want to make shopping fun and innovative."

Charleen Benson, Director Store Consulting Services at BT Expedite, thinks it might go even further than that.

"The use of tablet devices will transform the in-store shopping experience," she says. "You can do so much more because it's mobile – you can serve customers at their side and access stock from any channel, so you won't lose sales because an item isn't available.

"It used to be about replicating the store experience online. Now it's the other way round – and tablet devices and wi-fi are bringing the best of the web in-store."

But it's not just a case of throwing technology at it, as Charleen explains: "iPads themselves won't transform the customer experience. Retailers need to have the underlying multichannel capability in place – a single view of customer, stock accuracy and mechanisms in place to source and deliver items – otherwise it's technology for its own sake.

"This is all very new and really exciting – and we're finding new ways of serving customers and new benefits for both customers and retailers as we go through the trials."

For more information on our mobile point of sale solutions, visit www.btexpedite.com/mobilepos or call us on 0870 850 6880.

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