Elevating E-commerce: Stockmann's Journey with Looklet
Stockmann is a Finnish department store chain under the Lindex Group, with stores in Finland and the Baltics, as well as online stores: www.stockmann.com, www.stockmann.ee and www.stockmann.lv. Additionally, Stockmann operates separate online stores for its main biannual campaign, 'Hullut Päivät,' accessible at hullutpaivat.com, hulludpaevad.ee and trakasdienas.lv.
Stockmann was founded in 1862 in Helsinki. It is known for its wide range of products, including fashion, home decor, cosmetics, and other items. Stockmann has long been an iconic part of Finnish retail, especially thanks to its flagship store located in the heart of Helsinki. After reviewing various solutions, Stockmann chose Looklet as the ideal option for quality, cost, flexibility, and partnership experience. Here we highlight some key points that make this relationship a winning one.
"Looklet has revolutionized our cost structure, allowing us to significantly reduce expenses per item. This has freed up resources that we can now invest in other strategic areas of our business"
- Heidi Kontuniemi, Manager of the Digital Sales Preparation at Stockmann
Results & Value at a Glance
Key stats of improvement since using the Looklet solution
Cost savings
Automatized image production significantly reduced resource requirements and eliminated post-production efforts leading to a significant cost reduction per item.
Time to market
Items shot and style-ready within 6 hours resulting in more items online than ever for Stockmann every day.
Consistency
The maintained consistently facilitated a transition from traditional on-figure solutions to exclusively producing garments on Looklet in-house.
We sat down with Heidi Kontuniemi, Manager of the e-Com Content Production at Stockmann Studios, to discuss how Stockmann uses Looklet, key benefits and results of using Looklet and his feelings on the company as a whole.
How Stockmann Uses Looklet
In 2019, before Looklet, Stockmann used a combination of vendor-supplied imagery and traditional on-model photography. By using Looklet, Stockmann found they could (and did) eliminate traditional on-model photography shoots for women, men, female plus size, and kids apparel and certain accessories, resulting in even more positive externalities in terms of cost. Looklet was first implemented at the Distribution Centre in Tuusula, Finland as part of other studio facilities, from where these operations were transferred to Tallinn in 2021, further increasing cost efficiency.
Today, Stockmann utilizes a combination of vendor-supplied imagery, product lay-down shots, ministudio (mainly non-fashion categories), and Looklet. The flexibility and variety of styling opportunities in The Look Creator allow Heidi's team to style appropriately for each brand.
“Looklet fits every brand that we are shooting, and the images are often more versatile and better than the brand's own images – when using Looklet, we can also make the design of product images in the online store more consistent and clear, compared to using all the available supplier images."
Key Results
Looklet's implementation at Stockmann yielded positive results across key metrics such as speed and cost. The partnership not only generates significant cost savings but also helps Stockmann show almost 100% in-warehouse items online, and if needed, as little as 6 hrs from shooting the product to image publication online. Moreover, Looklet's robust support infrastructure ensured a smooth transition, allowing Stockmann to realize their e-commerce strategy with confidence.
1. Cost Savings
Through Looklet's innovative approach, Stockmann achieved remarkable cost efficiencies, enabling them to allocate resources strategically and drive further growth.
"Looklet has revolutionized our cost structure, allowing us to significantly reduce expenses per item. This has freed up resources that we can now invest in other strategic areas of our business."
Heidi elaborates on how she sees Looklet as cost-effective in the market:
“Based on the market, I would say Looklet is really cost-efficient. If you are shooting traditional on-model or outsourcing photo production, the price for one product will consider all the rental fees, employee fees, models, photographers, hair and make-up, etc. Considering this, Looklet remains really low for one product. You get several images and model rights added to the list; it's a big package you get for the price.”
2. Speed/Time-to-Market
Looklet's streamlined workflow empowered Stockmann to meet the demands of the modern consumer, delivering fresh product listings to their online store quickly. Heidi speaks on challenges facing the industry at large:
“In image production, the biggest challenge today is achieving the fastest workflow to get the data online. Our biggest challenge is to get items online as fast as possible.”
Looklet requires only 1-2 people to operate allowing both increased speed and risk reduction:
“Workflow efficiency is the key and it has to be as smooth as possible. It’s good to have less people involved in the workflow because if the team grows too big, then we have too many different links that could have a human error inside. And it would create a stalling in the production.”
3. Full Image Series
To fully show apparel products, Looklet allows Stockmann to use a full image series. Commenting on this Heidi notes that Looklet is “kind of a full package. We get the ghost image, model images, and both side angles.”
Styling a complete image series for all items in the Look Creator provides Stockmann with full control over the image output, a feature highly valued by the retailer.
“Nowadays it's really important for retailers to have that unique look on the pages and listings that Looklet is offering. It's very good to have this kind of a solution in-house because you always get the same results.”
Another positive impact of producing all images within the same solution is the seamlessly tailored and error-free naming.
"Right now, we have a system for ordering the main ghost image along with the front, back, and angled images, and it works very well without any errors.”
4. Ghost Speed and Quality Improvement
Looklet's integrated ghost capability increases Stockmann’s speed and efficiency. Before, Stockmann combined vendor images, ghost images and sometimes detail or lay-down imagery all coming from different production tools. By consolidating the capture of detail, on-model and ghost within Looklet, Stockmann achieves consistency and saves time because Looklet eliminates the need for time-consuming work to make all the images “match” before publication.
"One of Looklet's standout features is how the ghost is processed, it just comes out perfectly. Our studio stylists don’t have to spend time adjusting the garments on a millimeter level, and at the same time we don't have to manually straighten out the ghost hemlines in post-production."
5. Easier Styling with Advanced Mannequin Body
Stockmann has a studio styling team rotating between different photo sets, and they all agree that Looklet mannequins are easy to style on, Heidi's highlights: "Looklet's mannequin bodies ensure a perfect fit for our garments. Compared to other mannequins we styled on, the garments fit and stay on the mannequin better. We particularly appreciate how shirts drape nicely on the menswear pose.”
6. Simplified Workflow with Automated Post-Production
Looklet's advanced software empowers Stockmann's team to eliminate almost 100% of post-production tasks, using post only for rare cases with specific creative requirements outside the scope of typical product imagery. Eliminating steps results in lowering risks of human error in the traditional post process.
"Looklet's advanced software has simplified our workflow. The items come already as we want them in the Look Creator and we no longer need to spend extensive time on post-production work, reducing the risk associated with multiple manual steps in the process."
7. Handling Tricky Fabrics and Sharp Details with Ease
Looklet stands out from competitors by easily capturing and showing tricky fabrics like transparent or sequined apparel.
“Transparency always comes out perfect and so clean every time, I have never seen a solution that handles transparency as well as Looklet.”
Another notable benefit of Looklet's image output is its exceptional ability to display intricate details. The Looklet Studio even includes an additional handheld camera dedicated to capturing sharp details, although, as Heidi observes, the level of detail in cropped sections of model images is already more than sufficient.
“Looklet excels in detail quality. It's important to see the garment's fabric and texture accurately on the website, and Looklet does this better than many supplier images I've seen. After the update for higher resolution images, the quality is even better.”
Looklet: Company Highlights
Customer Support
Stockmann benefits from Looklet's dedicated support team, who offer personalized assistance and expert guidance at every stage of their journey, making for a strong and enduring partnership. Looklet’s in-house support team is responsive and deeply knowledgeable about the product and strives to provide best-in-class customer support.
“We always get instant responses when creating tickets in the system and the support team is also able to visit on-site if needed. I think it's kind of a perfect service.”
Training and R&D
Looklet's ongoing investment in research and development empowers Stockmann to stay competitive in the fashion industry, ensuring they remain agile and adaptable in the face of evolving trends in fashion photography.
"Training with Looklet is straightforward, thanks to extensive online resources and guides. Furthermore, Looklet's commitment to research and development ensures that we stay ahead of the curve in terms of innovation. As an example of this, we already have a few AI generated models in use that cannot be distinguished from Looklet's human models."
Advocacy: What Stockmann Would Tell Curious Retailers & Brands
We asked Heidi to comment on which type of retailers or brands he thinks would most benefit from using Looklet in their photo production workflow and the value it might give them: “Any retailer selling fashion and accessories products online. They could get all the items shot in-house efficiently and get it online as soon as possible.”
With this in mind, she enthusiastically recommends Looklet to retailers and brands seeking to enhance their online presence, image quality and speed up their product imagery workflow. She also notes that studio service providers could also benefit from offering Looklet as a solution for their clients’ imagery and workflow.
Looklet remains committed to empowering retailers like Stockmann with advanced e-commerce image production solutions. With our shared dedication to excellence and ongoing improvement, we look forward to shaping the future of fashion retail together. For more information on partnering with Looklet, email business@looklet.com.
Learn more about Looklet:
- Product Overview (Video)
- Find your perfect Looklet fit (Article)
- Item Reviewer - production monitoring tool (Video)
- Model Portfolios
- Looklet Dressing Room (Interactive Demo)
Find more articles like this on our Customer Case Studies page.
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