Fressnapf growing in all channels

For Fressnapf, digitalisation is not a question of technology but of culture, company founder and proprietor Torsten Toeller and IT head and management member Benjamin Beinroth agree. It is therefore important to the retail group to develop a digital mindset among its own employees. Whereas IT specialists and marketing people tended previously to give one another a wide berth, they are now working together on exploring digital customer relationships, jokes Benjamin Beinroth. He took journalists previously attending the company's annual press conference on a tour of the fourth floor of a building in the Düsseldorf Medienhafen, where Fressnapf has created a virtual practical workshop. This currently has a staff of around 40 people; a second floor could be added if necessary with approximately 120 staff. There are no plans to relocate the company headquarters from Krefeld to Düsseldorf, stresses Torsten Toeller, but the state capital has "greater international appeal" and is thus more suitable for attracting a digitally savvy workforce.

Moving the annual press conference to Düsseldorf has already signalled that Fressnapf is focused on digital transformation, which represents a social transformation for the core of the company and with which Fressnapf intends to reinvent itself. The company wants to learn how to understand its customer data better and draw the right conclusions from it in its operations, so as to be able to establish itself as a leading platform for pet owners. The key goals for the process are a stronger customer focus, intermeshing of all customer channels and the transfer of all legacy systems (meaning the previous company software) to the cloud. Fressnapf is investing 20 to 30 mio euros per year in this - a sum that "not many can afford," comments co-director Hans-Jörg Gidlewitz pointedly. The retail group intends to launch an app, probably by the end of the year, in which the topic of pet health will probably play a particular role. Fressnapf has evidently decided from the outset not to do everything itself, but also to bring partners on board, including start-ups, large companies and insurance firms, for instance.

The sales figures from last year demonstrate that Fressnapf is gradually surrendering its caution regarding online trading. In 2019 the company grew online by 21.4 per cent to sales totalling 109 mio euros. After adding new online shops in Poland and Austria last year, it is the turn of…