Shop Direct cleans up at technology awards

Shop Direct swept the board at last night’s BT Retail Week Technology Awards, taking home a total of four awards, including the overall Grand Prix winner of winners trophy.

The awards were celebrated at a glamorous ceremony at the Hilton Hotel, Park Lane on 11th June 2014. Run by Retail Week and judged by retailers, the BT Retail Week Technology Awards are designed to showcase the ways that cutting edge technology is shaping retail, improving the customer experience and driving profits. 

The award for ‘Best IT operations’ recognised the cross-functional work that Shop Direct delivered to enhance the stability of its websites and ensure they remained open for business during peak 2013. The project helped the etailer to reach 99.99% site availability in the run-up to Christmas, its busiest time of year.

The ‘Supply chain and fulfilment excellence’ trophy was awarded to Shop Direct and its two-man delivery partner Arrow XL for Delight, a joint initiative that has provided customers with a broad range of speedy delivery options across all large products. 

The award for ‘Payment project of the year’ acknowledged Shop Direct��s collaboration with partners Serco, ATS and Aeriandi to ensure the etailer was geared up for the introduction of security standard PCI DSS.

Of the overall Grand Prix winner of winners award, Retail Week said: “Shop Direct’s technology has been hitting the headlines for all the right reasons in the past few months. It is well on its way in its quest to becoming a world-class digital retailer within three to five years, and has been working on everything from payment to user experience and innovation. The etailer is a worthy winner of the overall prize.” 

Andy Wolfe, CIO at Shop Direct, said: “As we approach the end of year one of our strategy to transform into a world class digital retailer, the work our teams are doing and the investments we’re making in the business are beginning to paying dividends.

“Technology and innovation of course will play a major part in getting us to world class and we’ve made huge progress on that front over the last year. These awards are a fantastic acknowledgment of the fact that we’re on the right track and I couldn’t be more thrilled for both our team and our partners.”