2023-10-13 08:16:53
Now that Wehkamp charges 50 cents per returned item, the online store receives five thousand fewer products per day. This discourages customers from ordering and returning many items. The next step: having it delivered to your home will be more expensive than at a parcel point.
It is a thorn in the side of online stores that customers order multiple sizes and colors and therefore send a lot of items back. Until recently, returns were free for customers at many stores, but the unpacking and inspection work does entail a lot of costs for stores. Wehkamp introduced return costs in April this year, as did H&M, Zara and WE Fashion, among others.
At Wehkamp, 50,000 items were returned every day, says marketing director Heleen Janssen. “Since the introduction of return costs in April, there have been 10 percent fewer, so approximately 45,000. On an annual basis, this saves 1.5 million returned items. That is huge! Customers order fewer different sizes or different colors.”
The amount per item makes it less attractive to order and return a lot. That was necessary. Janssen discusses an example of a small customer group using someone with the fictitious name Gerda. For example, they order for 6,500 euros and return 85 percent of the 140 items.
“You want to get rid of that small club of these Gerdas, who order more than a hundred items and send most of them back. They now order elsewhere and we are not sad regarding that,” says Janssen.
“We naturally want to retain other customers, but we do want to encourage them to be more aware of what they put in their shopping cart. This now seems to be possible with a small amount per returned item.”
Ontvang een melding bij nieuwe berichten over de Wehkamp
Pay more for home delivery than for parcel point
Wehkamp also wants to try to have fewer buses driving back and forth unnecessarily. According to Janssen, the brakes on returns already result in fewer trips. But the online store will also encourage customers to pick up their orders at a DHL collection point by charging 50 cents for home delivery, while the parcel point remains free.
Janssen: “The vast majority of customers still have their items delivered to their home. But we noticed when we set the collection point as a standard option that suddenly twice as many people opted for this. That is 20 percent of all customers.”
The goal of the online store is to deliver more than half of the orders to a parcel point. “Then we have to make far fewer trips for delivery,” says Janssen.
“Free delivery and returns have always been a luxury. We think these new choices now make sense. Hopefully more parties will introduce return costs, so that this becomes normal. Just as it is now normal to pay money for a plastic bag.”
Less turnover, but more profit due to return costs
Janssen cannot say too much regarding the financial impact of the introduction of return costs. “We only provide figures in the annual report. But initially the turnover figures drop because someone no longer orders three but one dress. However, the actual sales only decrease slightly and it is actually a positive step in view of the profit figures.”
She also does not want to share the exact amount that customers pay for returns. But suppose that 50 cents were paid 45,000 times a day, that would generate more than 8 million euros annually.
And in addition, a lot of costs are saved when unpacking and checking the items. “We can now put those hands into other things, for example in extra service,” says Janssen.
H&M, which charges a fixed amount per return shipment, was also asked regarding its experiences. According to the clothing store chain, it is still too early to draw conclusions.
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