Polaris, Shopatron combo leads to e-commerce growth
Successful U.S. launch expands into Canada
As the Internet rattles traditional retail business and successively gives consumers control across verticals, global leaders in the industry like Polaris, BRP, Suzuki, Kawasaki and Ducati have responded with strategic investments in Shopatron’s inventory visibility and fulfillment solutions, placing buyers in the driver’s seat. The bold new business model disrupts the path to purchase and simultaneously strengthens dealer relationships, pushing the automotive and vehicle industries further into the digital frontier.
Shopatron Manufacturer is the only technology that allows trailblazers like Polaris Industries to elevate its e-commerce website as a direct sales channel that delivers orders to authorized dealers for fulfillment.
Polaris made its first move to share inventory across retail and e-commerce at the end of 2012 with the PG&A catalogs from its snowmobiles, ATV, ORV, GEM, Victory Motorcycles and Indian Motorcycles collections — comprised of over 5,000 products.
By June 2013, Shopatron integrated its patented Order Exchange with the Polaris e-commerce site, a platform where Polaris now shares online orders with over 300 active fulfillment partners. The partnership has grown Polaris’ online sales 13 percent from Q1 2013 to Q2 2014.
In light of the success, earlier this year Polaris released its Generator line onto the ship-from-store solution, and expanded the retail-integrated e-commerce initiative into Canada, where the online store shares orders with more than 50 dealers and growing. Eventually, the brand may hand over even more to its dealers. With Shopatron, Polaris can turn on in-store pickup and share its customer relationships too, driving buyers into stores to pick up online orders.
“Polaris customers increasingly research and comparison shop privately online,” said Libby Mura, e-commerce, marketing & sales director of the Parts, Apparel and Accessories division at Polaris Industries. “Our desire to thoroughly occupy the online space where more and more vehicle and accessorizing selection is happening sparked our interest in Shopatron, and through it, we have achieved a dealership buying experience that is a convenient, effortless transition from online.”
“Our saturation in powersports and the automotive aftermarket signals the ubiquity of e-commerce,” said Shopatron founder and CEO, Ed Stevens. “We’re ushering in a new era where progressive order routing technology will give consumers the ability to shop online for any new vehicle, because with Shopatron, manufacturers don’t circumvent dealers.”
Shopatron’s intelligent order routing logic will allow brands to prioritize fulfillment with filters and rules that can, for instance, automatically route orders originating in a specific area to assigned dealers to comply with the brands’ territory policies and best practices.
“Shopatron powersports clients have proven to be market leaders, anticipating the industry shift toward consumer-brand relationships by investing in new sales channels that support evolving customer needs,” Stevens said. “These brands are certainly paving the way for the automotive industry, who we believe will leverage similar technologies to unite dealers and manufacturers online in the future.”
Total same store sales revenue for powersports brands with Shopatron increased 23 percent in Q1 2014, year over year. There are approximately 50 powersports brands deployed on Shopatron that partner with more than 2,000 powersports dealers on the Shopatron network to fulfill orders.
