Wunderman Thompson Commerce Supports Delivery of Unbound Group’s New Multi-Brand Retail Platform

Wunderman Thompson Commerce, the leading global digital agency, today announces the launch of a new curated multi-brand platform for Unbound Group PLC. Working closely with Unbound Group, Wunderman Thompson Commerce has helped to scope, plan and deliver the project, including the technical implementation for the new platform and the integration into their ERP. To deliver this project, Wunderman Thompson Commerce worked in close collaboration with Mirakl, the leading global marketplace solutions provider powering the Unbound Group’s platform.

Unbound Group is the parent company for a group selling a range of brands focused on the 55+ demographic.  Building on the foundation of its current core main business, Hotter Shoes, Unbound Group will grow value through its curated, multi-brand retail platform supporting the active lifestyle of the 55+ demographic with a range of products and services. All partner brand relationships are designed to be capital light, operating a drop ship model with a fixed percentage commission payable on every sale. After a successful initial launch in July with partner brands in complementary specialist footwear categories, the Autumn Winter launch of the platform is on track to be completed this month as the Group continues to broaden its offering into apparel and other specialist footwear categories. Utilising insight driven from its loyal and growing customer base, the Group intends to expand into other relevant growth areas, including wellness, in Q4 2022 and will establish its own Unbound Group apparel range in Q2 2023.

According to Wunderman Thompson Commerce’s data, 34% of global shoppers get their inspiration from marketplaces, ahead of search engines at 31%. In fact, 55% of global shoppers said that marketplaces offer the best experience when it came to online shopping. These marketplaces range from the focused and curated to the vast and diverse, but all are part of a new wave of marketplaces launched by retailers looking to scale up their online offering by opening their doors to third-party brands. Unbound Group now has a strong digital foundation enabling it to partner seamlessly with selected third-party brands, efficiently scale product offering and support a frictionless customer experience.

Wunderman Thompson Commerce utilised the existing Hotter eCommerce platform built on HCL Commerce to power the Unbound Group platform. It was created using an extended store with a cloud integration layer which talks to the Mirakl Marketplace Platform, used for uploading products from the various third-party sellers. Working alongside Hotter and ProNavision, Wunderman Thompson Commerce provided the programme management services required to ensure the smooth delivery of the interface to Navision, which fulfils and manages Hotter orders. Additionally, they also implemented an instance of Business Central, to handle financial and back-office functions for Mirakl seller products and the production of new feeds for Business Intelligence reporting. 

A comprehensive design system, previously created by Wunderman Thompson Commerce to refresh Hotter Shoes’ new brand identity, was also used to provide Unbound Group with an enhanced customer experience, offering consistency, speed to market and efficiency in site build. Wunderman Thompson Commerce were also responsible for testing the end-to-end solution and developing a thorough test strategy encompassing the entire Mirakl, to commerce, to ERP solution.

Will Rose, from Unbound Group, commented: "With the help of Wunderman Thompson Commerce, and powered by the Mirakl solution, we can now leverage our new online platform to further understand, connect with and sell to our key target consumers on a broader and deeper basis. Our new platform is driven by the technology, expertise and ecosystem that will help us transform into a truly omnichannel brand. We look forward to seeing how the new site will go from strength to strength."

Neil Stewart, global CEO, commerce and technology at Wunderman Thompson Commerce, commented: “We are delighted to see a successful launch of Unbound Group’s new Marketplace following its soft launch in July this year. Marketplaces are one of the fastest growing areas in retail with high street retailers starting to take advantage of the growth opportunity they offer online, and we look forward to working with Unbound Group as they announce new brands and as they extend the offering to wellness later this year and clothing in 2023.”