Discount Retail Chain Action (owned by 3i Group) has started a pilot with a webshop in the Netherlands, a spokesperson confirms after reporting by trade website RetailTrends. The chain offers five to seven products in its online store that are purchased especially for this purpose. There are also no plans to sell the items for sale in the store online.
The trial is now in its third week and will run until the end of this year. Based on the results, the retail chain determines whether it wants to continue with the online formula.
Action held off for a long time, because the small margins make it difficult to sell products at low prices and also deliver to home. But due to successful click-and-collect experiments during the corona crisis, where customers could order products online and pick them up in store, the discounter has reconsidered its online plans.
And from that came the idea to start a webshop with products that you cannot find in the store. In any case, the products are delivered to your home for an extra amount of €3.99 (US$4.8). At the moment, however, there are temporary products for sale from the store, but only in large volumes. This is because not all ordered products have arrived yet, says the spokesperson.
It is not the intention that the entire store range will be sold online, not even in the longer term. CEO Sander van der Laan said earlier in conversation with NU.nl that for Action it is "until now not necessary to sell stuff online". "It is also damn difficult to get a product that costs €1.50 (US$1.8) excluding VAT at the customer's home without loss."
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