Revolutionizing retail analytics: Style Arcade earns G2 Leader title

Big news from our side of the screens - Style Arcade just won not one, but FOUR awards from G2.com!

In case you're not familiar with G2, it's basically the Yelp of software reviews. But what makes G2 better than other comparison sites, is that the ratings are entirely driven from user reviews. And that is what makes this win even sweeter.

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We scored Retail Analytics Leader 🥇 , Retail Intelligence High Performer and Retail Intelligence High Performer (Mid-Market) 🥈.  

And not that we should have favorites, but our award for Users Love Us… is right up there 🫶.

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Our users came out in support, and brought us all the feels in a big way:

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In light of the awards, I thought we’d take a quick look at just how Style Arcade has become key to so many of our users’ working days, months and seasons.

Ever watched Excel crash for the fifth time and thought, “I’m so tired of spreadsheets, I’m too bogged down in errors and manual work, and I’m never able to be strategic. There must be a better way!”— then that’s something you have in common with CEO & Co-Founder Michaela Wessels before Style Arcade.  I sat down with Michaela to get right down to what started this anti-spreadsheet revolution.

Why did you build Style Arcade?

Simply, we built Style Arcade for those talented buyers, planners, ecomm and marketing teams whose wants and needs we knew all too well (because we were there ourselves). Style Arcade lets users dictate their own merchandising and range planning roadmap.  It’s the ideas, innovation and timesaving that they asked for all in one app; we listen and really care about input from the people working in the industry day-to-day, and they’re ultimately the reason we succeed.

As I learned during my experience as a buyer and planner, the most important part of retailing is the product. You’ve got a great brand if the product is brilliant, and is what all your customers are coming to you for.

... if you want to understand your customer, you’ve got to find a way to understand why they love your product, and you need to the data combined with the visuals to achieve that.

What I knew then was, if you want to understand your customer at the deepest level, you’ve got to find a way to understand why they love your product, and you need to the data combined with the visuals to achieve that.

I had no way to see the impact of what was selling, and I needed that so I could be more strategic and ultimately remove all that manual work.

How did Style Arcade begin?

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It was during my first conversation with a Style Arcade co-founder that the penny dropped. They said, “Anything is possible with software. Anything.”

I thought, “If you say so! In that case, we'll build a world-leading merchandise solution that’s not only the most intelligent way to retail — but one that makes buying & planning fun again!” Realizing that we could do THAT was the most exciting part of starting Style Arcade.

Once the pandemic hit, the team hustled to produce a tool that the industry needed most at the time — which was a way to collaborate online in real time.  We launched The Range Plan that year, because the industry was in demand of visual and digital range planning.  It was a perfect storm; users were begging for it, and we were able to give them the perfect solution.

My best memory was when a user told me, “I love this so much I want to marry it!” As much as it made us laugh, it made the team so proud to hear that their efforts and passion had meant we’d created something that made users happy.  

Where is Style Arcade at now?

As well as our customer satisfaction focus, our other main goal is business impact. Recently, we did a benchmark study and analysed the performance of over 100 Style Arcade brands globally.

The results? On average these brands had all gained 8 points in gross profit in just 24 months. Not only is this significant in brand growth and longevity, but it reduces waste to create more sustainable businesses. Above and beyond the customer satisfaction, the real success is in the numbers we’re seeing.

Not only is this significant in brand growth and longevity, but it reduces waste to create more sustainable businesses.

Style Arcade was initially built as an enterprise ready solution, aka, pretty much the Rolls Royce of merchandise planning. Then we realized that there was much appeal for young brands beginning to hit that growth curve.  We needed to allow brands to grow into greater and greater sophistication, and to be able to use Style Arcade no matter what point of growth they are at.

That’s why now any brand on Shopify can be activated on Style Arcade in just one day and start benefiting from automation and expertise to help their business grow even more!

What has been key to Style Arcade’s success?

The reason why I think we’re successful is because we've all been there. I was a merchandise planner and we have some of the top talent in retail heading up our marketing, product and brand success functions. The team is highly motivated to change the industry and to break new ground for our users on a daily basis. We are our users. We lived and breathed it too, and we know that we can change the industry.

We know we’re not the sole reason brands are doubling and tripling their growth year on year (that’s thanks to your incredible products, captivating brands, and tenacious teams), but Style Arcade simply removes ANY and ALL barriers preventing brands from performing their very best.

Making the lives of merchandiser planners, buyers and ecommerce managers easier is our main goal.

We have always followed what the users want most, and it's been the reason for our success. When we let them lead us, that's when we win every day.