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Wigan Athletic FC Level Up Retail via Digital Transformation

Wed, 10 Jan 2024 20:32:34 GMT

Wigan Athletic Football Club have recently undergone a digital transformation using ClearCourse Sports solutions.

Hear head of retail at Wigan Athletic FC, Sam Swanton, talk about the Club’s journey, his experience of the retail overhaul, how the channels work together to enhance the fans’ experience, the results and what this means for the future.

About Wigan Athletic Football Club

Affectionately known as Latics, inspired by the local pronunciation of the name, Wigan Athletic Football Club was established in 1932 and made a name for themselves in non-league football before their election to the Football League in 1978. Wigan went on to move through the Football League and enjoyed eight Premier League seasons and an FA cup win.

Wigan Athletic’s Retail Tech Upgrade

Wigan switched to TRIMS, ClearCourse Sports’ back office designed to expertly handle fashion retail needs, in 2019. Last year, they upgraded their EPOS, introduced integrated payments, and launched their own-branded fan loyalty app – all using ClearCourse Sports solutions. Most recently, they have added ClearCourse Sports ecommerce to their tech stack which went live last October. Sam commented, “we looked at massively upgrading our retail systems... ClearCourse Sports had a much better way of integrating everything under one umbrella”.

EPOS & Payments

Cygnus EPOS with ClearAccept payments offers the club speedy in-store transactions with simple reconciliation and reporting, whilst seamlessly integrating with their other sales channels and back office. With Clearcourse Sports Kit Builder , Cygnus EPOS offers Wigan fans professional kit personalisation in-store and online.

Fan Loyalty App

Wigan’s new Latics Loyalty App is powered by FUSE; our fully customisable customer loyalty app . It houses loyalty accounts, point balances, alongside their ecommerce website and a news feed. Wigan can now build on their fan engagement by rewarding purchases and specific behaviour. The app also enables mobile push notifications to registered users to alert them of events, special offers, new product launches and exclusive app user updates, e.g., new kit reveals.

Ecommerce

Switching their ecommerce to ClearCourse Sports has enabled the Club’s digital transformation. It has allowed the use of online loyalty rewards and discounts to drive sales revenue. Operational efficiencies are also gained through the automation of previously manual ecommerce tasks, meaning the Club can provide an improved fan experience. “It's great - the whole process of doing an app notification through FUSE, to log on to our online site through ClearCourse Sports and then to see the sales come through onto TRIMS... you see how each digital variation works” Sam added.

Wigan doubled their sales percentage online in the first month after launching the new ecommerce site. They were averaging 23 to 25% of total sales coming from their website. This rose to 49% one month after launch and continues to rise.

Sam summarised his experience of the digital transformation process:

“The process of the transformation - I don't want to say the word easy or seamless - but it was. We initially launched Cygnus EPOS which was key to capturing all the data that we were so data poor with for the last 4 years. Soon after that, the FUSE app came in and then later the online (ecommerce) system. For me, that was the catalyst for the whole change. We really wanted to make sure that we had everything covered. Lee and Chris at ClearCourse did everything that they could to make sure that it was smooth as possible.”

The Future of Retail at Wigan Athletic FC

Looking towards the future of the Club, Sam remarked:

“Externally, the digital world is evolving, it always will evolve, and I think we have a platform and a company that we're working with that can keep up with those changes. I have every faith in ClearCourse to tell us whenever there's an upgrade or a system that could be integrated into ours.

“We have aspirations of our own, and we want everything off the pitch to match those aspirations on the pitch. Retail is a massive part of that. We have certain milestones that we need to hit, and I truly believe that under ClearCourse's guidance, there's no reason why we can't do that in the future.”

Catch Us at Bramall Lane Football & Rugby Business Networking Event

Tue, 14 Feb 2023 13:55:18 GMT

Join us at Bramall Lane, Sheffield, on Thursday 23rd March for the Football Trade Directory’s Business Networking event.

The event is the first of three this year. Organised by the Football Trade Directory, the day is designed to bring together like-minded individuals from professional football clubs and rugby clubs in an informal and friendly atmosphere.

Hosted at the home of Sheffield United, the event helps clubs find businesses and suppliers to drive their growth and give their fans the best experience possible. The Football Trade Directory have coordinated these types of events for over a decade and have seen long lasting business relationships develop as a direct result.

Our sports solution lead, Lee Hyde, will be on-hand to introduce you to everything that ClearCourse Sports has to offer. From comprehensive stock management and rapid order fulfilment to cutting-edge EPOS and world-class fan engagement.

Where

Bramall Lane, Highfield, Sheffield, S2 4SU

When

10:30am – 3pm Thursday 23rd March 2023

How to register

If you would like to attend or find out more about the upcoming networking events, you can register your free delegate place via the Football Trade Directory .

ClearCourse are Racing the Thames!

Mon, 30 Jan 2023 09:10:46 GMT

The race is on as 160 Clearcoursers are taking part in this year’s Race the Thames to raise money for deserving causes.

Race the Thames 2023

Alongside 19 other teams from across the ClearCourse Group, plus countless more from around the UK, our team will virtually race the length of the river Thames. That is a grand total of 346km (215 miles) split between eight – no mean feat!

Competitors can get their mileage done anywhere via a range of activities; from rowing, running and cycling to more unusual methods using pogo sticks and space hoppers. The race begins on Friday 27 ^th January at 3pm and ends a week later (or when every team has reached the estuary).

Vital Fundraising

As well as being a fun competition to help us get fit in January, the race exists to help raise funds for fantastic causes. It is organised by London Youth Rowing, a charity committed to providing enriching opportunities for young people in several locations across the UK. Their mission is to:

Encourage disadvantaged young people to be active, and improve their physical, social and mental wellbeing
Help develop crucial life skills, which are necessary for success in the classroom and the workplace
Enable young people to participate in the unique sport, regardless of background, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, disability or ability
Nurture determination and success in a new generation

Along with raising funds for London Youth Rowing, our team will also be supporting Breast Cancer Now, Rowans Hospice, Katharine House Hospice and Macmillan Cancer Support.

You can join us on our journey by donating to our team’s fundraising page .

We wish everyone the best of luck!

Thinking of Switching Retail Platforms in Time for the New Football Season?

Thu, 12 Jan 2023 22:07:03 GMT

If you are considering migrating your retail system to a new provider before the start of the football season this summer but have reservations about how long it could take and how much work it could generate, read on to find out what is involved and when you need to get started.

We caught up with Lee Hyde, Sports Solution Lead at ClearCourse Sports, to answer some common questions around switching retail platforms.

What could migrating our exi sting platform to the ClearCourse Sports solution achieve for our club operations?

“Switching your existing legacy platform to the ClearCourse Sports solution would give you access to our market-leading software, allowing your club to drive revenues, automate existing manual processes and increase efficiency throughout your operations and delivery teams. We know that many legacy solutions lack the functionality, efficiencies and speed required to maintain a modern-day, slick, business unit.

“System performance and user experience are two of our many priorities within ClearCourse Sports. Our feature-rich spec is built specifically for the sports and stadium environment and contains everything needed to drive your business growth. Whether it’s inventory control solutions which are built for true merchandisers, our vast reporting suite which has been developed to ensure you don’t waste time running various reports to get the figures you need, or our market-leading eCommerce solution which will elevate your digital shop front and user experience, ClearCourse Sports is developed with a forward-thinking and future-proofed strategy to ensure you will always have the exact tools you need to maximise your use of software.”

If we want to implement ClearCourse Sports ahead of the new season, when do I need to be making final decision s?

“Ideally, ASAP. We’ve already been working with clients for a couple of months on projects which are to be delivered in between the current season finishing and the new season starting.

“As a guide, we usually forecast 16-weeks from contract and sales order signatures to delivery of a full project. We don’t like to quote less than this as we want to ensure that we’re not pressuring any of the standard process in delivering a platform migration.

“Naturally, each project is unique so there may be a small amount of timesaving from one project to another but it’s always advisable to work on our standard quoted lead-times. Given that the initial stages of setting up product demonstrations, working sessions and providing full project estimates can also add to this timescale, we’d advise anybody seriously considering a migration to get in touch immediately!”

Is there still time to migrate before our major peak of kit launch, ahead of the new 2023/24 season?

“This would depend on a number of factors, with the most important being speed! If you’re able to commence exploratory calls and meetings where we can learn about your project, advise you on our solution and give you a product demonstration within a very short timescale, we’d ultimately maximise the amount of time ahead of your peak to be able to agree and deliver the project.

“The timing of your kit launches is also key to this discussion. If these are fluid and can be dictated by the timelines of the project, all the better. If the launches are already planned in and can’t be moved, we would need to assess our critical path for project delivery and we’d have to guide you on some very narrow windows for meetings, discussions and ultimately signing off the project to ensure we could work to your timescales. We would always be transparent with you and inform you if we reached a point where we could no longer guarantee a go-live ahead of kit launches. However, it would be our target to ensure you can launch your new kits with a bang on our ClearCourse Sports platform to allow you could capitalise on boosting sales with our extensive functionality and performance.”

What would the process i nvolve?

“As with all our clients, we’d want to understand your club’s operation and ensure that your solution is tailored to your exact requirements. Our modular approach allows us to be able to offer a full suite of software solutions or a number of our modules which integrate into other 3 ^rd party software platforms used throughout the club. We’d start our process by exploring what is in place currently and what you’re looking to achieve with our solution.

“Once we’ve completed the exploratory process, we’d provide a full demonstration of our products and compile a suggested approach in terms of the elements of the ClearCourse Sports solution that we feel would best suit your requirements and ambitions. This would be provided with a full commercial estimate for the project, including any CAPEX value and monthly OPEX SaaS fees.

“We’d be on hand to answer any follow-up questions that your team would have and give you all of the information needed in terms of making a decision on the project. As we’d be working to tight timescales, we’d likely provide a deadline date that we’d need a decision made by and a signed-off agreement in place by in order to achieve the go-live dates driven by your business requirements. This isn’t a sales tactic; we don’t believe in those – our software speaks for itself. It’s us being transparent and setting realistic expectations from the very start.

“Upon deciding that you’d like to migrate to our platform, we would pull together our project team, including highly qualified senior project managers, account managers and key points of contact. We’d start with a “kick off” call with your appointed project team and key decision makers and start guiding you on our project journey and timescales. We’d have very regular communication with you and plan in a weekly progress call throughout the project to ensure we’re making the necessary progress throughout.

“As go-live approaches we will carry out the final testing, full training and sign-off, before standing by your side through the go-live process. We’d have on-site support to ensure a faultless start to life on our solution. Once settled and confidently operational, the projects team would hand over to your regular account management contact (who will have been involved throughout the project phase) and our excellent in-house dedicated support team.”

Would this create lots of extra work for our team?

“Naturally, when delivering a collaborative project there will be an element of undertaking required from the Club staff resource. However, through effective and efficient project management, we will guide the key stakeholders through every step of the project and focus their attention on the key tasks and decisions. This is mostly from a user testing perspective to ensure we’re providing the solution which has been scoped and this operates in the way the Club require. We can help your team plan their time and even guide on how many hours of staff resource are likely needed for each given task.

“You will receive a project timeline showing which weeks of the project we’d need club staff to spend a little time on related tasks so that this can be planned in well ahead of the requirements.

“It’s our aim to make the platform migration as stress-free and unintrusive as possible, allowing your team to focus on their continuing day to day roles.”

Wo uld we lose everything we have in our current system, and would the fans be impacted?

“In a word, no. This is somewhat dependent upon the existing legacy system that is in place and the data contained within it. It’s highly likely that we would be able to take a full data extract from your existing solution and use this as a starting point for product setup, fan account data and historical sales records. This is often a great time to cleanse existing data and tidy up the information within the system with a spot of housekeeping, prior to us importing this into the ClearCourse Sports platform.

“In some cases, we’re even able to import your existing fan accounts and passwords. This ensures there is no loss of fan accounts and no requirement for fans to re-register, with the risk of some not carrying out this step and the subsequent shrinking of your available data pool.

“Our aim would be to retain as much of your historical sales, product and fan account data as you wish.”

W ant to know more?

Read the in-depth feature article from the October 2022 edition of fcbusiness, page 26: A New Era in Stadia Commerce Solutions .

If you are dreaming of a new retail system in time for the season kick off, get in touch today .

POS worthy of the Premier League

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 17:59:44 GMT

Our cutting-edge POS has been catching the eye of major football clubs over the past few months and we examine why.

The challenges of recent years have been a catalyst for change and made clubs re-evaluate their retail offering. Fans expect clubs to deliver the omnichannel experience and deliver it fast. ClearCourse Sports POS is all about speed and customer-centricity, and so adapts well to the changing needs of sports club retail.

ClearCourse Sports POS features

Our knowledge and expertise in the sports sector have driven the development of our latest POS software. We want our clubs to be able to delight customers at the checkout.

That means a fast, efficient transaction with the fans’ best interest at its core. This is achieved in a number of ways:

Speed – lightning-fast transaction processing
Synchronisation – all touchpoints update instantly for live reporting and analysis
Capacity – comfortably handles thousands of transactions per second
Promotion intelligence – fans get the best deal possible from their rewards
Cross-channel purchase history – a single customer view
Kit Builder – processes custom shirt printing requirements
Match Day Mode – even more efficient transactions for increased sales throughput
Customer-facing media – inspire fans at the point of sale
Integrated Loyalty App – reward wallets, receipts and targeted offers
Integrated payments – powered by ClearAccept

What impact does this have on football club retail?

We built ClearCourse Sports POS to improve the fan experience by making it fast and simple for your retail team to use. Transaction processing time is reduced by minimising the number of taps needed, making the interface aesthetically uncomplicated and streamlining our software.

As well as speed, we worked on presenting in-store fans with the best deal possible. Our POS has the ability to combine all current discounts and offers in a way that means the fan pays the least. This feature puts fans first and conveys honesty and integrity from the club, leaving fans feeling good about their purchase.

The till software can also show fans’ loyalty scheme balances and rewards from cross-channel purchase history. This links online and in-store purchases against a single customer account, creating a single view of buying behaviour.

Your fans’ retail experience doesn’t start and end at the till. That’s why our POS integrates with our mobile loyalty app module. The two synchronise reward wallets, purchase history, email receipts and other customer information, as well as any promotional incentives. The POS and app duo drives the omnichannel experience and adds to the thorough record of customer behaviour. Football clubs can gain insights from this complete picture and act on them to enhance their fans’ journey, loyalty and retail revenue.

Ultimately, ClearCourse Sports POS gives our clubs the power to delight their fans at every touchpoint.

Warrington Wolves choose ClearAccept integrated payments

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 17:59:43 GMT

Following the launch of their online store (fully integrated with their ClearCourse Sports retail system), Warrington Wolves upgraded their payments solution to ClearAccept.

Warrington Wolves have taken another step to future-proof their retail operations by choosing our new integrated payments solution powered by ClearAccept .

Like us, ClearAccept are retail technology specialists within the ClearCourse Group. We have collaborated with their industry experts to integrate our sports retail solutions with their payments system to bring our clients a seamless experience.

What do integrated payments mean for Warrington Wolves?

With ClearAccept , Warrington Wolves’ card machines integrate with their retail system at setup, and reconcile with their other pay ment channels.

“ClearAccept were extremely helpful during the application and instalment process. Moving to integrated payments has not only improved our customer service, with a considerably quicker card payment, but also reduced the risk of manual errors when taking payment.

"The ClearAccept online portal is very useful, enabling us to quickly find and resolve any payment issues that may occur. Technical support and account management are of a very high standard, giving us the reassurance there is someone at the end of the phone if any issues should arise.

"I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend ClearAccept.”

Head of Retail, Warrington Wolves

Match Day Mode: A retail game-changer

Fri, 25 Nov 2022 17:59:41 GMT

Minimise transaction times, maximise your fans’ experience.

Match Day Mode is a profile feature designed to optimise transaction throughput at peak trading times.

Accelerate stadium transactions

On match days, stadium venues need to process high volumes of sales within a short period of time. This often leads to pressure on your retail team and your fans having to wait in a queue to spend with you. The logic is simple, the faster you can process a sale, the happier your fans and team are, and the more sales you are able to make.

ClearCourse Sports POS is one of the fastest available, and we have made it even speedier by creating the Match Day Mode profile.

How does match day mode work?

Profiles allow various POS functionality to be activated or stripped out to suit the occasion, helping you process transactions even faster at busy times. Typically, a match day profile will save a significant amount of time by doing the following:

Stripping out the e-receipt feature – this feature requires entry of an email address, something that will cause delays when trying to maximise sales throughput in a short period of time. The Match Day Mode profile temporarily disables this whilst still allowing for the scanning of club loyalty or membership data. This ensures all transactional data remains tagged to the customer record with a quick scan of a barcode.
Keeping the POS logged in at the end of a transaction – the same cashier is more than likely to own one sales terminal throughout peak trading, so it makes sense to keep them logged in at the end of a transaction to increase sale throughput. It is far easier to logout once leaving the terminal, rather than login before every transaction.

These two simple settings can make a big impact on transaction times.

We know that different stadium venues have different requirements. Therefore, the Match Day Mode profile is configurable, and you can even create multiple versions to suit the event.