River Island

River Island

River Island is a British male and female clothes wear company with over 250 stores operating in the United Kingdom, Republic Of Ireland, Poland, the Netherlands, Turkey, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Singapore and Cyprus. A leader in casual fashion, River Island was set up in 1948, by Bernard Lewis in a small store in London branded Lewis Separates. Lewis Separates has since gone through several name changes before becoming River Island in 1989.
With over 50 years of fashion retailing experience, River Island is one of the largest and most successful privately owned companies, designing nearly everything they sell, ensuring that their products have a unique appeal on the high street.

Purpose

River Island.com's virtual store is a Business-to-consumer(B2C) model. It reaches consumers all over the world, aiming to showcase their entire collection through their catalogue, even in countries without River Island outlets. Also, consumers would be able to purchase pieces which may not be available at outlets in their own country, and may even enjoy greater savings by purchasing online.

Features

One of the unique features of riverisland.com is that the website helps people “get the latest look”. Under both the women’s and men’s tabs there is an category available that helps people find the look that the want be it street couture, film noir bar wear or film noir masculine for the women or brit mod, rock ‘n’ Rolla or bright young things for the men and so on. They have many different styles that shoppers can model their own look against and are essential for the shoppers who want to piece together a look but find it hard to decide which items they want.

Another feature of riverisland.com is its jeans selector tab available under the women’s jeans category. This allows shoppers to choose the type of jean cut they want such as bootleg, skinny, cropped or straight. The type of look they want whether it’s clean, worn or decorated as well as the length and size of their jeans. This helps shoppers zero in on the designs that they prefer.

Design

A very important aspect when it comes to shopping online is the design of the store’s website. The main page of the river island’s webpage gives shoppers a holistic look at what riverisland.com has to offer. The top bar has three tabs to choose from namely women, men and info while the bar at the bottom has seven tabs which are home, my account, search, size guide, store locator, email sign-up and help. These tabs provide shoppers with easy navigation of the website as everything a shopper might need is already listed out on a single page.

Riverisland.com categorizes their clothes into many different categories such as just arrived, tops, dresses, jeans, footwear, accessories and so on. This lets shoppers have easy access to what they’re looking for. The layouts for the clothes are neatly arranged in rows therefore making the website uncluttered for stress-free navigation. Clicking on any individual item lets shoppers know the price, product number, washing instructions, colour and sizes available as well as other pieces which might help to “create the look”.


Customization and Benefits Online

- ‘just right’ size guide


The size guide provided enables consumer to ensure the clothing they wish to purchase is of the right size. The sizes can be measured using a measuring tape, either by centimeters or inches. The method to measure the ‘just right’ size is also provided. This is a very important guide as consumers who purchase online will find it inconvenient and a chore to change the clothing they bought.

- ‘cool zoom’ function

Any small details or design of the clothing can be magnified by moving the cursor around the clothing. This function is able to highlight all parts of the clothing so that the consumer is able to observe the finest details of the workmanship of the designer.

-‘create the look’ feature

Suggestions of a wholesome look is provided. For example, if you select a shirt, matching jacket, jeans, and shoes will be provided to you as a reference.

- ‘reverse view’ feature

If necessary or when the back of a clothing have a special design, or cutting, then the reverse view of the clothing is provided to allow consumer to admire the designer’s work.- ‘information blast’ feature

Once you click on the clothing you like, information such as materials of the clothing, advise on washing and ironing of the clothing, colours and sizes available of the clothing are clearly presented for your reference.

Payment & Security

Making payment on the site is a breeze. Upon selection of desired items into "your bag", you would be directed to "your shopping bag" where you would then check out your items.

New customers would then be required to do a simple sign-up.
Upon successful sing-up, consumers can choose the shipping options and make payment using either VISA or MasterCard.

Strengths

River Island's target consumers are teens and working adults, who are IT savvy and enjoy the ease of shopping online. Therefore, they market their products based on hip and creative ideas. The video below shows their creativity and quirkiness.

River Island Promotion Video
The website is well designed, with attractive colours and appealing pictures. It categorises their products into "Women" and "Men", with sub categories like "just arrived", "tops", etc. Consumers are also able to view pictures of their products in different views, zooming in and out.

Weaknesses

- ‘how much is it?’

The prices shown are only in ‘Pounds’. Options to select consumer’s currency will enable people to decide better and to make comparisons better.

-‘no human touch’


Lack of models’ pictures to carry out the best qualities of the clothing.

- locked view’

No ‘view all’ option to allow for a quick browse. Consumer can only view 3-8 pieces of clothing at one go. This will pose a problem if consumer wish to compare two clothing from different pages.

- low loading time’

It takes approximately 10 seconds to fully load from one page to another throughout the website.

- delivery details vague’


It is stated 3-5 days for a normal postage delivery. However, the exact time is not provided. Thus it will be difficult to wait for the parcel if consumers have to attend school or work.