I recently attended a break-out session at the National Retail Federation’s Annual Big Show in NYC.  In this session, Laura Wade-Gery, CEO of Tesco.com and Direct, spoke on Tesco’s strategy for cross-channel retailing success.  Not surprisingly, the discussion spent little time on technologies that enabled a connected enterprise execution for cross-channel retailing.  Instead she focused on how organizational alignment of Tesco’s traditional stores business with its eCommerce business was their primary tool for success. 

Early on in the growth of the the Web business, Tesco took a thoughtful approach to eCommerce that included incentivizing stores to participate actively in the success of the eCommerce business.  This included in some cases internal double-counting of revenue to ensure the stores would continue their focus on customer service even for Web-based orders.  Additionally, Tesco rightly re-used their competitive advantage in the supply chain and superior store infrastructure to fulfill Web orders directly in the aisles of Tesco stores. 

What is striking is that both of the ideas above are inherently logical when an organization considers the eCommerce business to be an important component of an overall strategy.  When retailers do this they tend to make decisions with the customer in mind rather than the expediency of internal politics or existing enterprise systems.