Web shopping giant Coolblue will start delivering televisions itself and installing them at the customer's home from next month. Previously, it only did so with white goods. "You can only deliver televisions to the front door, but that doesn't make customers particularly happy," said ceo Pieter Zwart.
Coolblue yesterday published its 2017 annual figures and answered questions from viewers in a live video. In it, Zwart revealed that from next month, Coolblue will expand its delivery service to include the "TV delivery street". "We don't deliver it to your front door, we also bring it into your home and we install it. That's nice, because televisions are big." Black continues: "It seems like something futile, but believe me: it's a huge process, with dozens of vans and hundreds of delivery people."
Detailed tracking
Asked when Coolblue will start offering detailed tracking, Zwart says: "On the one hand, you want to be able to offer consumers as detailed information as possible. On the other hand, you don't want to inform them of every intermediate step, because then it just becomes irritating." This is a very thin line, argues the 'Start boss'. Currently, there are four to six contact moments between the time of ordering and the time of arrival. Some customers would already find that too much. "So we are still struggling a bit with that. But I don't rule out that we are preparing quite clever things for that."
All-round parcel deliverer
'Does Coolblue have the ambition to become an all-round parcel delivery company?" reads a question. To that, Zwart would not immediately answer 'no'. This does require a high stop density. "Otherwise it is simply too expensive. But when we grow up later I would think it would be cool to just do that with real Coolblue people, with those smiles and everything that comes with it."
Order now, home in an hour
Same-day delivery is indeed relevant, according to Zwart. "But what is even more relevant is that you give customers much better control over when and where." Speed is important here, but above all precision. Zwart argues that super-fast delivery can also be very interesting. "Like with pizza: order now, home in an hour. That obviously doesn't work in very small places, but theoretically you could think about it. Near shops. Ultimately, it can be done with a pizza too, or with a pokébowl, so why couldn't it be done with an iPhone?"
