Algolia Helps Co-op Overcome Pandemic-Driven Online Demand

Algolia, the leading API Platform for Search & Discovery, announced that Co-operative Group (the Co-op), one of the United Kingdom’s largest food retailers with more than 2,500 local, convenience, and mid-sized grocery stores and 65,000 employees, has implemented its search and recommendation products enabling Co-op to rapidly scale its online food shopping experience and differentiate its offering.

“Like many businesses, Covid-19 forced us to reevaluate our online presence and build an expanded digital infrastructure coupled with an innovative delivery system”

By using the Algolia Search & Discovery platform, Co-op enables shoppers to make purchases online that are delivered to their homes with rapid delivery options including same-day delivery or a “click-and-collect” service for in-store pick-up. By introducing this new approach implementing Algolia Recommend, Co-op increased conversion rates by 39%, saw 45% growth in customer orders as additional items were added to shopping baskets, and improved overall customer experience. With a hybrid shopping experience – basically an in-store and online experience – Co-op offered their customers a safe and convenient method to shop during a time when Covid-related restrictions on consumer movements were in place. Co-op’s hybrid shopping approach also attracted new customers, who enjoyed the new delivery choices. “Like many businesses, Covid-19 forced us to reevaluate our online presence and build an expanded digital infrastructure coupled with an innovative delivery system,” said Gareth Cottiss, e-commerce development manager at Co-op Food. “Working with Algolia allowed us to improve and scale the online customer experience quickly. Importantly, it enabled us to serve a wide array of customers’ needs through our e-commerce platform, as well as operate more efficiently with our partners, such as Deliveroo and Amazon, who offered same-day, hyper-local, immediate delivery on top of our own store-pick-up.” Also Read: 70% of Consumers Receive Mistargeted Information from Brands at Least Once a Month The pandemic created another problem – retailers across the country experienced supply chain issues and product shortages. To ensure a good customer experience, it was critical that Co-op only offered items that were available in local stores. With Algolia’s blazing fast indexing and hyper-localization capability, Co-op was able to instantly update their website and provide a robust, accurate search experience, ensuring customers are only offered what is available in individual stores or offered alternatives. This ability to recommend suitable alternatives for out-of-stock items ensured that customers stayed with the retailer rather than bouncing to competitor sites. Cottiss also noted: “Additionally, we were able to further fine-tune consumers’ search experience using Algolia’s artificial intelligence (AI)-powered Dynamic Re-Ranking ensuring we serve up the most relevant search results for our customers. We also use Algolia Recommend to further boost engagement through AI-powered carousels that feature relevant content for online shoppers to discover new items or special offers.”