Rigby & Peller prepare for their UK re-opening on 15th June. The specialist intimate apparel retail group has 9 stores in the UK – 5 in London and others in Harrogate, Bluewater, Cambridge and Guildford – and is owned by Belgian company, Van De Velde. Underlines speaks with Van De Velde CEO, Marleen Vaesen.
Will you be opening all shops (even with limited hours/days) on 15th June?
Our retail plan for Rigby & Peller has always been to follow the Government advice, which at the moment states “non-essential” retail can begin to open from 15th June. This reopening will be most likely done in a phased approach with the health and safety of both our Boutique colleagues and customers at the centre of our thinking. We are fortunate that we can call upon some of the experiences from our Rigby & Peller Boutiques in Germany.
How will you approach the reopening?
Our parent company Van De Velde have been busy during the lockdown, drawing up revised plans to support both retail and our wholesale retail partners in a number of different ways. The product design team has re-evaluated both our SS20 and AW20 collections in lingerie and swim, making sure the end consumer still has a full set of exciting products to choose from as well as helping our retail partners manage their cash flow over what is an incredibly difficult period for them. At a marketing level we have introduced a number of new initiatives such as #Shoplocal and #Thank You Hero, which will try to encourage customers to shop with us as well as recognise the heroic element of the key workers in the last few months.
Reusable face mask manufacturing in Schellebelle
On June 15, we will also will launch our Boutique Bra-vo campaign. With this campaign, customers can support their local lingerie boutiques by leaving a message for them on the brand’s Boutique Bra-vo page. After participating in the campaign, customers will receive a €10 discount voucher which they can redeem at their local lingerie boutique. This is also a great incentive for customers to shop local!
On operational level, our colleagues and retail partners have received reusable face masks, made by the seamstresses in our atelier in Schellebelle with leftover fabrics from our lingerie and swimwear collections, and supporting guidelines about how to work with social distancing.
As a supplier we remain committed to playing our part on helping them recover.
What do you see as the main difficulties in reopening?
There is no escaping the fact that the majority of our revenue is generated by the fitting room experience. Social distancing will make this tougher but not impossible. Our retail stylists will be re-trained in how to serve our customers in light of the restrictions placed upon them. 
We will continue to delight them with our in-store environment. We will certainly be optimising our online store appointment tool to avoid any customers being disappointed, the digital mirror will also help with that.
What is your timeline on possible recovery in this sector?
It wasn’t like it was all plain sailing before the Corona crisis came along! There are some early encouraging signs if we look at consumer behaviour from a few European countries which have just come out of lockdown and how consumers have responded.
A timeline for recovery is a very difficult question to answer. As a retailer and supplier we will do everything we can to make it as quick as possible, even if it means operating in a new normal for some time to come. At a time like this I fall back on the sheer resilience of both our retail colleagues and retail partners. They will play a key part in the speed of the recovery and we will continue to do everything we can to support them.
