DEVELOPING A PREMIUM WINE SHOPPING WEBSITES – ISHOP CHANGI WINES

Duty-Free Shop Group (DFS Group) is one of the 4th leading luxury travel retailers globally (according to The Moodie Davitt Report 2017). The business has undergone global expansion with many international representative offices in Australia, China, France, Italy, Japan, Macau, Singapore, USA, Vietnam, etc. At Changi Airport, DFS has developed a duty-free wine-and-spirits store for travelers across the airport.

Demand for a robust system

With the iShop Changi Wines project, DFS aims to be an ecommerce channel specializing in supplying world-famous wines and spirits with exclusive offers for Changi Airport passengers, especially loyalty members of Changi Airport Group (Changi Rewards members) via many attractive and diverse promotions.

Through Changi Airport Group (CAG), SECOMM had the opportunity to fully access essential requirements from all the partners for a successful project. SECOMM have experienced developing similar ecommerce systems; however, this project has been a highly complicated one. The complexity comes from both front-end and back-end, requiring system modernity and professionalism assurance:

• Modernized website, keeping the unique characteristics of the wine industry in both design aesthetics and branding elements for CAG and DFS
• Develop a complex pricing calculating-and-displaying system based on lots of Singapore tax principles for alcoholic products
• Categorize customer groups to process and fulfill orders immediately

In addition to providing key solutions for the system, SECOMM needs to improve web performance due to significant traffic and order increases during all promotion campaigns. Therefore, to maintain a smooth and stable system, SECOMM improved and optimized entire codes and infrastructure on the existing web system.

Refine specific wines and spirits interface to-every-detail 

We understand that buying experience of a wines and spirits website is one of the leading factors that make up a professional system globally. Therefore, to provide the best-fit customer experience, SECOMM carried out the following solutions:

• Refining the brand identity elements: using the dominant gray-and-white color combined with simple blocks to make logos, fonts, banners, and CTA buttons stand out with DFS and iShop Changi’s signature gradient effects.
• About page layout: optimize product-displaying function with widgets navigating the customer’s buying journey, including many displaying categories:

   + New arrivals
   + Best-sellers
   + Most viewed products
   + Same brand products
   + Same category products

• Arrange and refine the balance of design, image, and content elements while ensuring the overall simplicity and UI/UX.
• Categorize and optimize filtering features for a complex system of categories and product attributes to assist customers in finding their exactly needed products based on many combined criteria:

  + Category
  + Seller
  + Brand
  + Price (customizable price range)
  + Promotions 
  + Collection method
  + Pre-order options

Complex and specialized order processing, from price calculating/displaying to delivery

A major challenge from the project was developing a highly complex order processing system.

For the price calculating and displaying system: the wine industry-particularities require a customized display of different product types, prices, and taxes calculated by the logical system from iShop Changi Wines. This pricing system combines with many rules about taxes, promotions, exclusive products, … to figure out a total price for the right customer group.

For delivery: SECOMM continued to implement the customer classification process to support appropriate delivery:

• Support to receive goods at departure terminal: for customers departing from Changi airport or transiting with flight information requirements.
• Support pick-up at the arrival terminal: for customers departing to Changi with flight information requirements.
• Support “Home-delivery” within Singapore.

In detail, the system would allow all passenger groups to customize the appropriate pick-up date and time to receive the best support when purchasing orders.

Marking potential projects in the Singapore market

Although only launched in early 2020, the iShop Changi Wines ecommerce system has effectively met the needs of international tourists. SECOMM simplified initial complex elements into an utterly refreshing interface, ensuring a professional and outstanding overall of a wine-and-spirit website.

iShop Changi Wines is an impressive project marking SECOMM’s breakthrough in the Southeast Asian market. Although they were our new clients, the cooperation between SECOMM and CAG has brought high performance, promising long-term partnership for the upcoming projects.

Besides selling alcoholic products with a stable ecommerce system, the CAG have now constantly expanded their online retail with many brand-new categories with attractive promotions for both Changi Airport passengers and domestic online customers.