i3 - January/February 2017 - 102

Business
CT R E P O RTS

Scandinavian Retailer Svend Erik
Kristensen's Premium Pitch

A showroom
highlighting the latest
in-store experiences at
Scandinavian CE retailer
Hi Fi Klubben (HFK).

 W

hen Alibaba records $14 billion in online sales in a
24-hour period for China's National Singles Day,
and Cyber Monday sales figures continue to grow,
CT marketers can't be blamed for painting a
"sun-is-setting" view on brick-and-mortar retail. But as the
scale of online retail grows, the opportunities to segment the
market for traditional retail and recreate
in-store experiences also grow.
For example, Scandinavian CE retailer
Hi Fi Klubben (HFK) faced challenges
as a brick-and-mortar retailer in 2012,
focused on the great recession and the
resulting change in consumer buying
habits. A look at the chain today with
retiring CEO Svend Erik Kristensen,
shows new challenges, but also ways that
the company has adapted.
HFK was an 80-store chain with
a large retail footprint in Denmark,
102

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2017

Sweden and Norway four years ago. The
company had just opened its first store
in Amsterdam, with a plan to expand in
the Netherlands. The expansion meant
that HFK would operate across four
countries, deal in four currencies, have
to clear customs via two borders, and do
that from one distribution center with
products with very short life cycles. Add
to that store locations in regions with
long cold winters, very high sales taxes,
and employer rules that make firing or
layoffs difficult and costly and you get

a sense of the challenges. Despite those
obstacles, HFK thrived and managed to
weather that deep recession as a privately-held, self-financed company.

Premier Customer Service
"We have to be as competitive as a
mass marketer," Kristensen said. Yet
the emphasis on service and customer
loyalty, quality rather than quantity,
and mid- to high-end price levels
belies a comparison to mass marketers. "We want to be a lot for a few,"
said Kristensen describing his chain's
philosophy.
The company operates on many
norms no longer held in U.S. retail.
"Our sales members average 30 minutes
per customer in store, while our largest
competitor averages six minutes per
customer," says Kristensen. That level
I T I S I N N O VAT I O N



http://www.hifiklubben.com/

i3 - January/February 2017

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