Marks & Spencer, the UK’s biggest clothing retailer by value and which sells one in every four pairs of knickers bought in Britain, has launched new websites in Australia and New Zealand in the British retailer’s latest attempt to expand overseas.
Australian shoppers are already among M&S’s biggest online spenders, buying via the retailer’s UK website which delivers to more than 30 countries worldwide.
The new, dedicated sites for Australia and New Zealand feature local currency and sizing and have tailored editorial content highlighting items relevant to the local seasons.
David Walmsley, director of M&S.com, said: “Australia is firmly established as one of our top performing international delivery markets and our new localised website presents a key growth opportunity for our international online business.”
The website launch in Australia will be supported with an ad campaign using the tagline “British style for Australian life”.
M&S has long been rumoured to be planning a high street store in Australia, and the new website is only likely to fuel those expectations.
But a spokesperson for M&S said: “While we always look at new opportunities, we have no current plans to open stores in Australia.”
International expansion has been a key part of a turnaround plan put in place by M&S’s chief executive, Marc Bolland, who is to leave the business in the spring. He launched the company’s first dedicated overseas website in France in 2011 and that was soon followed by stores.
M&S now has dedicated websites in nine international markets including Germany, Ireland, Spain, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. The Australian and New Zealand sites are its first dedicated websites outside Europe. But M&S already sells online in China via the Tmall marketplace and in India via the Myntra and Flipkart sites.
Overseas expansion has proved trickier than expected. International profits halved in the first half of this year as a result of exchange rate headwinds in Europe as well as economic and political issues in Russia and Ukraine.
In 2014, M&S said it had hoped to open 250 international stores over three years, but last year it said those plans amid the civil war in Ukraine and an economic slowdown in China, where M&S has closed stores.
