We are thrilled to be recognized by Salesforce today as a Fast Track Pacesetter! It’s all the more impressive when you consider that, two years ago, BIRKENSTOCK had virtually no ecommerce activity.

Today we have set up online stores in 20 countries, in eight different languages, which we were able to achieve in a total of nine months, and that is not only coding, but absolutely everything; from setting up a team to selecting and implementing fulfillment partners. And thanks to the agility of Commerce Cloud, we are rapidly expanding our business internationally both on the web and on mobile.

Speed and time to market was of the essence for family-owned BIRKENSTOCK, whose digital presence was born in 2015 with the formation of Birkenstock digital GmbH, an entity formed to develop and manage the digitization and global ecommerce activities of the brand.

BIRKENSTOCK traces its roots to 1774 and is steeped in tradition, but we decided that digital would be a key component for our growth, international expansion, and creation of 1:1 customer journeys. As a latecomer to digital commerce, we knew we needed to get to market quickly, with a solution that was easy to implement, manage and update.

We launched our first site, in Austria, on Commerce Cloud within three months, and within six months launched internationally in over 10 countries. As a privately-held company, we can’t share specific sales numbers but online sales, both mobile and web, have grown by double digits, while traffic has grown in the triple digits.

We are moving very quickly to launch new sites in high-growth markets, particularly in Japan, China and other Asian countries. The multi-tenant architecture of Commerce Cloud, where a single instance of software serves multiple groups of users, is a big part of what makes this possible.

As the inventor of the footbed, BIRKENSTOCK has always stood for function, comfort and support, so our expansion from anatomically-shaped footbeds to anatomically-shaped beds, in early 2017, seemed only natural. At the same time, we have recently expanded our product line to include natural cosmetics which feature natural cork extract – the same type used in our iconic footwear.

BIRKENSTOCK leverages Salesforce Marketing Cloud for personalization of email marketing and campaigns based on customer data and customer journeys. Results show improvements in open rates as well as conversion rates. As a next step, the program will be expanded to customer acquisition, and in the final step, we will implement a loyalty program aimed at improving customer lifetime value. In doing so, digital will become the driving force of a “one face to the customer strategy.”

Our historic brand is one that cares deeply about quality and authenticity. A hallmark feature of our current products – flexible footbed insoles with contoured arch support – was mastered by Konrad Birkenstock way back in 1896!

But we know that digital is a crucial part to global growth, and because they are fully vested in our success, Commerce Cloud is the partner to help us achieve our ambitions and maintain a strong brand for the next 250 years.

We thank Salesforce for this recognition, and look forward to a long and prosperous partnership.