Endeavour Group injects $35 million into digital arm

Retail drinks and hospitality business Endeavour Group has invested $35 million into its  digital arm endeavourX as the company's online sales grew $603 million in just six months.

The group is home to the Dan Murphy's, BWS, Jimmy Brings and ALH brands, and demerged from grocery retailer Woolworths last year.

The $35 million boost is for "ecommerce and technology innovation" and coincides with strong online sales growth of around 25 percent, reaching $603 million in the first six month of FY22.

Endeavour Group expects its online sales will exceed $1 billion by the end of the full year.

It appears part of the additional spend will go into recruitment, with the company looking for workers in the digital, data, UX and personalisation domains, as well as more generally for business analysts and product managers.

EndeavourX director Claire Smith said the business is “accelerating digital to support our customers right across their shopping journey” as consumer increasingly turn to online channels and enablement services.

The digital arm last year built a personalisation engine to enhance Dan Murphy’s loyalty program.

It is also deploying electronic shelf labels in its BWS and Dan Murphy’s stores. The labels have embedded near field communication (NFC) technology that allows customers to tap their phone to it to get more information or access customer reviews.

The labels also captures geolocation data “which will be used when creating planograms for stores in the future.”

Planograms are used to keep track of product placement and shelf merchandising appearance in retail stores.

“This data will be analysed to create optimal shopping paths for our customers, and will help us create the most convenient customer experience possible,” Smith said.

The group has also rolled out contactless order-and-pay capabilities in its hotels network.