Premium British lifestyle brand Joules has elected to switch to Centric Software®‘s Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) platform to increase visibility and awareness in its supply chain, and to provide a central source of truth for product development.
Centric Software provides the most innovative enterprise solutions to plan, design, develop, source and sell products such as apparel, footwear, sporting goods, furniture, home décor, cosmetics, food & beverage and luxury to achieve strategic and operational digital transformation goals.
Joules is a premium lifestyle group which designs and sell branded clothing, footwear, accessories and homeware for the whole family. The company was founded in 1989, when Tom Joule started to sell clothing at a country show in Leicestershire, and today caters to over 1.7 million active customers through its digital platform, retail stores in the U.K., and at country shows and events. The brand also operates internationally in its target markets of the U.S. and Germany, which are served by wholesale partnerships and dedicated websites.
As Joules adjusted to the post-pandemic new normal, the business saw the need to leverage an increased level of agility and transparency across all areas of the business. Increased cost and longer timelines in global freight during the pandemic required that all products were being developed in the most efficient and cost-effective ways possible.
“Joules has and continues to grow very quickly,” says Kellie Hubbard, Senior Program Manager at Joules. “The business is not the same one which originally scoped, and implemented the legacy PLM system we operate currently. We knew that in order to achieve our future growth ambitions, we would need to update this core system, in order to provide our teams with the right tool to support them in producing our future product ranges.”
To achieve their goals of selecting the tools which add the most value, while keeping the customer journey as simple as possible, Joules knew it needed a proven, out-of-the-box PLM solution that wouldn’t require heavy customization. Rather, the business wanted to work with a partner with extensive fashion product development expertise and customer base, in order to ensure industry-standard processes and workflows.
As the ultimate stakeholders, the team who will use the PLM system ranked Centric Software® the highest of all shortlisted vendors during the selection process.
“It was important to us that one system covered as much of the development process as possible,” says Hubbard, “to have that one version of the truth for product data, which is so vital to the product teams and the wider business. We did see other vendors with broader industry bases but felt the nuances of our processes would be better navigated and supported with a fashion industry expert.”
Hubbard continues, “The team at Centric has been hugely supportive throughout the entire process. They fully understand the journey that the brand has been on to date, and the ambitions we have for the future.”
Digital sales now account for 70% of Joules’ overall business. “We think of ourselves as more of a digitally-led platform,” says Nick Jones, CEO of Joules. “Stores remain a key part of our strategy and multi-channel model. They not only drive revenue and customer acquisition but clearly communicate our brand and values. Looking ahead, we see the role of physical sales evolving to support the growth that we expect to generate through digital.”
As a brand heavily inspired by the environment, Corporate Social Responsibility is high on Joules’ agenda as well. The business has set ambitious sustainable materials targets and is looking to achieve new levels of visibility and awareness across the supply chain, thanks to the ability of Centric PLM to interface with systems like TrusTrace, a digital platform for product traceability and supply chain transparency.
Centric PLM™ will help Joules achieve these goals via standardization of workflows, having one version of the truth in product development, and visibility into processes, all within one centralized, online platform. The business expects those features to combine in order to make them more effective and efficient, and ensure the focus remains on creating great products for their customers.
“While we anticipate saving time based on current standards, our plan is to reinvest that time to support future growth,” Hubbard says. “We anticipate the key product development functions to see time savings of approximately 15% across the entire process. From our perspective, the time saving is better expressed as an ability do more, and do better, with the same resources.”
“This is the start of a long, mutually beneficial relationship,” says Chris Groves, President and CEO of Centric Software. “We are flattered that Joules sees Centric as a trusted technology partner in the fashion space and thrilled that we can help them take such positive steps towards environmental sustainability. We look forward to supporting and advising them to derive the greatest possible benefits from our platform.”
