ICONITE Spotlight: Got You Looking at our People - Platform Services Director, Georgie De Lautour

Welcome to ICONITE Spotlight, our monthly series where we shine a light on the incredible people behind THE ICONIC. This week we are shining the spotlight on Georgie De Lautour our Platform Services Director.

We sat down with Georgie to unpack what her role entails as Platform Services Director, how she and her team partner with brands and what makes a Platform Business different to a traditional retailer.

Can you describe your role as the Platform Services Director? 

In a nutshell - I show up to THE ICONIC every day to enable our brand partners to succeed within our incredible ecommerce ecosystem. This includes enabling brands to connect with millions of our customers via Marketplace, use our industry-leading Fulfilment Services or supercharge performance via Insights and Advertising tools.

What was your career path like leading you to this role? 

I started out by working in fashion retail stores and have since dabbled in wholesale distribution, analytics, planning, buying and more recently marketplace management - based across a mix of Sydney, Auckland & Berlin -  before arriving at THE ICONIC to supercharge our ‘Platform’ strategy. So I’m extremely fortunate to be able to utilise all my past experience in this very special role connecting our world-class brands with our shared customers. 

What exactly is a platform business? How is it different from a traditional retailer? 

Great question! Technically - a platform business is simply a business that is facilitating value exchanges between 2 or more groups. So when we evolved beyond a traditional wholesale retailer (where we buy products from brands and sell to customers) and launched our Marketplace model in parallel, we became a Platform business; facilitating a direct value exchange between brands and customers.  Since then, our platform ecosystem has grown so much further and it feels like we create a new ‘value exchange’ almost every month! 

What services does THE ICONIC offer its partners?

So our platform services are what I mean by ‘value exchanges’. We break the services into Fulfilment, Marketing and Data; within these areas there are end to end solutions available - whether you are looking to level up your ecommerce fulfilment on THE ICONIC (or even your own brand.com and other marketplaces soon), connect with and grow your customer base through the marketing funnel, or leverage better insights to drive decision making - we have you covered to succeed both on and off THE ICONIC. Really, it's about enabling the best ecommerce experience for ANZ customers. Period. 

How does your team collaborate with the rest of the business? 

The better question might be how don’t we! We are completely reliant on our incredible colleagues across all functions to deliver these services in the best way possible. Commercial, operations, marketing, finance, legal, product, data and engineering..many moving parts!  We are very fortunate to have a clear and focused purpose here at THE ICONIC to create a better way to shop so in turn, it's essential to drive a better way to partner. Every single team in our organisation takes ownership for their part in that purpose, which makes collaboration much easier! 

In a multi-brand environment, how do you balance the unique needs of each brand while ensuring the end customer remains at the heart of what you do?

It certainly isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ approach. Every brand is managing their own ambitions and challenges in the ANZ region or globally. We have some really good foundations laid in terms of allowing brands to supply the customer in flexible ways; whether that be a wholesale model or a more brand-lead marketplace model. We then support the success of those supply models with the services that make sense for the brand. So for example some brands might need us to do last-mile shipping from their FC, others want us to take full ownership of fulfilment while they focus on trading and brand building. 

With good foundations in place now, the trick is to have a clear framework that enables our Commercial team to work with our partners and find the right combination of solutions that suit them and our customers best.

Can you share an example/s of brand/s that have partnered with THE ICONIC as a platform business and topline what the results have been?

We are lucky enough to partner with the best of the best in terms of brands that are both local and global in origin. Some local heroes utilising our platform ecosystem are Country Road Group, who leverage our Marketplace via a dropship model as well as utilising our full-funnel marketing solutions regularly. Other locals include Belle & Bloom and Lorna Jane - both of whom are seeing impressive growth on the year via Marketplace using our Fulfillment Services. Looking offshore we have welcomed Inditex (Zara parent-group) brands Pull & Bear and Bershka into the ANZ market via Marketplace; they also utilise our fulfilment service offering. Most recently we launched a super interesting and innovative model with UK brand NEXT - they are utilising our sister company, Zalora’s fulfilment services in Malaysia to service marketplace orders on THE ICONIC, here in ANZ. This has given our customers access to new, world renowned assortment and given NEXT the opportunity to make their APAC stock pool more efficient. 

How can brands learn more about THE ICONIC’s ecosystem of services?

Feel free to reach out! But if not - you can also contact seller.support@theiconic.com.au

Finally, what is on your Wishlist from THE ICONIC for this Christmas? 

Well there isn't much left that I didn’t shop in our Season of Sales, I will admit! But I am eying this Marle Hat which feels like an essential for the summer break! I’m Kiwi so I love to see NZ brands thriving on THE ICONIC 🙂