Enhancing the view of the world
Luxottica is one of the world’s leading eyewear companies, with an end to end business model that sees them design, manufacture and distribute their product. Luxottica’s goal is to provide eyewear that protects its customers’ eyes and enhances their view of the world, whilst looking stylish and on trend.
Iconic eyewear brands in a national network of stores
Luxottica’s customers might know them better as their eyewear labels, which include the iconic Ray-Bans, Vogue Eyewear and Oakley, or as their retail brands – Sunglass Hut, OPSM and Laubman & Pank.
Luxottica operates close to 600 stores across its combined retail network – stores which use a sophisticated range of IT equipment to ensure they run efficiently and deliver the highest level of customer service. Managing that equipment –installing, servicing and decommissioning – is no small task, especially in a retail network spread across the entirety of Australia and New Zealand, and which opens 50-100 new stores every year and closes, relocates or refurbishes a similar number.
“We realised that we simply couldn’t manage this task with the staff we had in our in-house IT team” explained Matt Dewhurst, Director of IT, “so we looked for a partner to be our ‘boots on the ground’ in our retail network”.
IMI – Delivering on the promise
Luxottica chose to partner with IMI and it’s a decision that has delivered on its promise.
“IMI manage all the elements of the setup and go live for our new stores”, says Paul Grady, Support Team Leader for IT. “They warehouse and stage the equipment, deliver it to site, and provide two engineers to install and set up every piece of technical equipment. That equipment ranges from POS to digital media, signage, digital retinal scan equipment, EFTPOS and HICAPS terminals, voice systems, counting sensors, security cameras and wireless networks. It’s a wide range of skills, but IMI has the people who can cover it – and all within a 2-3day installation window”. To the retail store staff, there is no distinction between IMI and Luxottica’s in-house team. “IMI deal with our staff the same way we would”, says Paul.
It’s not just new installations – IMI also manage all technical issues in an operational store. The store logs the issue with the Luxottica helpdesk for triage, and the call is then passed to IMI who schedule shipping of the appropriate parts, along with an engineer if needed.
Store closures, relocations and refurbishments are handled by IMI too – they will decommission the equipment, ship and warehouse it and either dispose of it or prepare it for re-deployment.
“IMI can even provide someone to work directly in our IT team at head office if we need it”, says Paul. “It works because they understand our business so well.”
Making a difference
Luxottica says that the difference that IMI has made is enormous. “We simply would not be able to operate in a country the size and scale of Australia without a partner like IMI”, says Matt. “They know our business inside out, and they truly are a partner, not just a provider.”
“IMI deal with our staff the same way we would”
What sets IMI apart
- The interaction between the Luxottica help desk and IMI is seamless. We do the initial trouble shooting, then hand over to IMI. We get a notification when the engineer is onsite, regular status updates and a notification when the job is complete. It’s just like having one of our own team there.
- IMI’s willingness to adapt and change to our ever-evolving requirements. They are open to changing their process in line with our needs.
- They are accountable – problems are extremely rare, but on the few occasions when they have happened, they admit it, escalate rapidly to management and find a resolution and a better process.