‘I want it and I want it now’: How Dixons and Screwfix are serving impatient shoppers

Both Kingfisher-owned Screwfix and electricals specialists Dixons Carphone have revealed this week that they aim to slash delivery and click-and-collect times in a bid to appease impatient shoppers.

Rapid delivery has become a flashpoint over the past year as the proliferation of grocery services such as Getir, Gorillas and Dija buzzing around city streets has meant food can be delivered in less than half an hour. 

Such heightened expectations – given extra impetus by the pandemic – have now bled into non-food categories such as DIY and electricals, as shoppers demand their goods faster and faster.

Kingfisher boss Thierry Garnier has previously told Retail Week he is keen to offer delivery as fast as possible across all his fascias and now Dixons chief executive Alex Baldock has joined the race.

Instant gratification

Kingfisher’s B&Q and Screwfix, and Dixons Carphone – now rebranded to its main trading fascia Currys – have hailed the success of click and collect during the Covid outbreak, but even reducing the timescale down to one minute in Screwfix’s case is no longer good enough.

Both businesses are therefore taking it one step further by introducing their own rapid delivery services to keep up with consumer demand for instant gratification.

“As with everything, we are led by the customer and there are large numbers of customers whose expectations have changed and they’re becoming more impatient – they want it and they want it now – we see that in lots of different sectors and ours is no different,” says Dixons chief executive Alex Baldock.

Dixons’ wealth of consumer data – with over 12 million UK households as regular customers – has meant the retailer has its “finger on the pulse” in terms of what consumers want, according to Baldock, but he’s also keen to test and learn.

“What we’re hearing from a chunk of consumers is the desire to get stuff ever faster, but with all of these things, we don’t need to know the precise answer – we can test and learn,” he says.

Dixons is therefore set to trial a partnership with Uber to offer “better than same day” delivery, using its network of stores as distribution hubs, much like B&Q and Screwfix – which has also started its own trial.

Screwfix has partnered with rapid delivery service Gophr to trial fast delivery from its store in Bristol.

“We have recently launched a new high-speed delivery service, Screwfix Sprint, that will aim to deliver products to customers on site, or at home in as little as 30 minutes,” explains Mewett, with the plan to roll it out to more stores in the future if the trial is successful.

Retail broker firm Freetrade’s senior analyst Dan Lane believes this is a wise move from Screwfix.

“Teaming up with Gophr to keep increasingly impatient customers onside means it can stay relevant for a time-poor audience and not lag behind expectations,” he says. 

“Consumers are a fickle bunch,” Lane explains further. “We immediately turn our best customer experience with a brand or service into an expectation for everything we encounter afterwards. And that’s no more evident than in how we’ve come to expect instant delivery.

“It wasn’t so long ago we didn’t really mind waiting three to five business days. Now though, that timeframe would widen a few eyes and possibly stop us transacting altogether. Amazon does it, so why can’t everyone else?”

Click and collect 

Both businesses have also been working on cutting how long it takes to process an order ready for collection – Screwfix is down to one minute, while Dixons is looking to reduce its time to 15 minutes.

“We’re tipping our hat at 15 minutes,” says Baldock. 

“We’ve brought it down from 24 hours to an hour in the UK, 30 minutes in the Nordics.

“A big and increasing number of consumers are impatient and want their technology right now, and we can get it to them faster than anyone else.”

Baldock highlights how bricks-and-mortar stores can therefore play a role in this.

“We’re going to keep driving that time down and its a big growth driver for us, so we’re exploring other ways to do that, and one other way is to use our network of stores as local distribution hubs,” he adds.

Screwfix chief executive John Mewett agrees that leveraging the power of the retailer’s 720-strong store network can help it reach more customers.

“We are passionate about offering our customers the ultimate convenience to allow them to access the products they need, when they need them,” he says.

Retail analyst Natalie Berg agrees the role of the store needs to change.

“Its no longer about selling stuff, but about repurposing stores to act as fulfilment hubs to facilitate online purchases,” she says.

“This is how retailers need to leverage stores in a digital era fit for 21st-century shopping.”

She questions, however, whether non-food retailers are putting undue pressure on themselves to offer these rapid delivery options when the products themselves are not always needed that fast – requiring a power tool within 30 minutes, for example, will be an exceptional circumstance rather than the norm.

“Ultimately I don’t see one-hour delivery becoming the norm the same way it is in grocery – I see it being an option, but not the default, and one that customers pay a premium for,” she concludes.

Nevertheless, rapid delivery has clearly become a big talking point for many sector leaders to set them apart from competitors – meaning the race is on for who can innovate fastest.