The Boohoo Group has confirmed this morning that it is in talks to buy the Dorothy Perkins, Wallis and Burton brands.
The Manchester online retailer said in a statement that it was in “exclusive discussions” with the Administrators of Sir Philip Green’s Arcadia.
It added that these wouldn’t necessarily lead to an acquisition.
According to reports, Boohoo has offered around £25m for the 3 clothing brands, less than half it paid for acquiring the Debenham’s brand and website earlier this week.
Much like the Debenham’s deal, Boohoo is unlikely to retain any of Arcadia’s high street stores, or its employees.
Boohoo has also announced today that it has appointed product experience management solutions firm, Akeneo to manage its product information.
It will use Akeneo’s PXM platform to increase sales, reduce time to market and boost productivity. Ultimately it hopes the platform will enable it to centralise product information and scale up its business more quickly.
The system should also allow it to measure product data quality and consistency and offer more personalised product journeys across sales channels.
“So far, we have been managing our product information manually, which was time-consuming and a drain on resources,” said Steve Nolan, Head of Technology at boohoo.
“By implementing Akeneo PIM, we will increase efficiency and accelerate our time-to-market while also improving our product data and product experience.”
The group sells more than 6000 products each day, from a catalogue of more than 3m items.
“We’re excited to see the difference Akeneo’s PXM solution can make for boohoo. Improving product data quality and product experience often has a notable impact on a company’s conversion and growth rates, so I’m confident this partnership can help the company reach its growth goals,” added James Barlow, UK Country Manager at Akeneo.
