Belief in success in Kolonial.no
It has given me a lot of inspiration and great energy to be part of the team in Kolonial.no. This is what André Knüppel says, one year after he joined as production director (COO) in Norway's by far the largest and fastest growing grocery store online. The organization has taken seven-mile steps in development, both in the last year and in the five years since its establishment.
When will the store become profitable?
Knüppel has faith in profitability in the concept. At the C2U Knowledge Forum at Fornebu on 11 October, he explains why. When the high-profile Swedish investor Kinnevik Group has now entered Kolonial.no heavily, "everyone's" eyes are on the company. - Do they live up to expectations? Do they manage the impossible, to make online grocery shopping a profitable business? We want to know.
To take the simplest first. When will you be profitable?
- In the future, Knüppel answers.
This is the standard answer to a question he and the rest of the management team receive almost daily. Inaccurate as it is, the answer at the same time expresses a belligerent belief that they will succeed.
- If I had not believed that this will be a success, I would not have been here. If we live up to expectations, others must respond. What is certain is that we have a good dialogue with the owners, both the new ones and those who have been involved from the beginning. I feel that we have great trust from the shareholders. Of course, I can not go into detail about what that trust is based on, but I am confident, he says.
Distinctive industry
The grocery trade has its own peculiar industry challenges, which also set governing premises when such a business is to be moved online. There are factors such as large variations in customers' purchases, from small, fragmented purchases to wholesalers. All transactions must be handled in the shortest possible time, large parts of the day, and the online customer must be able to shop both via the browser he or she prefers to use, or via the mobile app on the preferred platform.
- From a start-up period with trial and error and above all fast learning, we have entered a period of systematic improvement work. Many people forget that the logistics industry has not built much experience with Lean. Continuous Improvement has been virtually non-existent. This means that we have a lot to tackle and have many opportunities to get better.
- Over the last couple of years, there have been major improvements. Only by improving methodology and working methods have we already made great progress. Yet we are only at the beginning. One of the things that inspires me is to see that the entrepreneurial team has done so much right from the beginning. This despite the fact that none of them had experience from the grocery trade when they threw themselves into it. They have experience from leading industrial production, as managers and consultants. It shows, says Knüppel.