Project background and challenges: how did FDJ digitize its sales initiatives with Instore Activation?

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Introducing the interviewee

Samuel Cartier, Process and Project Manager

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Company presentation, date of creation, sector and activities

Founded in 1976, La Française des Jeux, or FDJ, is France's leading player in the gambling industry. With sales of €2,461 million, the brand has almost 2,500 employees, 25 million customers and 30,000 partner retailers.

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What was your initial problem?

Our initial problem arose from an unprecedented situation within La Française Des Jeux: the renewal of the visual identity (NIV project) in our 30,000 points of sale.
The main challenge was to control the costs involved in recommending the installation of exterior merchandising elements.
We had budgeted around 3 years for the implementation of this new visual identity, and it was proving costly to mobilize external service providers to carry out these installation recommendations.
Our sales teams finally offered to take charge of this activity, on condition that we provided them with a tool to facilitate their work. We therefore needed a solution that would enable us to make recommendations simply, quickly and accurately. Several solutions were considered, including the possibility of providing a paper template, but this approach proved impractical.

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What were your objectives with this solution?

The aim was to get our field teams to produce quality recommendations and pass them on to our installers for implementation in the sales outlets.

Back to the solution: how FDJ digitized its sales campaigns with Instore Activation?

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How did the Instore Activation solution help you solve your initial problem? 

The Instore Activation solution has enabled our sales force to make installation recommendations in line with size requirements, and our partner retailers to plan their own point-of-sale design.

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What facilities/difficulties did you encounter in setting up?

Our first challenge was to help our 400 sales staff get to grips with this new tool. We put in place a solid support system, with training sessions, a video tutorial and webinars as required.

Thanks to these actions, the tool has been well received, and after getting to grips with it at a few sales outlets, handling is simple and intuitive. 

The second problem was that the Instore Activation tool only offered the transposition of elements onto a horizontal frame of reference. We needed to transpose our merchandising visuals, in particular window displays, onto point-of-sale windows. The Retail VR team listened carefully to our needs. The tool was quickly adapted to enable us to project merchandising elements onto a vertical frame of reference.

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What are the advantages of this solution?

Instore Activation comes with its own set of benefits: 

• Satisfaction of field teams: the Instore Activation solution facilitates the work of sales staff by making it quick and easy to make recommendations.
• Modernity : it helped reinforce the company's modern image during point-of-sale visits. 
• Realism : we can generate recommendations with realistic visual rendering.
• Cost management: the use of Instore Activation enables us to limit the use of external service providers, and therefore control the project budget.
• Evolution : the solution is regularly updated to maintain its relevance and efficiency. The Retail VR team is always ready to listen to our feedback and needs. 

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What benefits did you perceive?

By carrying out most of the installation recommendations in-house, we were able to significantly reduce the project budget compared with a totally outsourced operation.

Collaboration between FDJ and Retail VR : how FDJ digitized its sales campaigns with Instore Activation?

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Why did you choose Retail VR?

After consulting our Innovation team, several companies were presented to us. The decision to choose Retail VR was motivated by several factors. The solution seemed to be the easiest for users to get to grips with. In addition, it better met the requirements that had been expressed. In addition, the Retail VR team showed itself to be attentive to these requirements, which contributed to the final decision.

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What next for this project?

We've identified several opportunities and use cases where Instore Activation could be put to good use.

We are also launching a project to facilitate sales prospecting, particularly with retailers outside the Bar/Tabac/Presse network who are less familiar with our business and our furniture, and who may be hesitant because of the lack of projection. 

The tool will enable us to project our furniture in addition to our visual identification, to make the future layout of the sales outlet more concrete. This should help improve the conversion rate from prospect to partner retailer. 

About us

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The project 

Solutions: Instore Activation and the centralized platform 

Goal: Deployment of FDJ's New Visual Identity

Users: Field sales representatives, who will simulate visuals on point-of-sale windows, i.e. places that use FDJ's graphic identity.

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Retail VR

Founded in 2018, Retail VR offers a 3D experience platform to accelerate sales and retail processes.

Limited travel, high showroom operating costs, reduced carbon footprints - in this context, it's hard to come up with new concepts, or successfully launch a product or run a promotional campaign.

Thanks to our 2D/3D converter, we can create 3D environments and content very quickly.

Our solutions help brand owners and retailers to simulate their points of sale, validate product launches and work on consumer studies. We also help them to digitalize their showrooms and offer immersive, brand-enhancing shopping experiences, thus saving time and money.