South African footwear retailer Footgear is installing smart retail technology from Spanish firm Nextail at more than 200 stores.

The agreement also allows Nextail to extend its reach within the African retail market.

Over its 22-year history, Footgear relied on spreadsheet-based tools for planning and forecasting in-season inventory management. However, with the brand’s growth strategy, these methods proved difficult to scale. Consequently, Footgear recognised the importance of a centralised information source, better system integration, streamlined manual processes, and improved inventory visibility across its retail network.

Now, with in-season retail merchandising technology in place, Footgear can benefit from agility, speed and better anticipation of demand to increase sell-through. In turn, Footgear will be able to make ongoing adjustments to product offerings at its many points of sale to meet customer demand, no matter how it has changed since pre-season planning or continues to evolve.

“We firmly believe that Nextail’s fashion-first approach, automation and advanced forecasting capabilities will help us best deliver on our customer promise to offer the best shoe brands at affordable prices and an excellent in-store experience across South Africa,” said Footgear CEO Neil Stephens. “By automating and optimising our core retail merchandising processes, we can continue satisfying customers while ensuring a similar cost-to-serve as we expand our presence nationwide.”

Juan Avedillo, co-CEO of Nextail, added: “We are delighted to be a part of Footgear’s transformation journey and assist them in harnessing the advantages of automated, data-driven decision-making within their core merchandising processes. This partnership marks a significant milestone for Nextail in the African region, unlocking fresh avenues to broaden our market presence and explore new opportunities.”

Founded in 2001, Footgear has grown from a small single store in Cape Town to 220 stores nationwide, serving shoe brands such as Adidas, Puma, Converse and Reebok.

Nextail is a smart retail merchandising platform that empowers retailers to sell more with less stock through hyper-local demand forecasting and agile automation. By increasing stock efficiencies across channels, retailers can automate the science of retail and dedicate more time to creative and strategic work.

Users typically see sales increases up to 10%, 30% lower coverage levels, and 60% fewer stockouts in addition to being able to increase the sustainability of their operations by reducing leftovers and overproduction.

Nextail works with more than 60 brands and retailers, including River Island, Flying Tiger Copenhagen, Pepe Jeans and Grupo Suarez.