Marks & Spencer moves away from Amazon platform

Focus on content

The new Marks & Spencer website has suffered several delays, but its new site will now try to attract users with its magazine feeling, with larger images and an increased focus on articles to bring that feeling across. Fashion journalist Nicola Copping, who used to work for the Financial Times, will oversee the entire website, with attention for ‘style & celebrity’.

Executive director multi-channel Laura Wade-Gery told RetailWeek that Marks & Spencer wants to come across as a publisher, as it wants to convince its 14.5 million offline customers to give its online array of products a chance, instead of browsing at other web shops. 13 % of the chain’s non-food turnover last year came through online sales, worth some 800 million euro.

The British website is the first in a long line of new websites for Marks & Spencer, because the international versions, like marksandspencer.eu, will soon move towards the new platform. All in all, Marks & Spencer’s move to step away from Amazon’s platform is peculiar in a time when an increasing number of brands are moving in the opposite direction, right in the arms of Amazon.