Ten years: a lifetime in electronics

James Bell

By James Bell, Managing Director, Rapid Electronics
 
They say a week is a long time in politics. Well, ten years is a lifetime in electronics.

It is only when you look back at an old catalogue or web page that you realise how much has changed about the way we sell our products.

In 2005 Rapid saw itself unequivocally as a catalogue-based distributor, as it had been for the previous 26 years. The company had only been selling products online for a year, very rarely emailed its customers and published at least two 1,000 page catalogues per year. The following year the website was relaunched as www.rapidonline.com (click here to see what it looked like back then), but online orders represented barely 20% of overall sales.

Fast forward to 2015 and we have achieved 50% of our sales through the web. We no longer produce a printed catalogue for industry customers, which would have been unthinkable ten years ago.

The way we were

Today, the website is our main sales channel. Customers can use a range of online services and tools, such as the ability to place scheduled orders and enter personalised part numbers, as well as order on a smartphone or tablet via our mobile website. Recent innovations include an upgrade to our product search functionality and giving customers a more personalised user experience, depending on the industry sector in which they work. We are also able to offer a not in catalogue service (NIC), giving customers access to products not listed on our website or catalogue, which is only possible due to the close relationships we have with our suppliers.

Customers expect same day despatch and increasingly next day delivery as standard features, access to full online catalogues on mobile devices and the ability to post immediate reviews of products or services. Social media has transformed brand management. If a customer has a negative experience with your company, the whole world – rather than just a member of your sales team – will know about it. Equally, a good experience can make your followers your brand ambassadors.

Thankyou @Rapidonline a whole caseload of stuff I ordered yesterday afternoon here by 08:30 this morning.
— Nigel Booth (@m0cvo) June 18, 2014

Not being restricted by catalogue cycles has enabled Rapid to become a more dynamic player in a fast evolving industry. We can update product information more quickly. Targeted email marketing and social media brings new products to the attention of buyers at a fraction of the cost and time it would have taken ten years ago. This has been especially important during the recent microcomputer boom. Selling the various incarnations of the Raspberry Pi has been incredibly exciting for us – a product that has unique crossover appeal amongst our industrial, educational and hobbyist customers.

Securing Rapid's future

Everyone in the industry has had to respond to the changing face of technology. But that does not tell the whole story of the last decade at Rapid. I joined the company in 2010 and "Rapid" is certainly an apt way to describe the changes that have taken place inside the business since then. 

Becoming part of the Conrad Group in 2012 was a huge step for us.

Rapid had been an independent company since it was founded in 1979 so it was not a decision we took lightly, but Conrad has secured Rapid's future and provided us with many exciting new opportunities. 

Rapid's HQ and distribution centre in Colchester, Essex

It has helped to breathe new life into our product portfolio and procurement strategy, enabling us to move into different product areas and strengthen others. We are also able to share resources, best practice and logistics, and benefit from Conrad’s global supply chain.

Conrad has market coverage across Europe and significant economies of scale. We have worked closely with them to vastly expand our electronic, electrical and e-mech ranges, signed distribution agreements with major suppliers and increased our stockholding from 50,000 to 100,000 products. By the end of 2015 we aim to increase this figure to 200,000. Web and ERP systems will be developed to meet the demands of an expanding business. But we will still stock and source those components that customers have told us they struggle to find elsewhere – the resistor or transistor, for example, which keeps their product or application running.

Competitive prices and fast fulfilment times are part of the Rapid DNA, and we have always been “serious about electronics”. But now we have the infrastructure, the products and the processes in place to define the standard in electronics distribution for the next ten years.       

This article originally appeared in a special supplement published by Electronics Sourcing magazine in April 2015 to mark its 10th anniversary