{"id":7936,"date":"2019-07-18T15:38:29","date_gmt":"2019-07-18T13:38:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/corporate-idkids-com.azurewebsites.net\/canada-6-nouveaux-okaidi-en-6-semaines\/"},"modified":"2019-07-22T15:08:38","modified_gmt":"2019-07-22T13:08:38","slug":"canada-6-nouveaux-okaidi-en-6-semaines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/en\/canada-6-nouveaux-okaidi-en-6-semaines\/","title":{"rendered":"Six new Oka\u00efdi stores in Canada in six weeks!"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Local staff meet the challenge with flying colours. How? By embracing versatility! Country manager Timoth\u00e9e tells us more. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What triggered this project? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Like everywhere else in the world, the North American market is undergoing a complex period of change. When it was announced that a local children&#8217;s fashion brand was closing 400 retail outlets, we reacted immediately. We met with the lessor, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cadillacfairview.com\/\">Cadillac Fairview,<\/a> and soon reached a win-win deal: if we agreed to quickly reopen six retail outlets located in shopping centres, we would be given one year to test customer appetite for <a href=\"https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/en\/brand\/okaidi\/\">Oka\u00efdi<\/a> locally under very favourable rent conditions. We swung into action. The Expansion Committee approved the project in mid-April and on 1 June we opened our first store in Ottawa, Canada\u2019s administrative capital. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What difficulties did you have to\novercome?&nbsp; <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We had to create an Oka\u00efdi environment in a\nstore structure that wasn&#8217;t our own. On the plus side, the stores\u2019 average\nsurface area was in line with our concept, i.e. between 120 and 180 square\nmetres. And the furniture and windows, which we also retained, were neutral\nenough for us to stamp our image on them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>How did you manage to open six stores in\nsix weeks? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The two key ingredients were forward\nplanning and role distribution. We worked hard to plan the ordering of stock,\nsupplies, and so on in advance using a reverse planning model. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And we distributed roles appropriately: <\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>C\u00e9line, our local marketing\nmanager, was responsible for adapting all our existing marketing material for\nthe new retail outlets. <\/li><li>Elodie took care of managing\nthe existing network. <\/li><li>We got the \u201cold\u201d staff involved\nin setting up the stores.<\/li><li>This allowed us to work with\nour HR partner Elizabeth to focus on recruiting new staff, the biggest\nchallenge. <\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>In terms of HR, how were you able to\ncreate six new teams in so little time? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Six weeks before opening we recruited our\nsix store managers after a telephone preselection and interview. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then we launched a \u201cjob dating\u201d exercise\nwith each store manager in each outlet by advertising in the windows. This\nresulted in 80 to 150 applications. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To make the final selection, our process\nwas twofold:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Candidates first had a quick\n5-minute interview with Elizabeth, Elodie and\/or me, so we could initially\ngauge their fit with Oka\u00efdi\u2019s core values and check that their interpersonal\nskills were up to scratch; <\/li><li>This was followed by a\n20-minute interview with the store manager to confirm their level of expertise.\n<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>At the end of\nthe \u201cjob dating\u201d process, we had hired six teams of ten to twelve people &#8211; a\nfew more than we needed. As they worked to set up the stores, we were able to\nfine-tune the make-up of the teams. Only the most versatile team members stayed.\nThis is an important quality for Oka\u00efdi, even though the job of sales assistant\nin Canada tends to be more single task focused. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What was the\nimpact of this project on existing staff? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It allowed us to\ntest their robustness. By offering six \u201cold\u201d staff members the opportunity to\nmanage the new store set-ups, we were able to use a real-life test to see who\nwas most comfortable with this type of responsibility. They also had to train\nthe newcomers, which freed up Elodie to ensure the smooth running of the\nexisting network and manage the six store openings. Everyone learned something\nnew!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>What&#8217;s next? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Staff will\ncontinue to hone their skills in the coming months as they familiarize themselves\nwith the brand and our requirements. And we will meet with the lessor again in\na year to discuss the results. The stores that have proven themselves will be\nfully transformed in line with our concept. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em><strong>The six new Oka\u00efdi Canada stores are in Ottawa, Toronto North York, Markham, Kitchener, Hamilton and London.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>For more details visit <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/fr.okaidi.ca\/\"><strong>https:\/\/fr.okaidi.ca\/<\/strong><\/a><strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"475\" height=\"413\" src=\"https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-7849\" srcset=\"https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1.jpg 475w, https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1-300x261.jpg 300w, https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1-305x265.jpg 305w, https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1-28x24.jpg 28w, https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/RJYV0470-1-92x80.jpg 92w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 475px) 100vw, 475px\" \/><figcaption>The dream team of Don Mills shop, Toronto North York<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Local staff meet the challenge with flying colours. How? By embracing versatility! Country manager Timoth\u00e9e tells us more. What triggered [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":7847,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[202,193],"tags":[355,391,188,170,261,373,392],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Six new Oka\u00efdi stores in Canada in six weeks! - \u00cfDKIDS.COMMUNITY<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/corporate.idkids.com\/en\/canada-6-nouveaux-okaidi-en-6-semaines\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Six new Oka\u00efdi stores in Canada in six weeks! - \u00cfDKIDS.COMMUNITY\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Local staff meet the challenge with flying colours. 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