By: Vijay Talwar, President of Gifts and Celebrations at Sears Holdings Corporation Key Discussion Points: • Gift giving is an all year round opportunity to engage with customers as they celebrate their key life events and major holidays • Traditional e-commerce engines are not designed to support gifts shopping resulting in less than optimal customer experience • Technology enabled gifting solutions could cause a disruption and result in sustainable competitive advantage Traditional e-commerce engines are designed to enable shopping for self and lack key solutions to provide a seamless gifts shopping experience. Customers want assistance in finding the right gift to take guess work out of gifts shopping, demand flexibility in product offerings and wish to deliver a wow experience to gift recipient. Technology can not only help in creating key gift shopping experiences available to customers in physical environment on digital platforms, but also help create unique custom experiences to bring about a paradigm shift in gifts shopping. SHC used technology to provide an e-gifting solution to their tech-savvy customers. Advantage: This case study explores industry best practices and SHC’s approach to solve critical problems with customer’s gift shopping experience-using technology. This study will outline key deficiencies in traditional e-commerce engine, focus on critical customer problems and investigate appeal of a new technology based gifting solution to tech-savvy online shoppers.

1. Technology to enable gifts shopping – an opportunity to disrupt
Vijay Talwar
June, 2015
1

2. 2
Brief Introduction: Vijay Talwar
Current Role:
President of Gifts and Celebrations at Sears Holdings Corporation
Responsibilities:
Leading and executing member-centric business strategy and driving financial
results around gift purchases including Gift cards, Greeting cards and Gift registry
Leading Gifts, Fine Jewelry and Watch businesses across Sears and Kmart
Background:
COO for Central Europe, Middle East and Africa at Nike
CEO of The William J. Clinton Foundation’s India office
CEO, CFO and President, International and Global Customer Care for Blue Nile

3. 3
Executive Summary
Gifting represents $160B US market, which peaks in Nov/Dec; however, gifting is an ALL
year round opportunity
o Thanksgiving and Christmas remain top gift giving occasion for customers with gifts accounting for approx. 37% of total
household spend during major holidays
o Apart from Thanksgiving and Christmas, Mother’s day is one of the most important gift giving occasions with over $17B
spent on gifts during 2013
o Gift Cards continue to evolve as a gift of choice for both gift giver and recipient, and accounts for $39B in gifts shopping
Technology enabled gifts shopping solution could cause disruption and result in
sustainable competitive advantage
o Gift cards evolved as a key gifting product as customers are not sure about gift recipient preferences, however gift cards
are perceived as impersonal
o Gifts shopping is challenging and existing shopping experience (online and In-store) is not designed for buying gifts
o Gift it by Email: An ideal gift shopping experience that provide flexibility to both gift giver and gift recipient

4. 4
Gifting represents $160B US market and is driven by both major calendar
driven holidays and key life celebrations such as birthday, wedding and anniversary
-
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
March April May June July August September October November December January February
GiftsIndustrySize($B)
Gifting Industry In USA
Special Occasions Major Holidays
Xmas And New
Year
Thanksgiving
Black Friday
Cyber Monday
Mother’s Day
Father’s Day
Valentine’s DaySpecial Occasions such as
Birthday, Wedding, Baby,
Retirement etc.

5. 5
Thanksgiving and Christmas remain top gift giving occasion for
customers with gifts accounting for approx. 37% of total household spend

6. 6
Holiday sales is showing a positive trend with improving economic outlook
and digital channels continue to drive growth
• Holiday sales increased by 3.9% to $602.1B in 2013 despite shorter Holiday Season and adverse weather conditions
• In-store foot traffic declined by 6.5%
• Online sales grew 18% YOY and accounted for 9.5% of total retail sales
• Mobile channel accounted for approx. 15% of total online sales
Holiday Retail Sales Trends Holiday Online Sales Trends
2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Total Holiday Sales ($B) 527 504 506 532 560 580 602
Online (% of total) 5.5% 5.6% 5.7% 6.4% 7.3% 8.3% 9.5%
Online Sale ($B) 29 28 29 34 41 48 57
YOY Online Growth 16% -3.4% 3.6% 17.25 20.6% 17.1% 18.7%
Mobile as a % of total online 3% 9% 13% 14.8%

7. 7
Apart from Thanksgiving and Christmas, Mother’s day is one of the most
important gift giving occasions with over $17B spent on gifts during 2013
$17B
-14.50%
4.80%
1.50%
6.50%
0.20%
-20%
-15%
-10%
-5%
0%
5%
10%
14.5
15
15.5
16
16.5
17
17.5
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014
$Billion
Mother's Day Retail Sales Trend – Industry
Revenue YOY Change
Clothing
9%
Jewelry
16%
Flowers
15%
Books or CDs
4%Greting Cards
5%
Gift Certificates
11%
Electronics
6%
Houseware
and
Gardening
4%
Personal Services
8%
Special
Outings
16%
Other
6%
Category Contribution - Industry
• Approx. $17B were spent on Mother’s day in 2013
• Spending on Mother’s day is trending up since 2009
• Jewelry and Flowers are top selling categories for Mother’s day
• Gift cards and greeting cards combined contribute approx. 16% to
overall Mother’s day sales
• Apparel accounts for approx. 9% overall mother’s day spend

8. 8
Gift Cards continue to evolve as a gift of choice for both gift giver and recipient, and
accounts for $39B in gifts shopping
GC Market is poised for growth:
• GC market size - $118 B. in 2013, growth of 8% from 2012
• Closed loop/hybrid GCs growth outpacing open loop GCs
• E-gifting, through digital and mobile channels is showing robust growth, an 8 fold increase to approx. $3.5 B. in 2013
• In 2013, GC of over $43 B. exchanged hands during holiday season
Factors driving growth:
• Favorable legal environment (no expiration, low fees etc.)
• GC spillage is at historic low levels (less than 1%) and is expected to decline further
• Change in consumer behavior (Over 50% of US shoppers prefer receiving GC over specific gifts)
• Innovation (Mobile apps, e-gifting, virtual gifts etc.)
• Invent of secondary market for gift cards incentivizing value conscious shoppers
0 10 20 30 40 50
Open (e.g. VISA)
Merchant
Restaurant
Other
Gift card Sales in 2013 ($ Billions)
28 30 32
33
36 39
41 43 43
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
160
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016
$Bil.
Estimated Gift card spending by segments
Universal Restaurants Misc. Retail E-gifting

9. 9
Gift cards evolved as a key gifting product as customers are not sure about gift recipient
preferences, however gift cards are perceived as impersonal
Gifts
Personalized Solution
We need to provide a shopping solution
to customers that combines the
thoughtfulness of a gift with the
conveniences of a gift card to materially
expand the market size for gifts and gift
cards
Personal but
inconvenient
Impersonal but
convenient

10. 10
Gifts shopping is challenging and existing shopping experience (online and In-store) is
not designed for buying gifts
What shall I buy?
Will he like this color? What’s her shoe size? What’s their shipping address?
Buying a gift last minute?
Would be a real hassle to
exchange?
How can I include a personalized
greeting card?

11. 11
Gift it by Email
Technology enabled gifts shopping solution such as Gift it by Email could cause disruption
and result in sustainable competitive advantage

12. 12
Gift it by Email: An ideal gift shopping experience that provide flexibility to both gift giver
and gift recipient
Gift giver just needs Gift recipient’s email address for gifting
Gift Giver
Customers can identify, buy and send any product in the store as a gift
• No need to guess size, color or shipping address
• Last minute gifting with instant delivery or in-store pickup
• Gift it by Email button on every product page
• The price of the gift remains hidden
• Ability to add personal (custom) message and include an e-greeting
card with the purchase
• Ability to opt for gift wrapping at the time of order placement
Gift Recipients
Recipients arrive at our stores to get the gift they want
• Delightful and personal gift redemption experience
• Recipients select the color they like and size that fits
• Hassle free and discreet exchange before the gift ships
• Flexible store credit options
• Option to send a thank you note to gift giver at the end

13. 13
Technology to enable gifts shopping: Gift it by Email

14. 14
Technology to enable gifts shopping: Gift giver user experience
1 2
3 4

15. 15
Technology to enable gifts shopping: Gift it by Email
1 2
3 4

16. 16
Member feedback on this functionality is overwhelmingly positive with a few areas for
improvements
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
40%
1 (Very
unlikely)
2 3 4 5 6 7 (Very
likely)
How likely are you to use this service?
Question Correct Answer % response
Can the recipient choose a different item? Yes, they can apply the gifted amount to other items 94%
Can the recipient pick up items at store? Yes, as long as the item is available in the store 84%
Who pays for shipping? Its an optional choice, gift giver can decide to pay for it or
not?
23%
Can the giver use member coupons? No, they can not be used 17%
What worked
well
Areas for
improvement

17. 17