Gautier

Gautier is a leading manufacturer of contemporary and designer furniture in France and around the world. Since it was established in 1960, the Group has grown to encompass 120 stores worldwide with 750 employees. It is the only French furniture manufacturer to distribute through its own international franchise network, with plans to open a further 30 showrooms in France by 2024.

Key to Gautier’s success is a focus on creating showrooms that are advice-driven. The objective of sales professionals is to provide a valuable, hassle-free experience for all customers so that furnishing their homes remains a pleasure. To take this customer experience to the next level, Gautier recognized the need to expand its role: from furniture manufacturer to interior designer.

“Beyond furniture design and manufacture, we wanted to provide our customers with a complete home planning service, personalized advice and the most visually immersive experience possible”, said Audrey Giraud, client project manager. “We needed a platform that enabled our store advisors to easily engage with customers and capture their imaginations, whether assisting them with inspiration and advice or consulting with true-to- life visuals of their dream designs.”

In addition, Gautier required a more agile and complete alternative to its incumbent 3D planning solution to:

• Centralize functionalities of the planner and configurator, no longer having to rely on isolated product configurators to meet customer needs
• Support the integration of virtual reality for next-level visualization of a project
• Adapt to different store strategies and formats, which differ from country to country and store to store
• Deliver a flexible and scalable approach to meet future needs

Gautier turned to the HomeByMe for Home Retailers 3D planning solution to provide an unparalleled experience that would help customers visualize their dream home interiors. Combining a 360-degree photorealistic 3D catalog of Gautier’s complete product range with an intuitive planning platform, store advisors can create and populate an accurate plan of a customer’s home within minutes.

The HomeByMe for Home Retailers 3D planning solution allows customers to input precise dimensions of any type of room and style it to their exact tastes. For those unsure of where to start, templates can be created within the platform to populate rooms with the latest trends and product lines. Additional features include pricing that is updated in real time throughout the course of the design to help keep track of budget, while 3D HD renders provide a final lifelike picture of how the room redesign will look in reality.

Meeting Gautier’s key requirement for a centralized approach, the solution is entirely cloud-based for easy customization, scalability and integration with CRM systems. With HomeByMe for Home Retailers, Gautier can equip every store in its franchise with the capabilities to provide a personalized experience for customers that will add value to their interior design projects and help them to make better and faster purchase decisions.

The project was completed in a phased rollout – from digitalization of the product range to the first deployment in stores and user training at point of sale.

After kicking off the project in early summer of 2019, the first Gautier stores gained access to the platform in just a few months. In early 2020, the entire range of furniture was added to the solution, which, at the end of 2020, will be supplemented by an entirely configurable range of sofas. By October 2020, 6,024 home interior projects had been saved via the platform, with 8,247 high resolution renders created thanks to Gautier’s unlimited subscription.

Following a successful first phase, the HomeByMe for Home Retailers 3D planning solution is now being rolled out to all French and international stores, and Gautier plans to add its range of decorative accessories, office, and childcare brands to the platform in the near future.

The HomeByMe for Home Retailers 3D planning solution will also be integrated into the website, which will enable customers to get the same benefits at home as they would do in store. By delivering the same immersive retail experience to users anywhere, Gautier can help further enhance the sales cycle and meet the needs of today’s digital-first shoppers.