Walmart Acquires Outdoor Gear Retailer Moosejaw To Boost Online Sales
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
The $51 million acquisition is designed to best Amazon in the apparel and sporting goods categories.
Walmart has aimed a punch at Amazon’s chin with its announcement that it has acquired outdoor gear retailer Moosejaw. The $51 million acquisition, which closed on February 13, 2017, is designed to boost online sales and steal away sales of apparel and sporting goods from competitor Amazon.
Moosejaw currently has 10 physical stores and a large web presence, and carries more than 400 brands of gear. Founded in 1992, Moosejaw is headquartered in Madison Heights, Michigan.
With the acquisition, Moosejaw will be run as a standalone operation, and serve as a complementary brand to Walmart’s existing e-commerce sites, adding a crucial element for digital commerce in apparel and accessories.
According to Tech Crunch, Moosejaw recently made Internet Retailer’s 2017 “Hot 100” list, but Walmart is more interested how the retailer operates in the apparel and sporting goods category and the industry relationships it brings to the table, in addition to its expertise in social media marketing which allowed it to attract a younger audience.
Com.Score found that clothing and accessories became the largest online retail category for the first time in 2015, and now many companies are battling for control over the e-commerce segment among consumers.
“We’re thrilled to join Walmart’s eCommerce team and look forward to the opportunity to lead the outdoor vertical across their online presence,” said Moosejaw CEO Eoin Comerford, in a statement. “Our new relationship puts us in a unique position to manage these marketplaces for our brand partners, but inclusion on Jet.com or any of Walmart’s e-commerce sites is 100% at each brand’s discretion.”
"From the customer's perspective, they really won't see much change in Moosejaw.com or our stores," said Comerford. "We are going to continue to be an outdoor specialty retailer of premium brands.
"You are going to have the same Moosejaw voice and the same Moosejaw madness is going to be very prevalent," he said. At the same time, the acquisition does not mean that customers will see Moosejaw merchandise in Walmart stores. Comerford explained, “You won’t go into Walmart and see Moosejaw T-shirts. The customers are quite different.”
“There’s going to be a lot of integration on the backend,” Walmart spokesperson Ravi Jariwala said regarding the deal’s impact at Walmart. “[This will include] things like taking advantage of the bigger scale and leveraging those costs for things like shipping rates, credit card fees, and transaction processing fees,” he told Tech Crunch.
In addition, Jariwala pointed out that Walmart will model its operation of Moosejaw after Jet.com’s successful relationship with Hayneedle. “That’s a model we’re looking to replicate,” he said.