Should have gone to TerminalFour – Specsavers in pan-European CMS deal

12 Dec 2008

Pan-European retail optician chain Specsavers is to deploy a content management system (CMS) developed by Irish company TerminalFour to power all its websites and brands in 10 countries across Europe.

The TerminalFour solution will enable Specsavers to efficiently manage corporate brand sites across all international territories, and to innovate new ways of interacting with consumers online. The first sites have already been deployed in the UK and New Zealand.

Specsavers currently operates in 10 countries around the world, including the UK, the Netherlands, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia, Spain, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland. 

Previously, each of the websites supporting these countries had been administered by a central web team.

In order to foster integration and collaboration across all websites, Specsavers decided to invest in an enterprise web CMS to enable countries and departments to become responsible for their own content.

TerminalFour was selected to provide this service after a highly competitive global tendering process.

“The open-source ethos behind TerminalFour has given our developers the flexibility to integrate and customise every element of the project to our exact needs,” explained Chris Corbin, Specsavers IT accounts manager.

“As a result, Site Manager has expedited the project by removing the complexities and barriers to development, ultimately reducing lead times and driving down costs.”

TerminalFour Site Manager will enable Specsavers to clone the ‘master’ website across jurisdictions, while also allowing the flexibility to cater to individual country language, regulatory and cultural factors. 

The system also enables consistency in brand representation, while integrating with Specsaver’s in-house customer relationship systems and streamlined online order processing.

This includes an innovative ‘try on our frames’ option, which offers customers the ability to upload their image and super-impose glasses from the entire Specsavers range.  Since the site went live, five million frames have been tried.

“Specsavers has set itself a huge challenge in overhauling its global web presence, while still maintaining an interactive and engaging brand support and online shopping experience for its expanding customer base,” explained Piero Tintori, managing director of TerminalFour.

“The scale of the project is enormous and requires a strategic partnership with an enterprise web content management provider to make these plans a reality.

“We won the business based on our proven ability to deliver similar sized projects, our commitment to deadlines, and on the flexible nature of our software,” Tintori added.

By John Kennedy

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com