Luxury department store Selfridges is branching out into weddings and has been granted a wedding licence. The iconic central London store has created a dedicated wedding suite on the fourth floor of the Grade II-listed building, and will offer packages that include pampering, flowers and food and drink. And weddings are not the only new venture for Selfridges. The world-famous store will also be offering floristry classes, out-of-hours children's parties and private cinema screenings.
Selfridges is hopeful the new offerings will help it bounce back from its pandemic-year losses. Last summer the store announced it was cutting its staff numbers back by 14%, the equivalent of 450 lost jobs. And it's not the only business making changes.
COVID-19 has been a catalyst for some major companies to fast-forward plans or change their business model, even temporarily, to keep cash coming in and adapt to the new world we're living in. Click or scroll through our round-up of big businesses changing course as a result of the global crisis.
Despite coronavirus having an initially negative impact on the construction timetable of Tesla's first European Gigafactory near Grünheide in Germany (pictured), the electric carmaker has since forged ahead, with a deadline of 1 July 2021 imposed by company CEO Elon Musk. Recent reports suggest that red tape related to climate issues in the area could slow down proceedings, but no delay to the completion date has been suggested so far. Once completed, the mega-factory is set to create 10,000 new jobs, which is more than the small German town’s entire population currently, and produce around 500,000 cars each year. The demand for Tesla cars in Europe is expected to increase, as the pandemic has renewed focus on green issues, especially now that stricter emissions regulations have come into force in Europe.
Elon Musk has also fast-tracked moving Tesla's operations from Silicon Valley, California to Texas, and has himself already moved down south following confrontation with Californian officials in May last year. This came after they refused to allow the eccentric billionaire to reopen his Gigafactory at the height of the COVID-19 outbreak. Musk described the pandemic-related closure as “the final straw” on Twitter, and is one of many bosses who have determined Texas as a good alternative to the high taxes, expensive housing and stringent government regulations that come with working in California. Tesla is building a $1 billion (£700m) Gigafactory in Tesla, and plans for another development right next to Giga Texas called the 'Bobcat Project', but it's not yet known what this new facility will be for.
More traditional carmakers are also seeing the potential value of the electric car market, and Audi has even created a new department to focus solely on fast-tracking its electric vehicles to market quicker than planned. Called Artemis, the unit's job is to add more than 20 pure electric models to its range by 2024. The company has also confirmed plans to produce new electric cars based on the Premium Platform Electric (PPE) architecture from 2024, in partnership with Chinese manufacturer First Automobile Works (FAW).
Amazon is greatly benefitting from the coronavirus pandemic as stay-at-home orders have led online shopping to go through the roof. Needless to say, the e-commerce behemoth is fast-tracking the construction of a number of fulfilment centres, including new warehouse facilities in the US state of Delaware (pictured) and Brisbane, Australia. Last autumn, Amazon also announced plans for new state-of-the-art fulfilment centres in Mississippi and Oklahoma, and a second warehouse in Melbourne, Australia. The company has also taken advantage of shopping malls abandoned due to the pandemic, taking them over and turning them into distribution centres. For example, in March Amazon won approval to convert disused malls in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Knoxville, Tennessee into centres. But it's not a new concept for Amazon, and between 2016 and 2019 it converted 25 shopping malls into distribution centres.
Gap has fast-tracked plans to triple the number of robots in its warehouses. The automatons were due for delivery from supplier Kindred AI in autumn but were being rolled out months ahead of schedule so that the retailer could maintain its production line without compromising the wellbeing of human workers. In March, Gap expanded its robot capabilities to streamline how it processes returns, too.
Staying with leading US tech companies, Microsoft is relocating the production of its Surface desktop PCs, notebooks and tablets from China to partner factories in northern Vietnam according to Nikkei Asian Review. The risk-mitigating move was finalised during the second quarter of last year.
Microsoft has also brought forward plans to shut 83 of its physical stores. The move away from brick-and-mortar business has actually cost the tech giant $450 million (£360m) in taxes, but is seen as a strategic decision that will pay off in the long term. The tech giant will keep several physical locations open in cities such as New York, Sydney, London (pictured) and Redmond, Washington, but as experience centres where potential customers can try out Microsoft products rather than buy them.
After reporting a $3.2 billion (£2.6bn) loss in June last year, COVID-19 prompted Starbucks to double down on the rollout of its new pickup-only store concept, which lets customers pre-order via the firm's app and grab their pumpkin spice lattes and caramel macchiatos from streamlined, takeout-only outlets. The move comes from research pre-pandemic that found that 80% of Starbucks orders were to take out. Already, two cities – New York and Toronto – boast pickup-only stores, and hundreds more are set to open in North America before the end of 2021.
Walmart has shifted focus to its digital sales during the pandemic, and as a result the retailer is also firing some of its robot employees. In November the company terminated its contract with Bossa Nova Robotics, which had supplied around 500 robots capable of checking inventory levels in-store, after the retailer realised humans could do a better job. More recently Walmart announced it would be scaling back the automated pick-up towers (pictured) it has in many stores. The 17-foot towers hold orders ready for customers to collect at the front of stores, but 1,300 are being “hibernated” and a further 300 removed altogether as shoppers have reported preferring curbside pick-up, which has been implemented throughout the COVID-19 outbreak.
While the coronavirus pandemic has left the international travel industry in flux, Australian airline Qantas is hoping to boost domestic tourism by offering passengers mystery flights. Popular in the 1990s, passengers board a plane for a day trip without knowing the destination in advance, and activities such as wine-making and snorkelling are included in the package. This is just one of Qantas’ creative tactics for attracting travellers – the airline was also one of the first to launch flights to nowhere, which take off and land at the same airport and include a scenic route of the country’s iconic landmarks.
While flying for leisure still makes up the minority of the aviation industry for the time being, many airlines have changed tack from carrying holidaymakers to delivering life-saving cargo. In March last year, American Airlines made its first cargo-only flight in 35 years, while British Airways converted two of its Boeing 777s to be used as makeshift cargo aircraft two months later. And this pivot has continued. In November, Emirates was reportedly offering airfreight capacity on flights to 135 destinations, having created the world’s first dedicated air cargo facility especially for COVID-19 vaccines, and in March this year Abu Dabi’s Etihad Airways temporarily converted its fifth Boeing jet to cargo duty as demand for airfreight continues to exceed passenger footfall.
Some planes are being retired altogether. Plummeting passenger traffic has hastened the demise of the supersized Airbus A380, which some commentators have described as a modern-day dinosaur. Air France-KLM made the decision to accelerate the retirement of its fleet, a process that wasn't due to start until the end of 2022. Similarly, Lufthansa was also set to retire its fleet of Airbus A380s in 2022 but Germany's national carrier has also fast-tracked the process. Australia's Qantas, on the other hand, plans to retain its fleet of superjumbo jets, but the aircraft will be moved to America's Mojave Desert for storage until 2023 due to reduced demand. At the beginning of December, only 21 of the 243 Airbus A380s that were in use pre-pandemic were still in service.
A global surge in remote working and the near-on collapse of the international travel industry has prompted Princess Cruises to look at what it can offer customers to keep the company afloat. Its solution? Offices at sea. Princess Cruises has partnered with SES to provide all its ships with “land-like connectivity”, which will be possible thanks to a new satellite constellation due to be launched later this year, to entice those wishing to work or study while at sea. The service designed for working professionals will also include on-demand food, beverage and retail items delivered anywhere onboard and a friends and family locator or chat function to help you find your travel companions once you’ve finished work for the day.
Drone company Zipline has been able to fast-track plans to deliver medical supplies and PPE to Novant Health hospitals in North Carolina after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) granted the firm an emergency temporary waiver as a result of the pandemic. The trailblazing service, the first of its kind in the US, was slated to start in October last year but got off the ground in May, months ahead of schedule. And it isn’t just medical equipment being dispatched by drone – Walmart has also recently secured a deal with Zipline to pilot grocery deliveries from one of its Arkansas stores.
Across the Atlantic, UK pharmacy chain Boots, which is part of the Chicago-based Walgreens Boots Alliance, brought forward the trial of a new online doctor and pharmacy consultation service after extending its partnership with digital healthcare company LIVI. Boots is also rolling out in-store digital services including diagnostic tools such as blood pressure monitoring.
Holographic technologies are also being embraced like never before. London-based HYPERVSN has repackaged its offerings to enable businesses to thrive post-COVID-19, fast-tracking the launch of products that include holographic doctors, digital promoters, holographic informational signage and contactless holographic menu boards. Most recently bosses from furniture behemoth IKEA used the technology to ‘attend’ a store opening in Egypt, in the form of life-size holograms. The global holographic market is set to be worth around $1.8 billion (£1.3bn) by 2025, according to projections by ResearchAndMarkets.com.
Sophia the robot was first shown to the world in 2016, and she shocked onlookers with her eerily lifelike facial expressions and AI-based social capabilities. And so, as COVID-19 swept across the globe, the company behind Sophia, Hanson Robotics, saw how their invention could help in healthcare and education settings, as well as take on the role of a companion for those who felt isolated during the pandemic. As a result, mass production of four robot models, including Sophia, were set to start in the first half of this year, with the goal of selling “thousands” of the robots by the end of 2021.
In-person dates were suddenly off the table when COVID-19 struck, leaving the dating app industry in a bit of a quandary. Some apps were ahead of the game, such as Bumble, which had already introduced in-app video and face calls in 2019, allowing virtual dates to take place. The rest of the industry was quick to follow after user growth fell in the first quarter of 2020. Hinge introduced a ‘Date from Home’ video feature in May, while Tinder added ‘Face to Face’ calls in October.
As well as virtual property viewings and remote art experiences, virtual conferencing has exploded in popularity during the pandemic. With demand so strong, virtual events platforms such as Hopin are doing a roaring trade and have been able to bring forward expansion plans. “We’re pushing out the product faster than we expected to,” Hopin founder and CEO Johnny Boufarhat told CNBC in March. The brand secured $165 million (£121m) across two rounds of funding in 2020 after bringing its annual recurring revenue from nothing to $20 million (£14.6m) in the space of nine months.
With cinemas shuttered around the world, major movie studios put back theatrical releases. In contrast, streaming services such as Disney+ are fast-tracking their schedule. The production of the movie version of award-winning Broadway musical Hamilton was brought forward and the film premiered on 3 July, more than three months ahead of schedule.
Disney also announced an abundance of new projects set to reach our screens in the next decade, as the huge success of Star Wars spin-off series The Mandalorian has opened “an entirely new era” for the franchise, according to Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy. The next 10 years will see 10 new Star Wars series and 10 new Marvel series launched exclusively on Disney+, as the company looks to hold onto the momentum gained by the streaming service during the COVID-19 pandemic.
British café chain Pret A Manger (known colloquially as Pret) is set to open concession stores in UK supermarket Tesco in a new trial, with the first opening in the supermarket's Kensington, London superstore in June. The aim is to broaden Pret's appeal and audience, after the pandemic had a big impact on a business that had relied on people grabbing food and drink on the move. Before the announcement, Pret had been selling frozen croissants and granola in Tesco stores. And it's not the only measure Pret has brought in to try to accelerate the recovery from its coronavirus slump, as the chain has also launched a £20-a-month subscription, which gives customers up to five coffees per day.
Retailers that may have delayed introducing contactless payment options have had to roll them out sooner than anticipated to enable their customers to stay as safe as possible during the pandemic. US supermarket chain Publix, for instance, launched contactless payments at its 1,200 stores in the southeast of the country due to COVID-19. There has been a global push to increase the usage of contactless, as the UK and most countries in Europe increased spending limits on PIN-free payments at the beginning of the pandemic, and Visa launched new technology to speed up contactless payments on public transport. Many see this as speeding up the move towards a cashless society.