Old Brand, New Ideas

Pang Fu Wei, group managing director of Mothercare, on how the household name is revitalising physical retail in Covid-19 times.

- Daryl Lee

It’s safe to say that even before the Covid-19 pandemic hit last year, physical retail was already experiencing a bit of an existential crisis. Every few months, you might read news about the state of physical retail being in a dire state.

It’s enough to give any retailer sleepless nights, especially one with a long history in Singapore like Mothercare, which has 10 stores here. Group managing director Pang Fu Wei describes it as a fast-paced sector within a fast-paced sector, catering to a “very narrow subset of consumers” – parents in their 20s and 30s.

Another hitch is the falling birth rate and how Pang acknowledges this demographic readily “embraces change and new technology”. And it’s not a particularly forgiving market –Mothercare UK’s operations were put into administration at the end of 2019, shuttering all 79 of its stores.

In Singapore, under 32-year-old Pang’s watchful eye, things seem to be thriving, all thanks to changes implemented before the pandemic hit.