Australian department store Myer is setting the stage for a business revamp, centred around its 20-year-old loyalty program.
This follows major shifts for the business over the last few years, including the acquisition of Apparel Brands – Just Jeans, Jay Jays, Jacqui E, Dotti and Portmans – and challenging trade for its Sass & Bide, Marcs and David Lawrence brands.
Myer’s first point of call is to relaunch the Myer One loyalty program in October this year, with a revised rewards system and tiering, and greater personalisation and gamification. Myer One currently boasts over 4.6 million active members, with 804,000 new customer applications coming through in FY25 so far, up from 453,000 in FY24.
The relaunch in October will also be pushed across the Apparel Brands and strategic partners.
Within the loyalty revamp, Myer confirmed there will be reduced tier thresholds, alongside an increasing metal tier base intended to capture over 30 per cent of members. There will also be new value and experiential benefits, as well as integrated boosters, exclusive offers and first access programs.
Complementing the new program will include a new ‘Reward and Offer Hub’ and a shoppable app.
Further ahead into 2026 and 2027, the loyalty program will then be pushed across Sass & Bide, Marcs and David Lawrence, with other added benefits such as the option to bank points and redeem for non-Myer rewards, and the option to add non-spend based status accelerators.
“I believe we are only at the beginning of the Myer One story,” Myer Group executive chair Olivia Wirth said. “We haven’t been using it effectively to drive product decisions and to date it hasn’t been used at scale. That’s going to change.
“We can distil customer behaviour from the data and use it to better cater for their preferences in our shopping proposition. Our loyalty program also offers us a range of monetisation opportunities through retail media and building partnerships.”
Loyalty and omni-channel revamps aside, Myer is also keen to restage its fashion brands, including redefining Myer exclusive brands and Myer owned brands and how they show up in-store. This includes shifting product ranging and fixtures to target different age groups or categories, and launching ‘Only at Myer’ capsules.
In a note to investors, analysts at Canaccord Genuity said their top highlight was the “solid progress" being made on the Myer exclusive brands and owned brands portfolios – excluding Sass & Bide, Marcs and David Lawrence which they note had limited airtime.
“This includes retiring six brands and making five dual gender,” the analysts noted. “New ranges from these brands are expected by February 2026, with strong execution potentially seeing a 400bps improvement in gross margins for womenswear and 450bps for menswear.”
Speaking on the overall strategy released by Myer, covering a 116-slide presentation, the analysts said there is no doubt a level of execution risk lies ahead for the fashion group, “but we concur with management that MYR has a strong retail engine that can be optimised.”
“Having underperformed in each of its sector verticals over the past decade, we believe there remains a large potential prize worth playing for,” the analysts wrote. “Of importance, Myer’s brand health looks to be in good stead and, within a six-month window, material improvements to the way the group engages with its customers should have been actioned.
“Any early indicators of success from these initiatives act as key upcoming catalyst, in our view. We retain our BUY recommendation and $1.05/share price target.”
Myer’s forward strategy also drilled down into sourcing, supply chain and property, including overcoming the pain points amid the operational launch of its national distribution centre, and updating its financial framework. It also revealed a new store design concept for Myer and its Just Jeans subsidiary, and Myer exclusive brand designs.
According to Wirth, Myer is the second largest apparel retailer in Australia. “We carry more than 350,000 SKUs during peak trading and last year generated combined sales of more than $4 billion,” she said. “More than $800 million of those sales were online – a channel that is often overlooked by the market in relation to Myer.”