Four times a year, OLIVE YOUNG’s O.Y SALE brings seven days of special offers and new discoveries that customers look forward to. But behind those seven days is a much longer timeline. For the people who make the sale happen, the countdown begins nearly three months in advance. As soon as one sale ends, preparations for the next begin. Teams review customer responses, discover new products, work with brand partners on promotions and content, and check everything from stores and the online mall to logistics and customer services. The result is a week that may feel seamless to customers, but takes three months of work across OLIVE YOUNG to bring to life. Three months of preparation for seven days For OLIVE YOUNG employees, O.Y SALE is one of the company’s biggest cross-functional projects, returning every three months. From merchandisers (MD) and marketers to store operations, logistics and online and offline service teams, people across the company work toward the same goal. That means discovering products customers will want, creating compelling offers, and making it easy for them to find and purchase what they are looking for. Each team has a different role, but every part of the process ultimately comes back to the customer experience. Once the sale begins, the work does not stop. Teams closely monitor sales patterns and customer responses throughout the day, looking at which products are attracting more attention than expected and whether customers encounter any friction along the way. When the sale ends, those observations and results become the starting point for the next one. In that sense, the end of one three-month cycle is simply the beginning of another. O.Y SALE has evolved beyond being simply a time to shop at a great price. It has become an event where customers actively explore and discover new brands and products. For brands, it is also an important opportunity to connect with new customers during a period of heightened attention and see how products resonate with them. This is especially valuable for new products, as the customer response during O.Y SALE can provide meaningful insights that help us refine our strategies for developing them further.” — S from Cell Fusion C Discovering the potential of a product together OLIVE YOUNG MDs oversee the journey of a product from discovering new brands and products to bringing them into OLIVE YOUNG, developing promotions and communicating with customers. Alongside analyzing sales trends and customer responses within their categories, they are constantly looking for emerging brands and new products that customers may not have discovered yet. As O.Y SALE approaches, collaboration with brand partners becomes even closer. Together, MDs and partners consider what makes a product distinctive, who it is for, and what kind of offer or content will best communicate its appeal. When an MD believes a product has something special to offer, they may even take it directly to the promotional team, introducing the product and making the case for why customers should discover it. The process goes beyond simply deciding which products to feature. Teams refine offers and content, develop event plans and explore new ways to introduce products to customers. It is a collaborative process in which brand partners, MDs and OLIVE YOUNG work together to give a product the opportunity to be discovered, and potentially become the starting point for a brand’s next stage of growth. Finding the right way to bring each product to life The Sales Marketing Team looks across O.Y SALE as a whole, determining how promotional benefits can be presented most effectively and working with other marketing teams to decide how products discovered by MDs can be introduced in ways that help customers understand their appeal. The team also oversees key parts of product promotions, from selecting featured products and reviewing pricing to analyzing customer responses and sales performance. O.Y SALE brings together products that customers already know and love with brands and products that OLIVE YOUNG wants to introduce to a wider audience. Because every product has different strengths and speaks to a different customer, the goal is not to present them all in the same way, but to find the format that brings out what makes each one distinctive. At the same time, promotional spaces such as “Today’s Special” and “OLIVE YOUNG Pick” are limited. The Sales Marketing Team considers a range of factors, including product characteristics, customer demand, the value of each offer and the overall composition of the sale. The goal is not simply to maximize the performance of individual products, but to create a balanced selection across categories and brands, one that gives customers opportunities to discover something new. The first moment customers meet O.Y SALE By the time O.Y SALE begins, customers may already have encountered it several times. Marketing activities start well ahead of the event, using channels including YouTube and social media to build awareness and introduce products and brands to watch. Teams work with creators whose audiences align with particular customer interests and explore the formats that can best showcase each product. The aim is to spark curiosity to help customers discover something they did not know about and make them want to take a closer look once O.Y SALE begins. Turning that interest into an actual shopping experience requires another layer of preparation across the company. Products need to be selected and inventory secured. Online event pages and systems need to be checked. Distribution centers and stores need to prepare for increased orders and foot traffic. From the moment a customer discovers a product in a piece of content to the moment they purchase it in a store or online, a wide network of teams is working behind the scenes. The short journey customers see is supported by months of preparation and the infrastructure that connects every step. At the frontline of O.Y SALE: the store After months of preparation across the company, the store is where O.Y SALE ultimately becomes a customer experience. Store employees use sales data and the characteristics of each location to plan orders and monitor inventory throughout the event. They adjust displays so customers can easily spot new products and promotional offers, while carefully managing the store environment and customer flow to make shopping comfortable even when foot traffic increases. When O.Y SALE starts and customers begin coming into the store, that’s actually when I get more excited. Thinking about which products to recommend and what conversations I can have with customers makes O.Y SALE even more enjoyable.” — Crew member A from OLIVE YOUNG Myeongdong Town The stores are busier than ever during O.Y SALE, but they are also where employees can see customer reactions firsthand. Which products are customers drawn to? What kinds of recommendations resonate with them? What questions come up most often? Those observations become another source of insight for the teams working behind the scenes. Store employees share what they see and hear with relevant teams, helping turn the customer experience on the sales floor into insights that can inform future products, promotions and services. After months of planning, it is the energy and attention of store employees that bring the products and promotions to life for customers. Connecting what happens on the ground with the numbers For teams such as the Sales Strategy Team, which connect headquarters with stores, the O.Y SALE period often begins on the ground. They visit stores and speak with employees who are closest to customers, listening to which products are attracting attention and what questions or reactions are coming up most often. They look at customers’ shopping baskets and combine what they see with the observations of store employees, building a picture of O.Y SALE that numbers alone cannot provide. At the end of each day, those observations are paired with data. Teams analyze how customer visits and purchasing patterns have changed compared with previous sales, and identify newly emerging areas of interest among products and categories. The findings are then translated into clear, actionable messages that store employees can quickly understand and use. “More customers are visiting OLIVE YOUNG for the first time during this sale.” The work is not simply about presenting numbers. It is about interpreting what those numbers reveal about customer behavior and turning that insight into something teams can act on. With a clearer understanding of what customers are looking for, store employees can respond with more relevant recommendations and guidance. O.Y SALE is an important opportunity for Torriden to drive short-term sales while introducing the strength of our products to a broader range of customers. During last September’s OLIVE YOUNG SALE, our products featuring the Sanrio Characters IP led to more than a 40% increase in organic content created by customers compared with the previous sale, while brand sales grew 20% year over year. It was also meaningful to see customers showing interest across a wider range of products for not only our hero products, but also categories such as cleansers and toner pads. This helped us reach new customers and ultimately turn that interest into actual purchases.” — Y from Brand Marketing at Torriden Preparing for the experience after checkout The customer experience does not end when an order is placed. For an online purchase to arrive safely and on time, every step, from receiving products at the distribution center to picking, packing and shipping, needs to work together. The Logistics Team manages the flow of inventory and shipments through OLIVE YOUNG’s distribution centers, while using order data from each sale to refine how the next one will be handled. During O.Y SALE, a much larger volume of orders arrives within a concentrated period. While responding to the demands of the current sale, the team is already looking ahead to the next one. They share information with relevant teams and brand partners about which products may see increased demand, then coordinate everything from inbound inventory timing to outbound shipping and delivery. A surge in orders is welcome, but it also means paying closer attention to every step. A small delay at one point in the process can affect everything that follows. After each sale, the team reviews what worked smoothly and where additional time was needed. Those lessons become part of the operating playbook for the next sale. During O.Y SALE, orders come in all at once, so every step matters, from getting products in on time to shipping them accurately and making sure they reach customers safely. We review the results of each event and use what we learn to prepare for the next one more reliably.” — B from the SCM Planning Team The O.Y SALE experience extends beyond the moment a customer discovers and purchases a product. It also includes the moment that product arrives safely at their door. Three months of work, one week of experience O.Y SALE brings together products that customers already love alongside new brands and products just beginning to meet them. Before any one product reaches the customer, a long chain of people has already played a part: the brand partner that created it, the MD who discovered it, the teams that developed the right promotion and content, and the store employees who introduce it to customers in person. Along the way, new products are discovered, customer feedback is gathered, and those insights feed into the products and services that come next. The experience built together by brand partners and OLIVE YOUNG during one sale becomes a foundation for making the next one better. The roles may be different, but the focus is shared: discovering good products, communicating what makes them valuable, and helping customers find what is right for them with ease. From MDs and marketers to store and logistics teams, the work happening across OLIVE YOUNG comes together to create one seven-day event. For customers, it is a week to shop. For the people behind it, it is three months in the making.