Hearst, a global diversified media, information, and services company, has announced it will revolutionise the buying experience of its consumer media businesses with the help of a digital marketplace.

This transformational move will provide a unified and streamlined shopping experience for its 165 million monthly unique users across its fashion, do-it-yourself, home improvement, and lifestyle publications. Enabling this move is a partnership with VTEX, a global enterprise digital commerce platform and experience innovation company, Valtech.

Hearst plans to pivot with this new business model, playing an instrumental role in the company's strategy for thriving in the 2024 digital economy. This underscores Hearst's ambition to become a frontrunner in the rapidly evolving media-driven eCommerce landscape.

VTEX Commerce Cloud, a platform with a wide array of native capabilities, multi-site architecture, and a development platform supporting custom features, will be used by Hearst to transform its business model and render its high-traffic publications shoppable. This eCommerce platform aids in integrating marketplace and core digital commerce aspects to support multi-vendor business models. Consequently, Hearst's publications will enjoy enhanced interplay with shoppable interfaces, making shopping for featured products a simple task for users.

Mariano Gomide de Faria, VTEX's Founder and Co-CEO, expressed his excitement about the partnership, "We are thrilled to partner with Hearst Corporation by providing a digital commerce platform that will support some of the most beloved publications worldwide."

"In today's environment, traditional business models are being challenged. Forward-thinking organisations, like Hearst, are investing in the tools to reinvent themselves to thrive in the modern retail environment," said Mariano Gomide de Faria. 

Raising the question of why VTEX was the preferred partner, Robert Gash, Hearst's Chief Technology Officer of eCommerce, said, "VTEX provides us with the ability to launch quickly with out of the box features and the flexibility to use its APIs to iteratively enhance our offerings. This partnership will help us leverage new business models in the digital economy, and we're excited to grow with VTEX."

With VTEX's comprehensive digital commerce platform, Hearst aims to revolutionise how consumers engage with their publications. In this endeavour, experience innovation company Valtech is also partnering with VTEX and Hearst to assist in this digital advancement. Hearst is confident that the tripartite collaboration will reaffirm its strategy to brace the advancing digital economy of 2024 and beyond.

According to Charles Desjardins, EVP and MD at Valtech, Hearst's move towards embracing a media-driven eCommerce landscape is extraordinary. "With this launch, Hearst has taken a significant step toward becoming a frontrunner in the evolving media-driven eCommerce landscape."

"Their new VTEX-powered platform is redefining the industry. We're excited to help build a unique commerce journey to support Hearst's future growth and reflect its position as a media powerhouse," said Charles Desjardins.