El Corte Inglés online: The Spanish retailer that failed to become Amazon

El Corte Inglés struggles with e-commerce and runs out of time

A flat-pack wardrobe arrives damaged and takes nearly a month to return. Three orders are cancelled because they won't arrive by Christmas, despite the website promising delivery on the 21st. An item available in another city, just an hour and a half away by car, cannot be shipped because, according to customer service, "online and physical stores are separate channels." These are three specific examples of a complaint that has persisted for years: the department store giant, with the country's most powerful logistics infrastructure, fails to refine its digital management. The recurring diagnosis is always the same: it is not a technology problem, but a leadership issue.

A website with 2007 aesthetics and an app no one defends

The user experience on El Corte Inglés' online channel is the most frequent criticism. "The UX feels like a 2007 website. 'Lamentable' is an understatement," summarizes one of the most upvoted comments. The mobile app receives the same verdict: "The application is terrible. It makes no sense that they haven't improved it," notes another message, admitting they moved purchases to Amazon that could have been made at the Spanish giant precisely because competitors meet deadlines and don't obstruct returns.

The contrast with physical stores is what hurts the most. Several voices agree that in-person service remains superior: salespeople look for deals, compare store prices with their own website, and apply promotions. "As a physical business, it is among the most professional there is," says someone who, however, has stopped buying clothes online at El Corte Inglés in favor of Amazon. The gap between the two channels is not just about price or catalog: it is about experience.

The problem isn't logistics, it's who signs off on decisions

Here the analysis becomes uncomfortable for the company. El Corte Inglés has stock, warehouses, suppliers, and purchasing power sufficient to have been Spain's Amazon. "It could have been the Spanish Amazon; but it has a major problem, and it lies with its leaders and middle management," argues one of the most developed theses. The argument: in a structure where surnames, family networking, and private university connections weigh more than merit for promotion, adapting to a world without internet was not a technological challenge, but a cultural impossibility.

The description from those who worked inside is even harsher. Departments "anchored to working methods and procedures from the 80s," with middle managers to whom daily reporting was required and whose approval conditioned billing. Bureaucracy "even when you went to the bathroom," with no capacity to adapt to any setback. The conclusion of this testimony is a phrase that sums up the entire thread: "They are the retail version of the civil service world, a dinosaur in the 21st century."

The diagnosis repeats in another direct experience: a person who worked on the internal app during saturated holiday seasons claims they preferred hauling kilos of clothes in the warehouse rather than facing that system. Salespeople, they say, "spoke ill" of the tool.

Christmas as a stress test: cancellations, delays, and disconnected channels

The Christmas campaign serves as an annual test, and the result, according to collected cases, is systematically poor. Some cancelled three packages that didn't arrive on time, despite the website marking delivery for the 21st. And there is an episode that illustrates better than any other the rigidity of the structure: an item available in another city, an hour and a half away, that couldn't be shipped because, according to the response received, online and physical channels are watertight compartments. The solution proposed to the customer was for them to go buy it themselves.

The pattern repeats in in-store pickup: orders delayed while waiting for long shipments saying the product must come from "some lost center in rural Spain," only to appear by chance on shelves at another center in the same city. The feeling conveyed by several accounts is that of a company where no one has the complete picture.

The real business: the credit card and a captive clientele

There is a less technological and more financial explanation for why the giant survives. The El Corte Inglés card functions as a loyalty mechanism and, simultaneously, as a shackle: there are regular customers with debts of several thousand euros accumulated and monthly installments that leave their paychecks at the limit. In this context, continuing to shop at the store is not a consumption choice, but the only way to make ends meet. This is the argument supporting the view that the business lives not on e-commerce, but on consumer credit.

To this is added the company's historical weight in the Spanish economy. The analysis includes the thesis, debated within the material itself, that in the nineties the State relied on the company's liquidity to face treasury tensions. The more prudent version accepts that El Corte Inglés' advance payments might have alleviated some punctual urgency, but discards the grandiloquent reading. What is documented in the material is the group's technological arm: its former IT subsidiary became one of the largest government technology contractors, close to Indra in volume, before being sold and integrated into a French group.

The exception that proves the rule

Not all experiences are bad. There are buyers who received their orders on time, even during Christmas, with delivery dates indicated at checkout and met. And there is a case that has become the favorite counterexample: a sofa bought for 100 euros, including removal of the old one and two delivery visits, which the buyer calls the best deal of their life. "Yes, they took a little longer to come," they admit. The problem, in these cases, wasn't the price or the product: it was the time.

The question hovering over the entire analysis is why a company with such purchasing power doesn't copy what already works. Nothing needs to be invented: there are a thousand proven e-commerce models. Mercadona took years to have a decent app, but it has one. At El Corte Inglés, the feeling conveyed by the stories is that no one with decision-making power considers the digital channel a real priority.

Meanwhile, the shift of purchases to Amazon is described as a constant and increasing trickle. Not due to price, in many cases, but due to predictability. And that is the bill a centenary company cannot pay with Roscón de Reyes (traditional Christmas cake).