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Selfridges, the iconic luxury department store that has been reimagining retail and creating original ideas since 1909, has chosen Wordsmith AI and is exploring how legal and privacy work will be shaped and changed by AI in the years ahead.
While Selfridges is perhaps best known for turning shopping into a theatre of experience, picture an indoor skate bowl, a brasserie with its own towering Damien Hirst, a Corner Shop that changes its entire concept every month, and, most recently, its very own members’ club, 40 Duke, the Legal and Privacy teams have quietly been reimagining life backstage.
Meet Smithy. That is what the Selfridges Legal and Privacy teams have taken to calling their new sidekick, and the nickname rather suits it.
If you have ever tried to keep pace with Selfridges, you will know it is not a straightforward brief. Across four stores in London, Manchester and Birmingham, spanning over 96,000 square metres of retail space, and digital channels that ship to more than 130 countries, the business operates at relentless speed. A Disney Christmas collaboration one week, a members club launch the next and an ever-evolving line-up of pop-ups, brand activations and new circular products and services through Reselfridges.
Behind every one of those moments, there is a Legal and Privacy team. And behind these teams, there is a very long list of priorities.
Commercial contracts and supplier agreements, data protection queries, advertising reviews, digital channel work, compliance advice, the volume and variety of legal tasks that flow through a business as dynamic as Selfridges is considerable. The team were looking for opportunities to use tech to support with managing that breadth and pace.
Selfridges is not the sort of organisation that rushes into things, even if the pace on the shop floor might suggest otherwise. The teams undertook an extensive review of the legal technology market before making a decision.
Multiple platforms were evaluated, and the bar was high. The teams needed a secure solution that could be applied across the full range of tasks they undertake day to day, not a point solution built for one narrow problem, but a platform capable of handling the genuine breadth and variety of in-house legal work.
Wordsmith came out on top.
"We looked carefully at what was available in the market. What drew us to Wordsmith was the breadth of its capability, this is a platform we can apply across so many parts of our work, from those repetitive, high-volume tasks right through to support for more complex, nuanced projects. It genuinely felt like a co-creator rather than just a tool."
Sarah Hemsley, General Counsel, Selfridges
Two things set Wordsmith apart in the eyes of Selfridges’ Legal and Privacy teams.
The first was versatility. Selfridges wanted a platform that could support across different workflows, automating the routine, supporting the complex, and giving the wider business faster access to legal support where needed.
The second was something rather rarer in the world of technology suppliers: Wordsmith listens. Feedback given is feedback taken seriously. The team found, repeatedly, that their input genuinely shaped the product. In a market where legal teams can feel like an afterthought, that responsiveness made a real difference.
The decision to trial and commit to Wordsmith was also, deliberately, an investment in understanding what legal work looks like in the years ahead. Legal and compliance professions are changing. AI is reshaping how teams are structuring their time, and what it means to deliver legal value to a business. Selfridges' Legal and Privacy teams wanted to be part of that change rather than observing it from a distance.
By choosing Wordsmith, the teams have created a live, real-world environment in which to test and learn, to understand what AI does brilliantly, where human judgement remains essential, and how the relationship between the two will evolve. That is a very Selfridges way of approaching things. The store has, after all, been experimenting with what retail could be since Harry Gordon Selfridge first threw open the doors on Oxford Street in 1909.
Ross McNairn, CEO of Wordsmith AI, commented:
"Selfridges is one of those genuinely iconic organisations, a business that has always set the standard for creativity and ambition. We are proud to be working with a legal team that approached this with the same energy. They came to us with real problems, a clear sense of what they needed, and a willingness to explore what AI can genuinely do for in-house legal. That is exactly the kind of partnership we want to build."
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