Magazine Retail IT issue 7/2012

Retail IT | Year 2 | Issue 07

ISSN 2217-6012

Southeast Asia in Focus

Product data synchronisation between companies worldwide

Optimising the customer experience

Different approaches to store Capacity Management Systems

Smart cash management at retail is touchless cash management

Redefining retail in a multi-channel environment

Contents In this issue...

News

News from the Asia, Middle East, Europe, Africa, Australia, and North/South America

Page 5

Southeast Asia in Focus

Page 28

Different approaches to store Capacity Management Systems Page 34

The ten most dangerous trends impacting retail supply chains today

Page 38

Sustainability - contribution to recycling by reverse vending machines Page 42 Putting technology into place – why location matters Page 46

Redefining retail in a multi-channel environment Page 49

Smart cash management at retail is touchless cash management

Page 52

Optimising the customer experience

Page 54

In the cloud? So 2005. Built for the cloud? Now that’s 2012.

Page 57

Five ways retailers can leverage product information to increase corporate profits in today’s economy

Page 59

Integrating department applications, POS applications and advanced barcoding technologies into PC-based scale technologies Page 62

Product data synchronisation between companies worldwide Page 64

Editorial:

Managing Editor: Svetlana Kosić

Publisher

Retail Media Stražilovska 31/3 21000 Novi Sad, Serbia

Managing Director Managing Editor Advertising Director Design and Production Contributors

Dipl. Ing. Darko Pavić Svetlana Kosić Sandra Bokun Ivan Moritz Aleksandra Uvalić

Photographer

Srđan Srđanov

Web Site:

www.retail-it.info

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CIP - Каталогизација у публикацији Библиотека Матице српске, Нови Сад 339 RETAIL IT : the magazine for information technology in retail and logistics / editor Svetlana Kosić . - Year 1, ISS. 1 (2011) . - Novi sad : Retail Media, 2011 - . - Ilustr. ; 30 cm Tromesečno ISSN 2217-6012 COBISS . SR - ID 264554247

Southeast Asia in Focus Centre of our attention is the 4th Retail IT Summit in Zagreb and its special guest Mr. Jozo Dzakula from Konzum, one of the biggest retailers in Croatia. The event will visit more than 120 guests, a great number of exhibitors and speakers, as well as many journalists from retail industry. After Croatian Summit we will turn our attention to the Middle East and the 3rd Retail IT Summit in Dubai, where we can expect some very interesting topics.

In this issue of Retail IT Magazine you can read about SE Asia market.

The Southeast Asia region with an estimated population of over 600 million inhabitants accounts for a significant portion of the global economy. The region’s proximity to China and Australia makes it an important market to consider. A young population, natural resources and in some countries traditionally run family-based businesses makes them an attractive investment opportunity for local or large, international companies. Also, in this issue read about different approaches to store capacity management systems, about the dangerous trends impacting retail supply chains today, about reverse vending machines, Product data synchronisation between companies and many other interesting topics.

Retail IT Magazine invites you to attend the 4th Retail IT Summit in Zagreb, on 18th October 2012. See you!

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Asia NEWS Restaurant chain KFC to open new outlet India

($8.95m). The first outlet under the plan will be unveiled in Kolkata in the state of West Bengal reported The Hindu Business Line. Yogen Früz South and East India franchisee owner Rishi Bajoria was quoted by the website as saying that the expansion is part of the company’s strategy to cater to the growing demand for frozen yogurt. The smoothie maker currently operates over 1,300 outlets in 35 countries across the globe.

Essar Oil partners with CCD to open stores Fast food chain KFC, part of US-based Yum! Restaurants, has opened its first outlet in Asansol, West Bengal, India. The new outlet, which is located on the ground floor of Galaxy mall, is spread over a space of 3,283 ft², reported indiaretailing.com. The restaurant marks the chain’s first outlet in the city. Other quick service restaurant chains opened in the mall include CCD and Domino’s.

KFC currently operates more than 107 KFC restaurants in 21 cities across India.

Smoothie maker Yogen Früz to open 100 outlets in India

Essar Oil (EOL), a private sector refiner, has teamed up with Café Coffee Day (CCD) to increase its non-fuel revenues.

Under the deal, Café Coffee Day has unveiled its first outlet at Essar petrol pump on the Pune-Ahmednagar highway, India. Essar Oil’s marketing CEO, S Thangapandian, said the nonfuel business is a strategic segment for the company and it is expected to contribute significantly to the company’s growth in the near future. “Our tie-up with Cafe Coffee Day is part of this strategy and it also results in effective use of available land in a retail outlet’s premises, thus leveraging on the available resources to a maximum level,” added Thangapandian.

Home furnishing retailer Ikea to expand in China Frozen yogurt and smoothie maker Yogen Früz plans to open 100 new retail outlets in India over the next seven years outlining an investment of INR500m

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Netherlands-based home products retailer Ikea plans to expand its retail network in China by opening at least three stores annually. The retailer intends to focus more on second-tier cities as part of its long-term commitment to make

China its largest market in 15 to 20 years, reported ChinaDaily.com.cn. Ikea will have 17 stores across the country by the end of 2014, following the opening of a new outlet in Ningbo, a third store in Shanghai and a second store in Beijing.

British retailer WHSmith opens first store in Kuala Lumpur airport

UK-based books and stationary retailer WHSmith has opened its first store in Southeast Asia at Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA) in Malaysia.

The new store will be operated in partnership with local retailer Bison, reported DFNIonline.com. WHSmith’s KLIA store stocks a wide selection of books and a wide range of magazines, stationery, travel accessories and convenience products. The UK retailer is also looking to open two additional stores at Langkawi International Airport next month. WHSmith operates over 1,100 stores in the UK and several other international locations, including Copenhagen, Stockholm, Melbourne and Delhi.

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Asia NEWS Comfort Solutions to expand King Koil brand in China

Economic Times as saying that the company expects the cafés to be a more profitable business model than its existing outlets.

Bedding producer Comfort Solutions has inked a long-term deal with its Chinabased licensee King Koil-China to expand the King Koil retail store network in China. As part of the deal, King KoilChina will set up 50 stores in China in 2013 and an additional 500 stores over the next five years. Speaking about the expansion of stores, Comfort Solutions President and Chief Operating Officer Dave Roberts said King Koil-China is opening a third manufacturing facility to increase its production to supply 50 new King Koil outlets next year.

Coca-Cola Amatil targets Asia for SAP platform upgrade

Moods Hospitality to open 10 Yo! China cafes in India

Yo! China, a Chinese restaurant chain owned by Moods Hospitality, plans to open 10 new cafés in India over the next year, as a part of the company’s strategy to increase revenues. The first Yo! China café is expected to open in next 10 days and will occupy around 2,000 ft² of space, with display kitchens, serving alcohol and speciality desserts. Moods Hospitality managing director and CEO Ashish Kapur was quoted by the

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to expand into smaller towns all over the country as its sees them as the key to future growth. Jubilant Bhartia Group co-chairman Hari Bhatia was quoted by CNBC-TV18 as saying, “We have managed to keep our offering affordable which has allowed us to grow in Tier-2 towns.” As of 30 June 2012, Jubilant FoodWork operated 489 Domino’s Pizza restaurants across the country.

Electronics retailer Samsung to operate 1, 000 stores in India by 2012 end After completing its AU$65-million OAisys (One Amatil information system) project to move to a single SAP platform in Australia and New Zealand this year, Coca-Cola Amatil (CCA) has turned its eye to Indonesia. The project, which began in 2008, aimed to roll 120 legacy systems into one SAP platform. It was divided into three phases in the business, with the first two phases upgrading finance and human resources backoffice systems, CCA’s call centre, equipment service, warehousing, payroll, supply chain management, and demand planning systems. Phase three involved getting New Zealand’s systems on board, and the project was completed in the first half of 2012.

Domino’s to open 100 outlets in India in 2012-13 The franchisee of Domino’s in India, Jubilant FoodWorks, is looking to expand its retail network in India by opening 100 new outlets across the country in the 2012-13 fiscal year. The chain is looking

South Korea-based consumer electronics conglomerate Samsung plans to expand by up to 1,000 retail outlets in India by the end of 2012. The move is part of the retailer’s aim to capture a larger share of the consumer segment for IT products like laptops and printers. In 2011, the retailer’s Mobile and IT sales contributed about 55% to its INR200bn ($3.60bn) revenue, reported Business Standard.

Samsung India Mobile and IT Head Ranjit Yadav was quoted by the website as saying that the company is focused on launching more made-for-India products and expanding its retail footprint.

“Currently, we have about 700 Plazas, IT exclusive stores and presence across large formats retail stores and multi-brand stores,” Yadav added.

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Asia NEWS American retailer Nike to focus on grassroots expansion

President and Chief Executive Alan L. Escalona told the website that the company decided to aggressively expand beginning this year. “If I could expand up to 50 new stores up to next year, we will have no problem because we have the experience. But the expansion will now be in the outskirts,” added Escalona.

Indonesian retailer Matahari to expand hypermarket network Apparel and footwear retailer Nike plans to continue with its retail expansion in India. Nike India Managing Director and General Manager Tarun Puri said that the company will mainly focus on the grassroots segment. “We are looking at creating products for them. At the same time, we would like to increase our core connect to athletes. That is our core strategy and it will continue,” said Puri. Puri added that the replica sale market was picking up and expansion was being seen into different sports.

Philippines’ Fruit Magic to double retail stores

Philippines-based Fruit Magic is planning to double its stores in a move to expand its retail footprint. As part of the expansion, the juice company intends to focus more in regional areas, reported ABS CBNnews. Fruit Magic

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Indonesia-based Matahari Putra Prima plans to expand its hypermarket network across Southeast Asia over two years.

As part of the expansion, the retailer intends to invest IDR1.8 trillion ($189m), reported JakartaGlobe. Matahari President Director Benjamin Mailool was quoted by the website as saying that the company intends to open at least 20 new hypermarkets in 2013.

UK retailer Mamas & Papas to open 90 stores in China British children’s apparel and accessories retailer Mamas & Papas plans to open 90 stores in China over next five years, in a move to expand its international retail footprint. The first store under the plan will be unveiled in Shanghai’s Nanjinulu Baodaxiang and is slated to open in December 2012. The proposed outlets will be a combination of standalone

stores and shop-in-shops, and will be opened by the retailer’s local franchisee Zero to Seven. Mamas & Papas is also looking to develop a fully transactional Chinese website, due to go live in 2013.

Costa Coffee to operate 300 outlets India by 2015

British coffee chain Costa Coffee plans to expand its presence in India by opening 300 new outlets by 2015. The proposed new outlets will be opened in cities such as Chennai, Hyderabad and Punjab through the Jaipuria-promoted Devyani International, reported The Economic Times. Costa Coffee Chief Executive Officer Santhosh Unni said that the company will continue to expand but faces the challenge of inflated real estate prices.

Asus Technology to operate 100 stores by fiscal 2013 end Taiwan-based Asus Technology plans to operate 100 retail stores by 2012-13 end, in a move to expand its retail presence. As part of the plan, the electronics retailer has unveiled its first exclusive store in Coimbatore in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, reported Hindu Business Line. The company is also looking to open three more outlets within the next 30 to 45 days, one each in Chennai, Madurai and Tiruchi.

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The Middle East NEWS KOJ Group expands Oracle retail deployment Retail chain Kamal Osman Jamjoom Group has expanded its existing Oracle deployment with the Oracle Retail Pointof-Service and Oracle Retail Store Inventory Management applications to improve efficiency and customer services across its stores. The KOJ Group has over 500 stores in six countries throughout the region, including brand outlets, franchises and private labels. The group has been using Oracle since 2006, when it adopted Oracle Retail and Oracle E-Business Suite.

ENOC forms JV with Aldrees to open 40 fuel outlets in Saudi Arabia

stations will feature all the specialised brands operated by ENOC such as ZOOM, Pronto, Super Lube and Super Wash. ENOC Retail operates service stations across Dubai and the Northern Emirates.

Jumeirah Restaurants to expand Urbano brand in Middle East, British bakery retailer Turkey Hummingbird to The restaurant division of Dubai-based expand in Gulf region hotel chain Jumeirah Group - Jumeirah Restaurants, has inked two franchise agreements to open its Italian restaurant concept Urbano in Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Turkey. The Dubai restaurant operator has signed a licensing agreement with Bahrain’s major food and beverage company to open Urbano restaurants in Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain. The first restaurant under the deal is set to open in Seef District in late 2012.

Furniture In Fashion to open flagship store in Dubai

Dubai-based petroleum retailer Emirates National Oil Company (ENOC) has formed a 50:50 joint venture deal (JV) with Aldrees Petroleum & Transport Services to expand its retail footprint in Saudi Arabia. The JV will result in the opening of 40 new service stations across the Kingdom with the first outlet expected to open in 2013. The service

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expand its offerings in the future.

FurnitureInFashion targets interior decors and design shops besides restaurants and cafĂŠs that further help build the company profile and strengthen the brand image in Dubai. The company said that the firm will also plan on expanding operations as well as contribute towards setting new trends in the global business.

UK-based online retail business firm FurnitureInFashion will make its debut in Dubai over the next six months. The proposed store will offer living room and dining room furniture, with plans to

UK-based Hummingbird Bakery plans to expand its retail presence across the Gulf region by opening 20 new outlets over the next 10 years. As a part of its plans to expand across the Middle East, the bakery chain earlier signed an agreement with Daud Arabian to open the proposed stores in the region. The first store under the deal is slated to open at The Dubai Mall on 25th September 2012. Future outlets will be opened in various countries, including the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Lebanon and Egypt.

Australian retailer Jones the Grocer to expand in Gulf Australian specialty gourmet food retailer Jones the Grocer plans to expand its retail footprint in the Middle

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The Middle East NEWS East, including Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

The chain, as per its expansion plan, will set up its second outlet in Dubai.

Jones the Grocer Director John Manos was quoted by Arabian Business as saying that the chain is in the process of signing the lease for a new restaurant and food retail outlet in Dubai. “We’re just finalising a second site in Dubai, we’re looking at a second site in Doha and one in Kuwait, and we’ve also done some work in Saudi Arabia in terms of assessing the market,” Manos added.

MENA matches US as future destination of choice for UK Retailers

Two thirds of British retailers (66 percent) expect their overseas sales to increase over the next five years and rank the MENA region fifth highest globally as their preferred future destination according to research from Barclays.

The UAE (7.7 percent) and Egypt (2.6 percent) were listed as the most popular countries within the MENA region.

Nearly a quarter (23 percent) of retailers said Germany was their number-one choice for overseas expansion in the next five years, closely followed by China and Australia.

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Asda inks deal to launch George in Middle East

declining retail sales in the UK. The UK’s biggest retailer will debut its F&F stores in the kingdom under a franchise deal with local conglomerate Fawaz Abdulaziz Al Hokair & Co, which counts Zara, Marks & Spencer and Gap in its brand portfolio.

Alshaya to plough $155m into faltering UK high street Asda, the British arm of US retailer WalMart Stores, has said it has signed a franchise deal with a Lebanon-based firm to take its George budget clothing brand to the Middle East. Britain’s second biggest supermarket group behind Tesco said that the retail conglomerate Azadea Group would open George franchise stores in the Middle East. Beirut-based Azadea already operates more than 300 stores across the Middle East, with a retail portfolio that includes Mango, Pull and Bear, Maxmara and Stradivarius.

MH Alshaya Co, the Kuwait-based retail conglomerate, has said it plans to invest £100m ($155m) in the UK retail market in the next two years following its buyout of struggling chain La Senza UK. The Gulf franchise holder for H&M, Starbucks and Topshop said it had “reached agreement to take control of the ongoing La Senza business in the UK.” Plans for the business include store redesigns and new product collections, the company said in an emailed statement.

KPMG, the administrators of lingerie chain La Senza, said they had agreed to sell 60 stores to Alshaya’s UK arm, saving an estimated 1,100 jobs.

Tesco sets out its stall for Saudi debut in 19-store deal

Cash Converters debuts in Dubai

Tesco, the world’s third biggest retailer, has sealed a deal to open 19 of its fashion stores in Saudi Arabia as it looks to boost its overseas profits amid

Used goods retailer Cash Converters has opened its first store in Dubai.

Located on Sheikh Zayed Road, the franchise store’s customers can sell unwanted goods, buy used items from the store or secure an item with the store’s lay-by option. Customers can also use the consignment option whereby the store sells the item on their behalf receiving the money once the item is sold. The Cash Converters business model in Dubai is based largely on the buying and selling of furniture and white goods.

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Europe NEWS UK supermarket chain Morrison to open stores across the country

British supermarket chain Wm Morrison plans to open convenience stores across the country as part of its brand expansion strategy. The retail chain will open 20 new stores by 2012 end and an additional 50 stores in 2013 following successful trials of the M Local format stores in Leeds, Manchester and Birmingham, reported The Telegraph.

Six of the proposed 20 stores will be located in London and the company will also open a new distribution centre in West London to support the outlets.

Play.com brings contact centre back to UK Rakuten improves customer service of UK e-commerce acquisition with local approach. Play.com, which was acquired by Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten in September 2011, recently announced it has brought its contact centre back to the UK. It said the move is part of its drive to create a more personal service offering for UK shoppers through a local team, and that this is just part of a wider drive by Rakuten to implement the best practice Japanese service style know as

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‘Omotenashi,’ which is designed to deliver exceptional and personal online retail experiences.

John Lewis and M&S to open stores at Vangarde Monks Cross

John Lewis is to open a 100,000-sq-ft department store at the new Vangarde Monks Cross development in York. The store will compliment a new 120,000-sqft Marks & Spencer store as well as a further medium-size retail unit, smaller kiosks and restaurant units, and a range of community facilities. Marks & Spencer, which will retain and invest in its store on Parliament Street in the city centre, said its new store will extend the local offer of clothing, home and gifts as well as provide an M&S Foodhall and an M&S Cafe.

Edinburgh and intends to set up all stores in 1,000ft² of retail space; recently, the retailer has opened shops in Glasgow and Chester. Harvey Jones sells modular kitchens ranging from £10,000 to £80,000.

Fashion retailer Bosideng picks RSM for Europe launch

Chinese men’s fashion retailing giant Bosideng has called in RSM as it attempts to break into Europe for the first time.

Bosideng, which boasts 10,000 outlets in China, has invested more than £30m in its new flagship store in London’s Mayfair. RSM is launching the brand in the UK through an integrated digital, social media and events campaign, after being approached by the retailer for work until at least the end of the year. Milton Keynes-based RSM is also managing a corporate, financial and brand PR strategy for Bosideng, which is one of the first Chinese clothing retailers to enter the UK market.

European retailer Harvey Jones to open Amazon to create 70 stores in UK 2,000 new jobs for UK London-based kitchen specialist retailer Harvey Jones plans to expand its retail presence across the UK by unveiling 70 new outlets. The first store under the plan will be unveiled in Cheltenham in December 2012, reported Retail Week.

The company also plans to open stores in major cities such as Newcastle and

The world’s largest Internet retailer will create more than 2,000 permanent jobs in the UK over the next two years, as it adds a handful of new depots to its distribution operation. Amazon officially opened its new distribution centre in Hemel Hempstead, providing 600 of the

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Europe NEWS new positions available. The retailer will add another two depots in the coming months, as well as an additional 3,000 temporary staff members to manage its busy Christmas trading period at the new centres. The news comes as Amazon steps up its game in the lucrative tablet market, recently unveiling the larger Kindle Fire.

European retailer Media-Saturn enters into IT deal with Capgemini German-based Metro Group’s electronic retail chain Media-Saturn has inked a deal with consultants Capgemini on IT outsourcing. Capgemini, represented by its subsidiary Capgemini Outsourcing Services will host the data centres and deliver the central IT infrastructure services for Media-Saturn operations in 16 countries in Europe and Asia that includes over 900 outlets. The technology provider will take over full responsibility for all central IT infrastructure services at the corporate headquarters of MediaSaturn in Ingolstadt, Germany, and its own marketing agency redblue Marketing in Munich, Germany, from Q2 of 2013.

Metro to sell Real supermarket business

German retail major Metro Group is planning to sell the Turkish and Eastern European operations of its Real

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supermarket chain. The move is part of the chain’s long-term strategy to slim down its portfolio, reported Reuters.

Metro intends to focus mainly on its cash & carry and consumer electronics stores, seen as having better long-term growth prospects. Real is a European retail chain formed in 1992 from the merger of chains divi, Basar, Continent, Esbella and realkauf with a presence across Poland, Russia, Romania, Turkey and Ukraine, besides Germany. The stores offer a wide assortment of household goods, electrical appliances, books, media, textiles and footwear, sports goods, stationery and food.

Hypermarket chain Auchan to expand into Russia

Apple to foray into Swedish digital retail market

Electronics and personal computers major Apple is expanding its retail presence into Sweden with the opening of its first store in Stockholm. Apple is said to be opening the new store at the Täby Centrum shopping centre in Stockholm. The first store launch will be followed by the firm’s plans to open a store in the Harbour Street district of Stockholm.

UK retailer launches new in-store service Myhmv

France-based hypermarket chain Auchan plans to expand into the Russian market with the opening of its first Auchan Drive outlet in Moscow in 2013. The retailer as per its Russian expansion plan is looking out for a 3,000-m² site for the store, reported en.ria.ru. The Auchan Drive outlet, when opened, will help people pick up their goods, which they have ordered online.

British global entertainment retail chain HMV is launching a new personalised web-based in-store service, Myhmv, that broadcasts the retailer’s offers to its customers. Myhmv is a new service which customers can log into using their mobile devices in-store and it is designed to make the retailer’s offer more locally tailored with deals and events relating to that shop, reported RetailWeek. The retailer will launch the service in November 2012, after the installation of Wi-Fi across all its stores.

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Europe NEWS

UK retailer Fat Face announces international expansion

French retailer Carrefour to cut staff, wages

Fat Face is planning further expansion into overseas markets over the next year.

The UK retailer, which is owned by private equity group Bridgepoint, will also open 10-15 stores in UK every year for the next three years, reported Financial Times.

The company has over 190 stores in the UK with international stores in Singapore, Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates, Ireland, France, Kuwait, Oman and Qatar.

Carrefour is to cut staff and costs but not corners in its model of offering everything from vegetables to dishwashers under one roof, the French retailers’ new CEO Georges Plassat said Thursday, as it unveiled a first-half loss of €31 million ($39 million). Europe’s largest retailer by sales has struggled in recent years, has been hit hard by the economic crisis but also by several missteps by previous management that led to rising costs, higher prices and an unsuccessful plan to rebrand some stores as high-end.

Austrian Spar rumoured to be taking over Tommy supermarket chain

Austrian supermarket chain Spar is negotiating a possible takeover of the Croatian supermarket chain Tommy owned by entrepreneur Tomislav Mamić from the Adriatic port of Split. Business daily Poslovni Dnevnik reports that rumours of a takeover have been around for some time, but so far there has been no official confirmation or denial.

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Marks & Spencer spends $400 million on web projects

In a move to more closely tie its store and web sales, UK retail chain Marks & Spencer is testing adding free Wi-Fi in stores and outfitting store staff with iPads.

The UK’s e-commerce market is the biggest in Europe. British shoppers spent 34.9 billion pounds ($54.2 billion) online in the first half of the year, up 12.58% from 31.0 billion pounds ($48.1 billion) in the first six months of 2011, the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index reports.

To target this expanding market that is growing despite the recession throughout Europe, M&S is spending $400 million on web projects. It’s relaunching its e-retail site, offering Wi-Fi in stores and outfitting store staff with iPads.

UK discount retailer Poundworld to open 250 stores by 2017

British value retailer Poundworld plans to open 250 new retail stores across the country over next five years in a move to expand its retail footprint. The store openings are expected to create around 10,000 new jobs. Under the national expansion, the UK retailer had created 1,000 jobs since January 2012, reported Yorkshire Post. Poundworld recently unveiled its 200th store at Newbury Retail Park in Berkshire, as its 44th store opening in 2012.

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Africa NEWS JD Group plans new stores after good results Furniture and household goods retailer JD Group plans to add 50 stores to its portfolio in the next financial year, mainly in rural areas, as it seeks to drive more business through its retail and financial services divisions. But an analyst warned that the increase in unsecured lending in the furniture retail sector could unravel, affecting consumers and businesses that were extending these loans. David Sussman, the group’s executive chairman, said yesterday that JD Group was pleased with the successful roll-out of personal loans kiosks in furniture stores.

Essar to set up new retail outlets in Kenya

Indian multinational conglomerate Essar Group plans to expand its retail footprint in Kenya by setting up new retail outlets in the country under the Essar brand.

The company has set up a pilot fuel retail outlet in the African country under a franchise model, reported Business Standard, Essar Group spokesperson told the website: “Currently, we are studying the market and, depending on the outcome, may undertake modest expansion.” Essar Oil is a unit of Essar Energy through a franchisee model and operates about 1,400 retail outlets.

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Cold Stone Creamery Flagship Food Lover’s to expand in Nigeria Market opens at Norwood Mall

Kahala, the parent of American ice cream parlour chain Cold Stone Creamery parent, has signed a 10-year franchise agreement with Ivybridge Trading in Nigeria. The franchise partner, as per the agreement, will open nine new stores over first five years. The deal marks the expansion into the 20th international market for the chain, and is a part of the plan to expand its oversees footprint.

When opened, the Cold Stone Creamery will be the first national ice cream chain and the first ice cream concept to provide the customisable serving option to customers in Nigeria. The chain, which began international expansion in November 2005, opened its first oversees store in Tokyo, Japan.

Bringing even more variety and choice to Norwood Mall, Food Lover’s Market opened on Thursday, 30 August, 2012.

Elsabe Griesel, portfolio manager for Norwood Mall owners, The Cavaleros Group, says: “We’re delighted to welcome Food Lovers’ Market to Norwood Mall.

Our research shows it is a strong match for the mall and ideal to meet the growing needs of our shoppers who will now enjoy more choice under one roof.” Taking South African kitchens by storm, Food Lover’s Market is a theatre of food that caters for the professional ‘foodie’, connoisseurs, and anyone who values exceptional quality and variety.

Topshop to launch in South Africa

Imperial Logistics wins at Green Supply Chain Awards

Fashion retailer Topshop is to launch in South Africa as the company continues its international expansion strategy, it has been announced. South African retailers Edcon and House of Busby have secured the exclusive franchise rights in the country for both Topshop and Topman which will bring the total number of countries that the Arcadia-owned companies operate in to 37. Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia Group Ltd, said he was delighted to be launching the brands in South Africa.

Imperial Logistics’ operating company, TFD Network Africa, won the category for the best project over R10 million at the fourth annual Green Supply Chain Awards in Johannesburg. The awards are a joint initiative of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport: South Africa (CILTSA), the Consumer Goods Council of South Africa (CGCSA) and Supply Chain Today magazine.

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Australia NEWS

Williams-Sonoma to enter Australia with new company-owned stores

American consumer retail company Williams-Sonoma plans to step-up new company-owned stores across Australia to expand its retail footprint in the country.

The proposed stores to be located in Sydney are slated to open in early 2013 and mark the retailer’s first entry outside North America. Williams-Sonoma has signed a lease for around 22,000 ft² of space at Bondi Junction to house four of its stores -- Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, Pottery Barn Kids and West Elm.

Australian Retail Food Group to acquire Crust Gourmet Pizza Australian retail food brand Retail Food Group (RFG) plans to acquire Australian food chain Crust Gourmet Pizza. The move follows the company’s full-year profit which has seen a 8.9% increase to $30m, compared to same period last year. According to the terms of the deal, RFG will pay $24m upfront, with a second payment scheduled 12 months from settlement. Crust Gourmet Pizza currently operates 119 outlets and has also expanded into Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and the US.

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Australian retailer Darrell Lea acquired

by Quinn family

Australia-based chocolate retailer Darrell Lea has been acquired by the Quinn family, which owns the Queenslandbased VIP Petfoods, for an undisclosed amount. The Quinn family plans to restructure Darrell Lea operations, by focusing on its manufacturing and distribution capabilities to facilitate greater access to the brand for its consumers. The restructuring plan will lead to a loss of 246 permanent and 172 casual jobs besides the closure of 27 company-owned stores.

Australian retailer JB Hi-Fi to open 16 new stores

profit fell 4.6% in fiscal 2012 whilst its sales at its stores in Australia and New Zealand rose by 7%, while comparable store sales fell 1%. The electronics retailer offers CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray discs, video games and consumer electronics and unveiled 15 new stores in 2011. The retailer currently has 168 stores, and aims to expand to 214 stores in Australia and New Zealand.

Online tax no silver bullet, say retailers A goods and services tax on overseas online purchases will make Australian retailers only slightly more competitive, and will not be the adrenalin shot needed to revive local shopping, analysts and retailers say. A federal taskforce study has given support to lowering the $1000 threshold on GST on imported goods, saying the cost of collecting the revenue may not be as high as previously suggested by a Productivity Commission report. But, said Deakin University lecturer in consumer marketing Michael Callaghan, shoppers who bought from overseas websites would not be deterred by a 10 percent rise through the GST, because they often saved up to 50 percent.

Largest Australia retail sales drop since 2010, profits fall

Australian electrical goods retailer JB Hi-Fi plans to open 16 new stores in the next 12 months. The retailer will also launch an online portal to offer its product line to online consumers. JB Hi-Fi’s net

Australian retail sales unexpectedly declined in July by the most in almost two years and company profits dropped for a third straight quarter, sending the local currency to a five-week low. Sales dropped 0.8 percent to A$21.4 billion ($22 billion) from June, when they rose a revised 1.2 percent, the Bureau of

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Australia NEWS Statistics has said in Sydney. This was the first fall this year and the steepest since October 2010. Gross operating profit declined 0.7 percent last quarter from the January-March period, when they slid a revised 3.7 percent, another report showed.

MAC hauls Target into court over claims the retailer is selling fake makeup

Australia retailers’ expectations hit 12-year high

Australian retailers are hoping customers will flock through their doors this Christmas, with sales expectations for the three months to Dec. 31 at a 12-year high, according to a survey by Dun & Bradstreet. The survey of 800 businesses in the retail, wholesale and manufacturing sectors found sales expectations among retailers for the December quarter rose to 50 index points from 5 points at the same time last year, while profit expectations rose to 11 points, from minus 1 point. Australian retailers have suffered over the past year as consumers have been careful about their spending in the face of the higher cost of living and concerns about the health of the global economy. The strong Australia dollar is hurting local retailers too as many Australians turn to online shopping overseas.

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MAC Cosmetics and Target were in the Federal Court on 10 September after MAC claimed the retailer was selling counterfeit MAC products. MAC undertook “extensive testing” of the products in its US laboratories and claims the MAC marked products that were, until recently, being sold at Target Australia are counterfeit. The cosmetics company says it cannot guarantee the quality or safety of products not purchased from an authorised retailer of MAC Cosmetics. Target Australia is not an authorised retailer of MAC Cosmetics and we did not supply any MAC products to Target Australia.

Fashion retailer Ojay collapses, jobs to go

FASHION retailer Ojay has gone into administration after 36 years in business, as rising rents and penalty rates pile pressure on stores. Lowe Lippmann

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accountancy firm partners David Coyne and Gideon Rathner were both appointed joint administrators last Friday, they said.

The Melbourne-based fashion chain, which has been operating since 1976, has 22 stores in Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia. Jobs are expected to be lost and stores closed as a result. Australian Retailers Association president Russell Zimmerman said he hoped that the administrators would be able to save the women’s clothing store.

Myer remains persistent despite NPAT fall

While Myer continues to feel the financial pinch it aims to continue to roll out its five-point strategic plan, which it hopes will better position the company for the future. In its full year results for 2012, the department store giant has reported a net profit of $139.3 million – a 14.3 per cent slide from last year’s results. Chief executive Bernie Brookes believes the company has delivered solid results given the subdued consumer confidence, particularly given that they finished the year with three months of positive comparable store sales growth. “The highlight of this year’s result is the strong gross profit performance reflecting a number of key achievements. We delivered on the objectives of growing our Myer Exclusive Brands to 19 per cent of sales, further reducing our shrinkage and markdowns, and improving our sourcing,” he said.

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America NEWS

SuperValu to shut down 60 underperforming stores

including Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin, and adds additional locations to the company’s Texas EV program. Each of the participating Kohl’s locations will have two or three parking spaces reserved for EV drivers to charge at zero cost while they shop at its outlets.

Nordstrom to open two new stores in US

Grocery store chain SuperValu will close around 60 of its underperforming stores in the 2012 fiscal year. The company plans to close 38 stores in its retail food segment and 22 Save-A-Lot outlets with the majority of them expected to face closure before 1 December 2012. The closures include 19 Albertsons stores in Southern California and eight in the Intermountain West region; four ACME stores, and one previously announced Jewel-Osco outlet.

US-based retail chain Nordstrom plans to open a two new Nordstrom full-line stores in the states of Florida and Texas.

The proposed Florida store will occupy 124,000 ft² of space, spread over two levels and will be located at St. Johns Town Center in Jacksonville. Nordstrom’s Texas store will be located at The Woodlands Mall in The Woodlands, and will occupy 138,000 ft² of space. Both the stores are scheduled to open in the autumn of 2014

Kohl’s Department Stores to expand electric vehicle charging station network

Denny’s to open 10 new outlets in Chile Kohl’s Department Stores plans expand its network by setting up 36 new electric vehicle charging stations across 18 additional outlets by the end of 2012.

The expansion spans three new states,

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Denny’s, franchisor and operator of fullservice restaurant chains in the US, has entered into an agreement with Musiet Group to develop 10 new Denny’s restaurants in Chile over the next 15

years. The first outlet under the agreement is slated to open in Santiago in 2013. Denny’s President and Chief Executive Officer John Miller said that the new deal is the company’s first major expansion in South America and is one of the brand’s largest international development agreements to date.

Restaurant chain Del Taco to open new outlets in US

American fast food restaurant chain Del Taco has signed a 20-unit development agreement with premier hospitality operator Larry Blumberg & Associates.

As per the agreement, Larry Blumberg & Associates will open Del Taco outlets in the new markets of Alabama and northern Florida. The first of these restaurants is expected to open in early 2013 and marks the restaurants first entry to Alabama. A dozen outlets are expected to open up in Alabama including those in Huntsville, Montgomery and Birmingham/Tuscaloosa.

Restaurant chain Chicken Salad to open 18 new outlets in US Restaurant chain Chicken Salad Chick plans to expand its presence in the US market by opening 18 new outlets.

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America NEWS Simply Southern Restaurant Group, the franchiser of Chicken Salad Chick, said the proposed outlets will be located in Alabama, Florida and Georgia. Simply Southern Restaurant Group Marketing Vice-President Debbie Mossburg told The Auburn Plainsman that some of the new restaurants will be opening shortly and others during the opening weeks of the upcoming football season. “We’re looking at Montgomery to be open sometime in late September, early October,” Mossburg said. “We’re looking at Columbus to be open earlyto-mid-October and then Tuscaloosa mid-October to the first of November.”

Restaurant chain Wok Box to open two new outlets in Arizona

Pizza chain Marco’s plans to open 85 new outlets by the end of 2012

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which said it would drop the $5 upfront service fee and eliminate the minimum purchase requirement for all orders created in stores through October 31st and Walmart, which, while not cutting back its layaway fee, has rolled it back to $5 from $15.

JCPenney spices things up with first-ever Cosmo collection The restaurant chain Marco’s Pizza aims to increase its total outlet count to 1,500 over the next seven years. Commenting on the expansion, Marco’s Pizza CEO Jack Butorac said, “We’ve accomplished considerable growth in the past few years and continue to strike multi-unit deals in new areas around the country to expand our footprint.” Recently, the chain announced the opening of its 300th store in Wheeling, Illinois.

Kmart joins trend of cutting layaway fees Canada-based restaurant chain Wok Box has signed a two-store franchise agreement to expand its presence in the Phoenix market of Arizona, US. The two new stores under the deal are scheduled to open in late 2012, and will bring the chain’s Phoenix area store count to five. Besides this, Wok Box plans to launch more than 15 US restaurants in Oregon, Arizona, Minnesota and Texas over the next 12 months. Launched in 2003, the chain currently has over 60 stores in Canada, with multiple stores in the US featuring Stirfry Noodle Boxes, Rice Boxes, Curry Boxes, Soups and Banh Mi.

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The trend of doing away with layaway fees continues, this time with Kmart announcing that it has removed its layaway service fee both in stores and online through November 17th. The retailer follows suit with Toys”R” Us,

Popular women’s magazine Cosmopolitan is leveraging its brand in the retail space by launching its firstever fashion collection at JCPenney.

The collection includes lingerie, sleepwear, footwear and handbags, available now exclusively in more than 600 JCPenney stores nationwide, as well as on JCP.com. “Millions of readers turn to Cosmopolitan for insights into relationships, beauty, fashion and health, and our first-ever fashion line celebrates the sexy spirit of Cosmo women everywhere,” said Joanna Coles, editor-in-chief of Cosmopolitan.

“We are thrilled to bring our magazine to life through this collaboration with JCPenney.”

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America NEWS

H&M to enter South America

Digital menu boards make splash at Hawaiian BBQ

develop eight restaurants in Southeast Houston and MM Donuts, that will develop 11 restaurants in Northeast Houston.

Supermarket chain Whole Foods Market to triple retail stores

Swedish fashion retailer H&M has announced that it is to open its first store in South America.

The store in Santiago in Chile will be a full concept flagship and will be located at the Costanera Center shopping mall.

H&M said it plans to open the store in the first half of 2013. Karl-Johan Persson, CEO at H&M, said: “It is our first step into the Southern hemisphere, and we see great potential for further expansion in this fashion-conscious region. We look forward to bringing fashion and quality at the best price to Chilean customers.”

Bloomin’ Brands to expand Bonefish Grill, Carrabba’s retail network American casual dining company Bloomin’ Brands plans to expand its Bonefish Grill and Carrabba’s Italian Grill resturant chains. The company is looking to open 19 new Bonefish Grill restaurants in 2012 besides adding 1417 new Carrabba’s restaurants over the next two years, reported Business Journal. Bloomin’ Brands CEO Liz Smith said Bonefish Grill has the potential to double its store count, from the current 152 outlets.

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L&L Hawaiian Barbecue in Aurora, Colorado, is immersing customers in the Aloha spirit with scenic views of Hawaii via Ping HD’s Digital Menu Board system. The Asian and American fusion chain worked with Ping to design an attractive and engaging design that fits the theme and style of the restaurant.

The solution is made up of three 42-inch commercial-grade displays and a single media player that can drive unique multizone content on each screen via a web-based content management platform, said Sai Yamagata, owner of the Aurora L&L franchise.

Dunkin’ Donuts to open 29 new outlets in US

Coffee and baked goods chain Dunkin’ Donuts has signed multi-unit store development agreements with four franchise groups to open 29 new outlets in Houston and Texas over the next few years. The franchise groups include Daily Grind which plans to

US-based supermarket chain Whole Foods Market plans to triple its store count to 1,000 by setting up new stores in underserved areas and smaller markets. The move follows the recent opening of a new store in Detroit in May 2012. The average size of the stores ranges from 15,000 ft² to 75,000 ft², reports Bloomberg. According to Whole Foods Co-Chief Executive Officer Walter Robb, the move reflects a new direction for America’s largest purveyor of natural goods.

Burger King franchisee acquires 96 outlets in Orlando/ Daytona market Fast food chain Burger King has refranchised the 96 company-owned outlets in the Orlando/Daytona market to Magic Burgers, a subsidiary of Sun Holdings, and wholly owned and operated by long-time franchisee Guillermo Perales. The acquisition makes Perales the fourth largest franchise operator and the largest minority franchisee in the US, said the company.

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America NEWS Swedish retailer H&M to open new store in Florida

a lot of our domestic retailers have seen their growth top out domestically and are looking at South America, Asia and Europe to expand into their brands.”

Meijer opens new store in Illinois, US

Swedish retail-clothing company Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) will unveil its new store in Jacksonville, Florida, on 6 September 2012. To be located at The Avenues, an open-air, pedestrian friendly shopping destination in Jacksonville, the new store will be the seventh H&M in Florida, and first between Atlanta and Central Florida.

The store will feature men’s, women’s and children’s clothing and to celebrate the opening, H&M will offer gift cards to members of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida.

Supercentres and grocery stores operator Meijer has unveiled the Meijer Marketplace in Cermak Plaza in Berwyn, Illinois, US. Occupying more than 91,000 ft² of retail space, the new Meijer Marketplace features national and Meijer’s own branded grocery items, along with a full-service pharmacy offering a variety of national and Meijer brand health and beauty products. The store includes more than 600 varieties of fresh produce including Hispanic produce such as nopalitos, tomatillos and chayote.

European retailers flood Miami market

Clothing retailer Dots to operate 1,000 stores

Globalisation is bringing more European retailers to the US, and once they are there, Miami’s economy, demographics and location make it an attractive choice for expansion. “We’re seeing globalisation all over,” said Michael Comras, principal of Comras Cos. “Major investment into the US is going to continue as our market continues to evolve and European markets stagnate. “At the same time,

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US-based clothing retailer Dots will expand its retail footprint by increasing its store count to 1,000. The retailer has also unveiled plans to create a Dots merchandise centre in New York City and recently appointed Lisa Rhodes as new CEO to further its expansion.

Rhodes brings to Dots more than 30 years of experience in retail and was a former senior vice-president of Wal-

Mart’s US. The retail chain currently operates 400 outlets across 28 US states.

Express subsidiary to open more than 30 new stores

American apparel retailer Express’s subsidiary has inked a franchise deal with Fastco Commercial to open more than 30 Express stores in Central and South America over the next five years.

The proposed stores will be located across Panama, Peru, Costa Rica, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. Three Express stores will be set up in Panama, Peru and Costa Rica by the end of the fourth quarter of the current fiscal year as part of the agreement. The store openings are part of the company’s international expansion strategy that includes company-owned stores, joint venture relationships and franchise agreements.

The product assortment in the new stores will mimic the retailer’s US stores.

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Business NEWS Belgian retailer Delhaize names new CEO

Belgian international food retailer Delhaize Group has appointed Roland Smith as new president and chief executive officer of Delhaize America and executive vice-president of Delhaize Group, effective 15th October 2012.

Smith has served as president and CEO of The Wendy’s Company and, prior to that, as president and CEO of Wendy’s / Arby’s Group. Smith has also served as CEO of Triarc Companies, Arby’s Restaurant Group, and National Golf Properties and AMF Bowling Worldwide.

Delhaize Group is a Belgian international food retailer present in 11 countries on three continents and at the end Q1 of FY2012 operated 3,309 stores worldwide.

SSI Schaefer to fulfil e-commerce demand for NBTY Europe SSI Schaefer has won the contract to provide NBTY Europe Ltd with an automated system that, according to SSI Schaefer, will revolutionise its capabilities within the e-commerce market. Currently breaking into the e-commerce industry, NBTY Europe Ltd, the parent company of the retail brands Holland & Barrett Holland, GNC UK, Nature’s Way Ireland and De Tuinen Holland, has recently experienced significant growth within this area, much higher than previously predicted.

Currently serving their high street and online subsidiaries using a manual system within their central distribution centre in Burton-on-Trent, Staffordshire, the pressure to fulfil daily demand is growing.

ScanSource Europe POS and barcoding appoints VP of sales

Slovenia: Mercator plans return to profit Mercator, Slovenia’s largest food retailer, is hoping to return to profit this year by reducing its costs and selling off some of its estate. CEO Toni Balazić said Mercator, which is likely to be put up for sale later this year, hopes to improve profitability and cut costs by 60 to 80 million euro per year over the next three years by improving logistics and seeking new suppliers.

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ScanSource has named Richard Gregoire vice-president of sales of the company’s European POS and barcoding business unit. Reporting to Managing Director Maurice van Rijn, Gregoire will manage the strategic

growth and development of the company’s sales and business development efforts, including cultivating and strengthening customer relationships and working closely with reseller partners to assist them in growing their business.

Tesco acquires e-book provider Mobcast founded by Andy McNab

Tesco has acquired e-book platform provider Mobcast for £4.5m as the grocers’ march on the digital entertainment market continues. Tesco’s purchase of Mobcast – which was founded in 2007

by Chief Executive Tony Lynch and bestselling author Andy McNab – is the latest in a string of acquisitions in the sector. The grocer purchased movie and TV streaming service Blinkbox in 2011 and personalised Internet radio service We7 in June 2012. Sainsbury’s has also made advances in the sector.

The grocer last week signed a deal with Rovi Corporation to provide a new digital video service for its microsite Sainsbury’s Entertainment. In June, Sainsbury’s purchased HMV’s stake in e-book business Anobii for £1.

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Business NEWS IBM Sells POS Hardware Division for $850 Million

Throughout the past decade, IBM has strategically re-oriented its primary business model toward software and technology services and geared up to become more clearly defined as a consulting firm. With the sale of its Retail Store Solutions business, Pointof-Sale (POS) hardware is now going the way of IBM’s old PC business, which was sold to Lenovo in 2005. IBM and Toshiba TEC announced an agreement in April, under which Toshiba will acquire IBM’s Retail Store Solutions (RSS) business. The RSS business includes POS hardware solutions and services. Part of the deal is a multi-year contract between IBM and Toshiba TEC, a subsidiary of Toshiba Corporation and Japan’s leading maker of POS systems, in which Toshiba TEC will become an IBM Premier Business Partner for Smarter Commerce.

Waitrose boss eyes rapid online expansion Waitrose boss Mark Price anticipates doubling the grocer’s store count to 600 as well as rapidly increasing its online sales. Price said Waitrose expects to double the proportion of sales made online to 6% in the next

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eight years and has long-term ambitions to take online sales to 20%.

He said that Waitrose also aims to extend its market share to 10%, up from the 4.5% it already holds, The Telegraph reported. Waitrose, which is due to report on its first-half performance next week, will achieve annual sales of £6bn this year, Price revealed.

Barnes & Noble announces further Nook retail partnerships

Belgium food retailer Delhaize partners with Retalix Belgium-based food retailer Delhaize Group has entered into a multi-year global strategic partnership agreement with software and services provider Retalix to be its preferred supplier of in-store software. Retalix will be the provider for in-store software for all Delhaize Group’s stores including 20,000 point-of-sale (POS) terminals across Eurasia and the US.

JYSK secures services of e-commerce platform OrderDynamics

Barnes & Noble has confirmed that three more UK retailers will sell its Nook e-reader following the announcement earlier this week that John Lewis would be the US bookseller’s first UK retail partner for the devices. Foyles, Blackwell’s and Argos have agreed to begin selling the Nook Simple Touch and Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight devices this autumn, in time for the Christmas shopping season. Argos will stock the Nook e-reader both in its 700 stores and online while Blackwell’s will carry the devices in 55 stores serving universities and major high streets nationwide. Foyles will sell the products in its six bookshops in London and Bristol as well as through its online shop.

Canadian international retailer of bed, bath and home furnishings JYSK has selected on-demand e-commerce platform provider OrderDynamics to enhance its multi-channel order management and fulfilment strategy.

The new partnership will enable JYSK customers to experience in-store pickup options, synchronise online and offline sales channels, and advanced order routing capabilities.

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Business NEWS PepsiCo expands cooperation with DB Schenker Logistics in Poland

DB Schenker Logistics provides comprehensive warehouse logistics and support in the distribution system for PepsiCo. As part of the warehouse and distribution operations outsourcing maintained by PepsiCo, DB Schenker Logistics was selected as the operator of the four Regional Distribution Centres (RDCs) located in Warsaw, Łódź, Kraków and Kielce, with a total area of approximately 25,000 m2. The contract also covers the management of about 50 transhipment platforms and transport from factories to the Regional Distribution Centres and then from the RDCs to the transhipment platforms.

Retail Solutions International – Expands retail advisory franchise practice Prague, Czech Republic, and Moscow, Russia – Retail Solutions, a leading European retail advisory and consulting provider has begun franchising its structured business model. Art Vartanian, Managing Director of Retail

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Solutions, commented: “Over the past 10 years, Retail Solutions has created tremendous brand awareness within the emerging markets. As Retail Solutions embarks on the next phase of its growth, a decision has been made to establish roots via territory specific franchise rights. This has created an opportunity for ambitious entrepreneurs to operate under the Retail Solutions umbrella in a stimulating and challenging environment enabling personal and professional growth.”

Qatar firm inks deal to launch WHSmith bookshops

Ahold to sell stake in Nordic ICA supermarkets

Dutch retail group Ahold plans to sell its 60% stake in Swedish food retailer ICA. The Dutch group jointly controls ICA with Hakon Invest and said that it would take six to 12 months to explore strategic options regarding its exit. The move is part of Ahold’s strategy to shift its focus towards those assets where it had managerial control; the estimated transaction to sells its stake could be worth up to €2.4bn.

McDonald’s France to introduce mobile payment service Qatar’s Al Meera Holding has said that it has entered into a franchise agreement with the UK’s WHSmith Travel Ltd to operate bookshops in the Gulf state. Under the agreement, Al Meera Holding has been granted the exclusive rights to establish and operate bookstores under the WHSmith brand in Qatar, state news agency QNA said. It did not say how many WHSmith shops it would be opening in the Gulf state or when the first outlet would open. WHSmith is one of the UK’s leading retailers and is made up of two core businesses - Travel and High Street

Quick service restaurant chain McDonald’s has inked an agreement with PayPal to introduce a contactless mobile payment service in France.

PayPal, owned by eBay, is a global e-commerce business allowing payments and money transfers to be made through the Internet. McDonald’s is currently testing a mobile payments service featuring PayPal at 30 of its restaurants in the country. The technology enables customers to order food on smartphones through a McDonald’s application, or online, and pay with PayPal. Customers who pay with the PayPal option have a separate line in the test locations to pick up their meals.

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IT NEWS UK retailer Shell to enhance customer shopping experience with new technology

The retail division of Shell UK Oil Products (Shell), a unit of Royal Dutch Shell has selected NICE Systems’ Voice of the Customer (VoC) solution to enhance customer shopping experience across its businesses. The VoC solution gathers feedback in real time from various channels, with a focus on mobile, from the entire Shell-owned retail operation. The solution will help the company take a more customer-centric approach across its retail fuel business, according to company. Shell UK Retail General Manager Melanie Lane said, “By adopting NICE Fizzback, we can listen to what customers are saying in real time and react accordingly to their needs to help provide a better level of customer service.” Shell is a top fuel retailer in the UK with over 800 service stations nationwide.

Monsoon launches customer loyalty app High street womenswear retailer Monsoon has launched a loyalty app, the first in UK fashion retail. Developed by retail loyalty specialist Ikano Financial Services, the app allows customers to join the Monsoon Reward Scheme or register existing accounts. It also enables

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them to receive alerts for generic or apponly Monsoon promotions and to use their reward card from their phones, thereby negating the need to carry a plastic card. In addition, customers are able to access their latest reward balance and locate their nearest Monsoon store within a three mile radius. The app is free for customers to download and works across multiple smartphone platforms including iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Windows 7 and mobile web.

Joe Irons, e-commerce & multi-channel marketing director at Monsoon Accessorize explained: “As well as being convenient for customers by allowing them to manage their Reward Card on the move, the app will allow them instance access to their Reward Card balance and transactions as well as our latest exclusive offers.

enhanced news featuring embedded images and videos for global news, politics and technology. Data Call also has included its newly available real-time domestic and international flight information, providing mobile users upto-date scheduled and estimated departure and arrival times, gates and current flight status.

Intel releases modular digital signage evaluation kit

Digital signage content firm adds iPhone app

Digital signage content feed firm Data Call Technologies Inc. has released a new infotainment app exclusively for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch, according to a company release. Leveraging DCLT’s experience in the digital signage infotainment market, DataCallQ brings the company’s existing product offering, as well as its new offerings, to the rapidly growing mobile marketplace, said the company. In addition to Data Call’s current products available for its digital signage partners, DataCallQ adds

Intel Corp. has announced its nextgeneration Digital Signage Evaluation Kit-12 designed to streamline the digital signage evaluation process, reduce costs and enable faster deployment across a range of market segments including retail, health care and transportation. The DSEK-12 is intended to address a growing need as retailers and advertisers increasingly turn to digital signage to explore new ways to attract and engage consumers. Evaluating digital signage solutions involves a costly, time-intensive process of collecting and integrating software and licenses before even beginning content creation, Intel said, but the new kit is intended to streamline that process.

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IT NEWS Motorola goes big and small with Razr line-up

Motorola has joined the parade of autumn smartphone announcements, unveiling three new Droid Razr smartphones for Verizon just hours after Nokia debuted its first Windows Phone 8 devices. The Razr phones - the Razr HD, Razr Maxx HD and Razr M - follow on the heels of last year’s launch of the Razr and Razr Maxx, which revived the Razr name as an Android smartphone. The Razr HD and Razr Maxx HD will be the higher-end options, serving as flagships for Motorola’s autumn smartphone line-up.

The Razr HD will feature a 4.7-inch 720p Super AMOLED HD display with a dualcore 1.5 GHz Snapdragon S4 processor with 1 GB of RAM, 16 GB of storage, an 8-megapixel camera and a 1.3-megapixel front-facing camera. The device will offer a 2,530 mAh battery and will get an upgrade to Android 4.1 Jelly Bean by the end of the year.

Maginus showcases its eCommerce solutions at eCommerce Expo 2012 Maginus, the UK provider of eCommerce and online marketing services for retailers and B2B companies, will be demonstrating its eCommerce and mCommerce solutions, at the 2012

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eCommerce Expo (Olympia Exhibition Centre, London, 2-3rd October) on stand 838. Maginus will be exhibiting its eCommerce solution which is built on the EPiServer platform.

This eCommerce platform is claimed to help users deliver the best possible experience online across every customer touch point, whether it is in the web store, through a mobile device, or through social media.

Ann Summers launches virtual fitting room app

Ann Summers is using augmented reality app Blippar to bring its brand to life, including allowing customers to virtually try on its lingerie. Shoppers with smartphones who have downloaded the app can pick underwear from seven of the retailer’s underwear collections and try it on by pointing it at Ann Summers catalogues or in-store marketing. The underwear is layered over a shot on shoppers’ camera phones so customers can line it up with a picture of themselves ‘wearing’ the underwear.

Walmart tests iPhonebased wireless checkout systems US-based retail chain Walmart is testing a new Apple iPhone based wireless self-checkout system at one of its

Arkansas stores, expanding its investments in technology. According to the company, the technology will allow customers to scan barcodes using their iPhones while shopping, which can be further transferred to carts to a self checkout station, where customers can pay. Walmart said that the program will allow customers to pay without having to deal with a cashier. The new move follows Walmart’s announcement of a native search engine called Polaris, which will allow customers to find products more easily, thus increasing online purchases by 10-15%.

Rovi launches ‘Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers’

American firm Rovi has launched the Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers, a new offering that is expected to provide consumers in Europe and the US with more ways to turn their physical DVD and Blu-ray Disc film collections into virtual movie libraries. Rovi Digital Copy for Retailers offers solutions for in-store and disc-to-digital conversion services, as well as retailer-branded in-home services. Both services will use industry proven Rovi technologies for content recognition and authentication, and utilise core components of Rovi Entertainment Store, the company’s platform for digital storefront creation and management.

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IT NEWS Tablet enclosures protect your technology investment

Gatwick airports, allows passengers to scan their boarding passes before proceeding to the security screening area. They were installed as part of the airport’s ongoing £21-million investment programme.

JD Sports delivers display impact

With tablets increasingly becoming integral parts of the retail, hospitality, salon and restaurant industries, business owners are seeking ways to protect their valuable retail technology investments. Recently, MMF POS released its new line of tablet enclosures, the Atrio Series. This series is designed to seamlessly protect your business’ investment in tablet technology. The Atrios series is created to protect both iOS- and Windowsbased tablets and offers easy access to the tablet for maintenance.

Queue-busting boarding pass scanners introduced at Glasgow Airport The airport is the first in Scotland to bring in the automated scanners which, bosses claim, will speed up the time it takes passengers to pass through security. Six self-service scanners are now in place at the main security hall. The technology, which is also in use at London City and

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Digital LED screens form an eye-catching signage system for the retailer’s flagship London store. A new digital LED display screen from Messagemaker Systems is helping to increase footfall at the flagship store of JD Sports in Oxford Street.

Installed in time for the sportswear retailer’s key selling period, the three-bytwo metre moving display delivers an immediate visual impact, providing a bright counterpoint to conventional printed window displays. The full colour display and looping video content is designed to capture the attention of passers-by on both sides of the street, helping to promote the JD Sports brand 24 hours a day while drawing attention to current promotions and offers.

UK phone retailer Carphone Warehouse to carry Sony Xperia devices British independent mobile phone retailer Carphone Warehouse (CPW) will stock the new Sony Xperia devices across all its stores in UK. The new Xperia T, Xperia

J and Xperia Tablet S devices are expected to land on shelves on 5 September 2012. Carphone Warehouse is part owned by Best Buy and sells home and mobile telephone equipment.

Founded by Charles Dunstone in 1989, the chain currently operates over 1,700 stores across Europe.

Walmart tests iPhonebased wireless checkout systems

US-based retail chain Walmart is testing a new Apple iPhone based wireless selfcheckout system at one of its Arkansas stores, expanding its investments in technology. According to the company, the technology will allow customers to scan barcodes using their iPhones while shopping, which can be further transferred to carts to a self checkout station, where customers can pay.

Walmart said that the program will allow customers to pay without having to deal with a cashier. The new move follows Walmart’s announcement of a native search engine called Polaris, which will allow customers to find products more easily, thus increasing online purchases by 10-15%.

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IT NEWS Shopping goes 3D

Carphone Warehouse launches mobile payments app

Australia’s first virtual mall will launch in October, with more than 100 national brands already signed up. The 360° Mall sees a new era in retail shopping with the 3D shopping centre allowing users to shop inside virtual stores. Retailers who sign up to open a virtual store have no contract periods, minimum store fees, or fees for cancellation, providing retailers with a “zero risk” opportunity. The concept is the brainchild of 16-year-old school boy, Alex Danieli, who says that while online shopping has seen a huge boom in recent years, it provides a “lacklustre experience for the consumer”.

The Carphone Warehouse Mobile Checkout app will be made available to Carphone’s 3.5 million customers. Once customers register for the app they can shop quickly with their payment details already saved by Simply Tap. Staff at the retailer’s 800 stores will help shoppers sign up to the app and use its image recognition feature. Using Simply Tap, consumers can shop from a marketplace within the app on their mobile phone or directly from any participating retailer using alphanumeric or QR codes and image recognition via an instant mobile checkout.

Cheap Monday opens digital pop-up shop

Amazon Kindle Fire HD

Cheap Monday, the Swedish fashion brand, has taken an unusual step in the fashion world by opening a digital popup store on its website to enable its Facebook fans to see and shop for items from its Spring/Summer 2013 collection before its fashion show. Named the Cheap Monday Sneak Peek Shop, the online shop uses Tictail’s “Exclusive Access” login feature that allows only Facebook fans access to the store with a special code.

One of a range of Kindle tablets announced by Amazon for release in the run-up to Christmas, the Amazon Kindle Fire HD is a 7” device running a heavily

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customised version of Android, integrated into Amazon’s content services in the same way as any other Kindle device.

The Kindle Fire HD features a 7” 800 x 1280 pixel touchscreen display with some advanced screen technology to give a clearer image and wider viewing angles. Inside is a dual-core 1.2GHz processor, a 3D graphics processor, advanced stereo audio and 16GB or 32GB of internal flash memory.

Tesco launches Discs on Demand service in-store

Supermarket giant Tesco has launched a new service for customers wanting to buy CDs and DVDs, which uses electronic kiosks in stores. The supermarket’s Discs on Demand service enables customers to buy discs that can be printed and collected in store within minutes. The new kiosks cater to customers who prefer to buy ‘hard copy’ CDs and DVDs, and complement Tesco’s digital film and music offerings through Blinkbox and We7. Using a touch screen to browse the supermarket’s library of music, film, TV and software, customers are able to select the product they wish to purchase then have it printed onto a disc, ready for collection, complete with original artwork on both the disc and inlay sleeve.

Retail IT | Year 2 | Issue 07

Optimize store space. Reduce operational costs.

Maximize performance of every shelf.

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An accurate, total store plan is essential for understanding and optimizing category space, impulse sales, and the overall shopping experience. Aldata Store Planning is a practical, comprehensive database-driven floor planning and analysis software solution that dramatically improves the retail space planning process.

With Aldata Store Planning you can: ■ Efficiently and effectively create and maintain store layouts ■ Optimize the position, performance and layout of merchandise categories ■ Align store layouts with category management initiatives ■ Get a clear picture of store performance from advanced reporting and analytics ■ Quickly execute planogram and SKU level changes ■ Reduce investments in capital equipment

More than 20 years of experience in supply chain management

More information: Office Slovenia Aldata Solution d.o.o., Tržaška cesta 515, 1351 Brezovica Phone: +386 (0)8 2000 700, E-mail: info.si@aldata.com

www.aldata.com

28

Southeast Asia in Focus The Southeast Asia region with an estimated population of over 600 million inhabitants accounts for a significant portion of the global economy. The region’s proximity to China and Australia makes it an important market to consider. A young population, natural resources and in some countries traditionally run family-based businesses makes them an attractive investment opportunity for local or large, international companies.

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29 The SE Asian countries fall into two categories in terms of their political and economic climate, the first group of countries is those with developed economies and a stable political climate (Singapore, Thailand, Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia). These countries have advanced and competitive economies which are also open to foreign investments. The second group comprises those countries with less developed economies and volatile political regimes and which are taking steps forward to develop their economies (Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Burma) – investors are naturally very cautious about investing in these countries.

Singapore The city-state of Singapore, a former British colony, is a small-sized country covering an area of 710 sq km (274 sq mi) with a population of approximately 5 million (100% living in urban areas) but it is one of the most developed and most prosperous countries in the world.

Economic indicators: GDP [2011 estimate], total: $259.849 billion, per capita: $49,270. Singapore is one of the most open and competitive markets in the world.

business – ahead of Hong Kong and New Zealand. Singapore is also ranked third in the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report behind Switzerland and Sweden. Today, Singapore is the busiest port in the world, beating Rotterdam and Hong Kong.

Trade, industry (petroleum and petrochemicals) and banking (fourth largest foreign exchange market in the world after London, New York and Tokyo) are the main engines of Singapore’s economy.

Retail in Singapore Supermarkets and hypermarkets dominate the retail food sector with around 75% of the total market share, growing at 4% per annum for the past five years and likely to continue growing at around 5% per annum over the next three to five years. The biggest retailers in Singapore are: 1) NTUC FairPrice supermarket chain with over 180 stores throughout the country 2) Cold Storage, with 44 supermarkets across the country 3) COURTS Singapore Limited, retailer of household goods, furniture, personal computers, IT, electrical and electronic products through its 12 outlets 4) 7-Eleven, a network of 400 convenience stores across Singapore, providing exclusive snacks and quick meals (Big Gulp, Slurpee, Mr Softee ice cream, QuickBites), and CashCard top-up and bill payment facilities 5) Harvey-Norman, a Singapore branch of the international retailer of electronics, computers, home appliances, furniture and bedding, with over 215 stores in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, Slovenia and Malaysia, operates under Pertama Merchandising Pte Ltd

Thailand Officially the Kingdom of Thailand, this Southeast Asian country has a population of approximately 64 million inhabitants (33% living in urban areas) and covers an area of 513,120 sq km (198,115 sq mi). The country is a constitutional monarchy. Having reigned since 1946, King Rama IX is the world’s longest-serving head of state and the longest-reigning monarch in Thailand’s history.

Thailand progressed towards prosperity and a stable democracy in the 1980s.

Economic indicators: GDP [2011 estimate], total: $345.649 billion, per capita: $5,394.

Retail in Thailand The retail industry is a combination of traditionally-operated businesses and modern, western-style hypermarkets and retail chains.

Driven by hypermarkets and convenience stores, Thailand has the second most dynamic retail market in Asia after China.

Some of the biggest names in retail are: 1) CP All Public Company is the biggest retailer with over 5,000 stores and is the world’s third largest 7-Eleven network after Japan and the U.S. 2) Tesco Lotus with 660 stores, 88 of which are hypermarkets 3) Family Mart (Japan-based) has 713 branches in Thailand

The 2011 World Bank “Ease of Doing Business Index” ranks Singapore as the best country in the world in which to do

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30 4) Tops is a grocery chain in Thailand.

In addition to Tops Supermarket, some branches of the Tops brand go by the names Tops Super, Tops Market, Tops Daily or Central Food Hall. It is the largest supermarket chain in Thailand and operates 120 stores nationwide.

Malasya Malaysia is a federal constitutional monarchy in Southeast Asia. It consists of thirteen states and three federal territories and has a total landmass of 329,847 sq km (127,350 sq mi). In 2010 the population exceeded 27.5 million inhabitants (70% living in urban areas).

Economic indicators: GDP (2012 estimate), total: $278.68 billion, per capita: $10,466. Malaysia is a relatively open state-oriented and newly industrialised market economy and is one of the most developed nations in Southeast Asia. International trade and manufacturing are key sectors of the country’s economy.

Retail in Malaysia Malaysia’s retail industry is dominated by several chains of hypermarkets and supermarkets. These modern trading outlets account for approximately 5055% of the total local retail industry.

Supermarkets and hypermarkets are becoming increasingly sophisticated with the introduction of in-store bakeries, food service areas and a range of ready-to-eat meals and improvements to fresh food areas. Some of the biggest players are:

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1) Dairy farm with 4.4 % of the market share 2) Tesco with 3.6% of the market share 3) Carrefour with 1.8% of the market share 4) AEON with 2.6% of the market share Philippines The Philippines, officially called the Republic of the Philippines, is a sovereign state in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and is a country with an area of 299,764 sq km (115,831 sq mi) comprised of a large number of islands of varying sizes. With a population of more than 92 million people (65% living in urban areas), the Philippines is the 7th most populous Asian country and the 12th most populous country in the world.

Economic indicators: GDP [2012 estimate], total: $227.584 billion, per capita: $2,328.

The Philippines is a unitary presidential constitutional republic.

The economy has been transitioning from an agriculture-based economy to a more services and manufacturingbased economy. Of the country’s total labour force of around 38.1 million, the agricultural sector employs close to 32% but contributes only about 13.8% of the GDP. The industrial sector employs around 13.7% of the workforce and accounts for 30% of the GDP. Meanwhile the 46.5% of workers involved in the services sector are responsible for 56.2% of the GDP.

1) Robinsons Supermarket with 32% of the market share 2) SM Supermarket with 25% of the market share 3) Waltermart Supermarket with 16% of the market share 4) Save More Supermarket with 12% of the market share Indonesia Indonesia is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 17,508 islands, total area: 1,904,569 sq km (735,358 sq mi). It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people (52% living in urban areas) and is the world’s fourth most populous country.

Economic indicators: GDP [2011 estimate], total: $845.68 billion, per capita: $3,508.

Indonesia has a mixed economy in which both the private sector and government play significant roles; it is the largest economy in Southeast Asia and a member of the G20 major economies.

The industry sector is the economy’s largest and accounts for 46.4% of GDP (2010). This is followed by services (37.1%) and agriculture (16.5%).

However, since 2010, the service sector has employed more people than any other sector, accounting for 48.9% of the total labour force; followed by agriculture (38.3%) and industry (12.8%).

Retail in Philippines The Philippines retail sector is highly fragmented. Relatively few major chains exist and the top five retailers have a combined market share of less than 30%.

Retail trade liberalisation has led to more efficient, modern and large scale supermarket chains. Major retailers in the country include:

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31 Retail in Indonesia Modern retail formats such as supermarkets and department stores are well established along with traditionally run stores.

Top retailers in Indonesia include: 1) Carrefour with 70 hypermarket format stores mostly located in Jakarta (the capital of Indonesia).

2) Indomaret with its 3,000 stores is the market leader in the Indonesian convenience/mini-market sector.

3) Alfa Mart with 2,700 stores.

4) Dairy Farm with 415 stores, comprising a range of hypermarkets, supermarkets and specialty retail formats. The company operates in Indonesia under the “Giant” and “Hero” names particularly in Jakarta, Bandung and Surabaya

Foreign ownership restrictions may prevent foreign retailers from entering certain districts or provinces. To protect traditional retailing, the government also plans to move hypermarket outlets which currently operate in city centres out to suburban areas. Since 2006, restrictions have applied on foreign ownership in local retailing, limiting their share to no more than 49%.

Laos Officially the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Laos is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, Vietnam to

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the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west, covering an area of 236,800 sq km (91,428.991 sq mi).

Its population was estimated at 6.5 million in 2012 (31% living in urban areas). Economic indicators: GDP [2011 estimate], total: $7.891 billion, per capita: $1,203. Laos is a single-party socialist republic. The Lao economy depends heavily on investment and trade with its neighbours Thailand, Vietnam, and, especially in the north, China. Agriculture accounts for half of the GDP and accounts for 80% of employment.

Cambodia Officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, the country is located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With an area of 181,035 sq km (69,898 sq mi), it is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east and the Gulf of Thailand to the southwest. Economic indicators: GDP [2012 estimate], total: $14.204 billion, per capita: $931. The government of Cambodia is a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy.

With a population of over 14.8 million (22% living in urban areas), Cambodia is the 68th most populous country in the world. Cambodia’s per capita income is rapidly increasing, but is low compared to other countries in the region. Most rural households depend on agriculture and its related sub-sectors. Rice, fish, timber, garments and rubber are Cambodia’s major exports.

Retail in Cambodia The retail sector is mostly dominated by traditionally run shops and convenience stores. A retailer with nationwide presence is: 1) Lucky Market Group which has over 15 locations for its supermarkets and

fast-food outlets nationwide. Lucky Supermarket is Cambodia’s biggest nationwide shopping retailer in providing the most varied array of goods while Lucky Burger is the biggest local fast-food chain.

Vietnam Officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, it is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia with a total area of 331,210 sq km (128,565 sq mi). Vietnam’s population of over 85 million people (28% living in urban areas) makes it the second largest population in Southeast Asia and the sixth largest population in Asia. Vietnam has had consistent economic growth of around 7% over the past decade and since 2006 it has exceeded 8%, making it the second fastest-growing economy in Asia.

Economic indicators: GDP [2012 estimate], total: $135.411 billion, per capita: $1,498. Vietnam’s government regime is a single-party state.

Vietnam has been, for much of its history, a predominantly agricultural civilization, based on wet rice cultivation, however, manufacturing, information technology and high-tech industries now form a large and fast-growing part of the national economy.

Since Vietnam’s accession to the WTO in January 2007, foreign service

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32 providers have been allowed to establish Joint Ventures with Vietnamese partners and as of January 2009, totally foreignowned retail outlets and franchises may be set up at the discretion of the government.

Retail in Vietnam Vietnam’s retail sector is less developed than other countries in the region.

Traditional family owned stores and wet markets continue to dominate the retail food sector. However, the modern retail sector is expanding at a very fast pace of over 20% per annum.

Top retailers in Vietnam include: 1) Metro Group with 9 stores and 9.9% of the market share.

2) Saigon Co-op with 36 stores and 3.5% of the market share 3) Casino with 14 stores and 3% of the market share 4) G7 with 550 stores and 1.4% of the market share 5) Citimart with 23 stores and 1.2% of the market share.

Burma Also known as Myanmar, Burma is a country in Southeast Asia. It is bordered

by India, Bangladesh, China, Laos and Thailand. One-third of Burma’s total

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perimeter of 1,930 kilometres (1,200 mi) forms an uninterrupted coastline along the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. Covering an area of 676,578 km2 (261,227 sq mi), it is the 40th largest country in the world and the second largest country in Southeast Asia. Burma is also the 24th most populous country in the world with over 60.28 million people (33% living in urban areas).

sizeable population of 60m and a middle class that is only expected to grow as reforms take shape.

Despite the global financial crisis affecting the world economy to various degrees in different countries and regions, SE Asian countries have great potential for economic growth and expansion and the outlook remains positive.

Souteast Asia map

Economic indicators: GDP [2011 estimate], total: $51.925 billion, per capita: $832. Burma’s government is a unitary presidential constitutional republic. Burma is one of the poorest nations in Southeast Asia, suffering from decades of stagnation, mismanagement and isolation. The lack of an educated workforce skilled in modern technology contributes to the growing problems of the economy. The country lacks adequate infrastructure. Railways are old and rudimentary, with few repairs since their construction in the late 19th century.

Highways are normally unpaved, except in the major cities. Energy shortages are common throughout the country.

Burma’s retail sector is largely unorganised, dominated by small, familyowned shops that sell local, low-quality goods and lack economies of scale.

Against the backdrop of Burma’s recent opening up, retail is one of the most closely watched sectors in view of the country’s agricultural base, young and

The difficult situation in which European banks find themselves in has given regional banks the opportunity to lend credit to businesses to help them grow.

In the most developed markets such as Singapore and Malaysia, competition is fierce and the big retail chains are eyeing neighbouring countries in which to expand their business activity. The fact that some of the economies of SE Asia are in the developing stages and the population is young provides opportunities for new investments and expanding existing ones. As the standard of living improves, people are spending more, providing a good basis for the growth and consolidation of the retail sector. Giant European retailers such as Carrefour and Tesco already have a significant presence in SE Asia.

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34

Different approaches to store Capacity Management Systems

Cemil Yildiz is a professional who has been focused on adding value to the retail sector for more than 10 years. During his career, he has gained experience implementing several projects such as Allocation Systems, Replenishment, Capacity Management Systems and Forecast Systems. He also led implementation of Axapta for a retail fashion company as well as the implementation of Oracle Retail Merchandise Planning Solutions. His current position is Head of Merchandising of Aydınlı Group. The Aydınlı Group is today one of the leading firms in Turkey’s ready-to wear industry with nearly 200 retail stores, 3 Aymerkez multi-storey megastores and more than 500 points-of-sale throughout the country. Aydınlı Group, with its 2,500-strong work force, brings high quality clothing to Turkish fashion while introducing the superb features of Turkish design and manufacturing to a large area spanning the Middle East and the Balkans with its international brands such Pierre Cardin, Cacharel, and U.S. Polo Assn.

Cemil Yildiz, Aydınlı Group

One of the retail industry’s objectives has always been to generate more profit with less inventory. There are many issues to consider when trying to achieve this goal that also entails maximizing the return on inventory investment. It requires keeping high-profit stocks with a high selling speed.

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35 Of course, the most important thing is to make this sustainable. On the other hand we know that there is a positive linear relationship between the level of stock and sales up to a particular stock level. So for each rising unit of stock there will be an increasing amount of sales. To achieve the this maximisation of profit, the natural reflex will be to put more stock in the store.

Unfortunately, the physical structure of the store, store decoration and visual standards impose constraints on the stock carrying capacity. On the other hand, making greater profits with less inventory under a capacity constraint would appear to be another optimisation problem.

In line with the above objective it is important to calculate and manage store capacity. This article focuses on different perspectives on Store Capacity Management Systems.

Store Capacity Management Systems should be looked at from two aspects: the first is calculating capacity, and the second is deciding how to use this capacity. The way to utilise the capacity is usually built into Assortment Planning systems. This article will focus on how to calculate capacity and its outputs.

The main outputs of a Store Capacity Management System can be summarised as: 1) how many different options or SKUs can be shown at a time and 2) how many units the store can carry.

Efficiently using store capacity serves

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the purpose of making more profit for retailers. Both in the planning stage and allocation stage, efficient use of store capacity means sharing out capacity for each product group in a way that achieves their objectives.

Thus it is is extremely important for retailers to be capable of assessing this constraint for each store. In a Store Capacity System option display capacity, and sometimes stock carry capacity, become much more important.

Option display capacity is the number of different options that can be shown to customers in the store at a specific time. Option display capacity is mostly needed by planning systems. It is extremely important to know option display capacity in situations where visual standards are important and it is important to ensure that there are enough options in store to meet customer expectations. Stock carry capacity is the number of units that can be stored in both the store region and warehouse at a specific time. It is extremely important to measure stock carry capacity, especially in order to avoid stock-outs in companies with a rapid inventory turnover rate and to avoid stock-overs under the pressure of sale. Stock carry capacity is mostly used in allocation systems as a constraint.

After this rather lengthy primer, let us look at different approaches to capacity calculation systems.

Square Meter This is the simplest method and is based on how many units can be stored in one square metre. The store carry capacity can then be calculated using this measurement. This method can be used for companies that want to obtain a system rapidly.

The error rate of this method is higher than with others. The number of fixtures in the store is an important factor influencing store carrying capacity. If numbers of units have been specified in a homogeneous way, independent of store sizes, then determining store carry capacity using this method can have a healthy outcome. However in many practical situations this is not possible. Front of store, number of columns, areas allocated for fixtures and types of fixtures used, seriously break up this homogeneity.

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36 LM (Linear Metre) Method We could say that this is the most complex method. The purpose of the LM approach is to determine the store carry capacity based on the number of fixtures. The square metre size of store is not of direct importance. In this method the number of shelves and hangers are calculated and converted to hanger LM for each fixture. According to the number of fixtures then, the total hanger LM can be calculated as if all hangers lay end to end.

For determining store carry capacity, store LM value, product mix and product group, the LM value should be used in a calculation. In dynamic management of store capacity, store carry capacity is not calculated, rather store inventory is converted to an LM value and it is determined whether store LM capacity has overflowed or not. Also, if needed, the allocation system can do a free capacity check during product ships.

Determining Fixture Option Display Capacity The dominant need of the first two approaches is to determine the carrying capacity that will be used in allocation systems. In this approach, the dominant need is to determine the number of displayable options that will be used in planning systems. In this method, for each fixture, the number of displayable options according to visual standards should be determined.

The only problem encountered up to this point is how the shelves are to be transformed into hangers. The error rate of this method arises at this point.

The average of several measurements for each product group must be taken.

Product mixes for different times must be taken into account for this calculation. After all these calculations the information obtained is how much LM each store has. This information alone is not enough how much LM is needed within the framework of the visual standards for each product group for each unit has to be determined.

Dynamic capacity management becomes more important within companies that have a particularly wide product range and rapid inventory turnover. Because store carry capacity is calculated based on an ideal product mix, small changes to the product mix may precipitate major changes to store carry capacity. Serious systems need to be established to implement the LM method with success. In addition, the Visual Merchandising Group, Allocators and Store Managers need to work together.

Then for each store the option display capacity should be determined using the number of fixtures owned by stores and the capacity of each fixture option display. Store warehouse storage capacity is not considered in this approach. This method is suitable for companies with clearly set visual standards. It is difficult to implement for companies whose visual standards are not yet clearly defined or where very different visual standards are implemented.

These approaches form the basis of the philosophy of the Capacity Management System. In real life the necessity is more complex and a synthetic solution for the needs of the company can be implemented.

Planning and Allocation requirements drive what kind of solution to be decided on. If it is the first time that a company is developing or implementing a Capacity Management System then visual standards should be set and implemented in all stores in order to avoid major difficulties in managing the system.

At this point, there may be two different approaches, determining the stock carry capacity or managing capacity dynamically.

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38

The ten most dangerous trends impacting retail supply chains today

Russel Beron is a director at Core Solutions, a provider of extended product lifecycle management, global sourcing and supplier collaboration software solutions which help retailers and brands increase their profitability. Core Solutions (CORE) helps retailers, brands and their suppliers collaborate more effectively from concept to delivery, to streamline their supply chains and accelerate profit growth. Over a 17-year period, many of the world’s top retailers and thousands of their suppliers have relied on Core to transform their supply chains and increase their profit margins.

With the ongoing economic crisis in Europe, uncertainty in the United States and a relative slowdown in Asia, global retailing is still on uncertain ground. According to the International Monetary Fund, global economic growth is projected to drop from around four percent in 2011 to approximately 3.5 percent in 2012. The bright spot is still emerging markets where, led by China, growth is expected to approach 6%.

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39 While this list looks at the 10 key dangers impacting global retail supply chains, they can also be flipped into 10 opportunities for smart global retailers.

This article is a summary of a larger research project undertaken by Core Solutions to understand the outlook for global retailers.

Rising Costs Not a new issue, but one that is definitely not going away, is the reality of rising costs. For most retailers, whether they are focused on hard or soft goods, labour costs in “lowcost� sourcing markets are a topof-mind concern pushing retailers to look for new sourcing markets as an alternative to the dominance of China and to optimise their supply chains. Commodity and energy price fluctuations are also expected to be the norm and smart retailers will prepare for the impact these fluctuations will have on their supply chains.

Increasing Complexity Alongside rising costs, the increased complexity of retail global supply chains is another trend that will continue unabated. The complexity ranges from the growth in retail channels (multichannel) and the need to service consumers effectively across these channels (omni-channel) along with shifts in global sourcing markets, requirements for faster lead times and more demanding consumers. Retailers who want to survive and thrive need to manage this complexity by continually adapting to the market and using their supply chains as a competitive advantage.

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Shifting markets As with costs and complexity, the shift in our global economy that is having a dramatic impact on retail is both a danger and an opportunity for global retailers. With home markets in the US and the UK facing flat or negative growth, the potential for retail in emerging markets is an easy draw.

However, few international retailers have found success in China and other developing markets. The other shift that is occurring, especially in China, is towards a focus on supplying the domestic market as opposed to the export market. This threat to capacity of retailers dependent on Asia sourcing is not to be ignored.

Demanding Consumers In the driving seat of many of the changes occurring across the global retail landscape and in turn impacting supply chains are consumers. It is they who are demanding better-quality, lower-priced, sustainable products that match the latest trends. They tell their friends and create a buzz on social media that can make or break products. They buy smaller baskets of products and treat retail stores like a showroom, buying online where prices are cheaper. In this consumer climate, supply chains need to be fast, flexible and efficient.

Margin Erosion Late 2008 was a wake-up call for most retailers which in reality they are still trying to recover from. While retailer revenues have increased steadily since late 2010, profit margins are still around half of what they were pre-crisis. This is a function of a number of variables such as international growth and

higher costs. Retailers that are bucking this trend are those that have focused intently on their supply chains. In the U.S. this includes industry leaders such as Walmart, Kroger, Target and Costco who understand the need to respond quickly to consumer trends, maintain lean inventories and improve their business processes.

Multichannel Multichannel is now an everyday buzzword in retail which refers to the multiple formats that retailers use to sell in different markets. Retailers can test markets online before setting up physical stores and adding catalogues, online stores, social commerce and mobile.

From a supply chain point of view, multichannel retailing brings the challenge of integrating the back-end to ensure the efficient supply and delivery of products. According to one survey, a third of respondents stated that they identify products differently across channels (i.e. same product but different stock-keeping unit (SKU)). In this climate, it is imperative for retailers to develop greater efficiencies across channels.

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40 E-Retailing According to the RetailSails 2011 Productivity Report, most retailing - 92% in the U.S. - still occurs in brick and mortar stores. However while the physical retail channel is growing in the low single digits, electronic retail or e-commerce is growing in the double digits. According to a recent report by Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG), the global business to consumer e-commerce market will reach US $1.25 trillion (1 trillion euro) by 2013, and the total number of Internet users will reach 3.5 billion from 2.2 billion in 2011. Retailers need to figure out how this will continue to impact their supply chains.

Social Commerce As social media has risen in popularity, retailers and other consumer-oriented companies are setting up Facebook pages and Twitter feeds as a way to engage and influence consumers. This form of social media continues to evolve and is now an e-commerce channel in itself. In late 2011, Facebook launched 3,500 store-specific Facebook pages along with a Facebook app, called My Local Walmart.

Consulting firm Booz & Co. has predicted that $30 billion will be spent via social commerce by 2015, up from $5 billion in 2011. While this is just a fraction of the total e-commerce figure, the growth rate is something to keep an eye on and we can expect to see many developments in this channel.

Sustainability Unfortunately, sustainability is often near the bottom of the agenda, perhaps because it is softer and a good closing topic. However, this does not mean it is any less important. In fact, it has already been touched on in the above points, where demanding consumers

Data Analytics Analytics on consumer behaviour is as important as ever as sophisticated methods gather information about consumers at various touch points from the point-of-sale to mobile devices, social media, online and in store behaviour. While this consumer information is then used to market to consumers in a more personal way, it is still a challenge to figure out what this information means.

According to a recent Accenture survey, more than two thirds of North American business executives said they plan to spend more on analytics.

To fully utilise this data, retailers will need to bring in sophisticated software and business consulting and integrate this information into their planning and forecasting process

are pushing for everything from greener products to better quality and safety and fair treatment of workers.

Aside from consumers, government regulatory bodies and policy makers are also taking sustainability more seriously and are more stringent about enforcement.

By no means is this a comprehensive list, but these dangers are indicative of a fast changing and highly competitive global retail climate where former retail giants such as Borders and Best Buy are struggling or in receivership and relative newcomers such as Amazon and Apple are global players.

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Sustainability - contribution to recycling by reverse vending machines

Yujiro Sato has been working at Teraoka Seiko in Japan (www.digisystem.com) for nearly 25 years.

Teraoka Seiko is known globally under the brand name DIGI for top quality equipment for retailers such as weighing scales, automatic wrapping machines, and POS. DIGI is a leading global supplier of retail equipment and its products are used by almost all major retailers around the world including Tesco, Ahold, Dehaize, Metro, REWE, Carrefour, Auchan and Wal-Mart. Mr. Sato has mainly been involved in the retail business in his career at Teraoka/DIGI. As the managing director of the Teraoka/ DIGI German subsidiary, he launched an initiative for Teraoka to break into the reverse vending machine business for the German market in 2004. Appointed as general manager of the Global Business Division of Teraoka/DIGI in 2010, he is now expanding reverse vending machines globally.

Yujiro Sato, DIGI

Sustainability is becoming increasingly important around the world. The “environment” alone is not enough to drive retailers to go for an investment.

Sustainability should be associated with “economy” too. The question is how do retailers benefit from the investment in the recycling operation in stores, environmentally and economically?

How do you dispose of empty drink bottles or cans? Throw them away at home, leave them in the street, or take them to depot? The answer depends on whether a deposit system has been put in place by a country or a province.

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The deposit system has been adopted in countries and provinces such as the Nordic countries, Germany, Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Quebec in Canada, and several states in the U.S.A.

What is the deposit system?

The deposit system is when a consumer is charged a small sum of money when buying a bottled drink as a deposit for the beverage container. When they return the empty beverage container,

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43 they get their deposit back. This system motivates consumers to return the bottles to the depots in order to get their money back, and it forms part of a recycling chain. The depots in the countries which have adopted this system are often retailers.

have to handle them at tills, huge lines will form at the check-out lanes. If they ask that customers return their bottles before heading in store to do their shopping, retailers need a dedicated location and personnel. The store staff needs to know which beverage containers are subject to deposit and how much money is to be returned to customers. To minimise human labour and mistakes, the entire process can be automated by reverse vending machines, which accept and count the returned beverage containers automatically.

There are different kinds of drinks packaging: glass beer bottles, glass wine bottles, PET bottles including re-useable PET bottles, and cans. The amount of the deposit also varies. For instance, in Germany, the deposit is 8 euro cents for glass beer bottles and 25 euro cents for PET bottles and cans which can be used only one time (called one-way containers or nonrefillable containers). When the bottles are sold in a plastic case containing 20 or 24 bottles, for example, a deposit is even paid on the plastic case.

Why Reverse Vending Machine?

Imagine what happens when thousands of empty drinks containers are returned to retailers on a daily basis. If retailers

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countries, a special safety mark is printed on containers which the machine can also recognise using its special safety mark reader. There are also other security features, meaning bottles not subject to a refund will be rejected.

The non-reusable containers such as PET bottles and cans are often compacted inside the reverse vending machines to accommodate more quantities in receptacles in the machines, while re-usable containers such as glass bottles are stored on a table behind the machine.

Reverse vending machines are often located at the entrance of a store.

Shoppers bring their empty beverage containers and insert them into the reverse vending machines. The machine recognises the containers and issues a receipt specifying the total deposit which is to be returned. Shoppers are refunded when they present the receipt to the cashier.

How does it work?

The reverse vending machine has recognition units. It can recognise the barcodes and shapes of containers and cases, and consults its database to judge whether the returned items should be refunded or rejected. In some

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44 Normally, shoppers present the receipt to a cashier when paying for their shopping so the deposit is credited from the total amount due for the shopping at the cashier.

The challenge is how to utilise reverse vending machines in order to contribute to recycling and sustainability in nondeposit countries.

A challenge in non-deposit countries It is very easy to get ROI in the deposit countries because the machine automated operation reduces labour cost and time, minimising human error in the recognition of types of beverage container. Sustainability is gaining more and more importance around the globe.

Yet, instant investment in reverse vending machines cannot be made just on account of the environment in a nondeposit country. It should be associated with and seen as an economic solution for retailers.

Here are some examples of the use of reverse vending machines in nondeposit countries. A store could give a certain number of points for each bottle returned to the machine, which can be

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added to the customer’s already collected store membership points. The machine could issue coupons which the shopper can use in store or it could issue a voucher for every 50th person for instance. A donation function would also be interesting – the refund (in the deposit countries) and points could be donated to a NGO by pressing a donation key on the machine.

For sustainability Approximately 50% of PET bottles were collected in the 27 European Union countries and several neighbouring countries in 2011. The collection rate has been increasing and 50% is a good rate to achieve, but it does mean that half of all bottles were not collected and not recycled. Regardless of whether a country is deposit or non-deposit, increasing the rate of recycling is a recurring theme for sustainability.

Reverse vending machines can play an important role as a front-end collection point for empty beverage containers to be recycled.

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ERP Software for Wholesale and Retail Trade: Compex Commerce With integrated solutions for trade and logistics based on our standard software Compex Commerce, we are a preferred partner for large and mid-sized enterprises at both the national and international levels when the following topics matter:

Merchandise Management

e-Business (B2C & B2B)

Store Merchandise Management

Financial Accounting

Logistics (WMS)

Business Intelligence

Sector Functionality is Standard Compex is a European-wide producer of standard software with the exclusive focus on wholesale and retail trade. Our future-oriented standard software solutions are the result of many years of market experience, gained in close partnership with our customers.

Thousands of users in wholesale and retail trust the trade, logistics, bookkeeping, business intelligence and project experience of Compex. Our software solutions continually convince well known mid-sized and large customers across all of Europe.

Visit us at the

Retail IT Summit 2012 in Zagreb on 18. October 2012 and learn all about Compex Commerce, the standard software for wholesale and retail trade.

Make an appointment for an individual discussion with: Mr. Vedran Slavic, Area Sales Manager veslavic@compex-commerce.com

Compex Systemhaus GmbH Hebelstrasse 22 D-69115 Heidelberg Phone: +49 (6221) 53 81 - 123 Fax: +49 (6221) 53 81 - 60 Internet: www.compex-commerce.com E-Mail: sales@compex-commerce.com

www.compex-commerce.com

46

Putting technology into place – why location matters

Simon Thompson is the group leader of Esri’s commercial business industry solutions. Prior to joining Esri, Simon held senior positions in enterprise GIS and IT companies. He is a widely published author and speaker on the use of location data and geographic science in retail analysis and geomarketing.

He works with Global Tier 1 retailers, who wish to profit from Simon’s experience and interests in the role of technology in democratising information, social media, Big Data and the changing dynamics of the global supply chain. As the GIS leader, Esri’s Geographic Information System (GIS) software is used by the majority of retail leaders for everything from market planning and site analysis to logistics and merchandising. Currently, there are more than 1,000,000 users, in 350,000 organisations across the globe.

Simon Thompson, Esri

Technology has changed consumer expectations about shopping, and retailers need to respond. It has been said that retailers need to rethink everything, but the fundamentals of retail remain the same despite the Internet – the right product, the right place, the right time, the right price. Location analytics is helping retailers compete and overcome showrooming. Physical stores are an asset that may help traditional retailers outcompete etailers. Discover how an understanding of place is helping traditional retailers fight back and prosper.

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47 We shop on our phones, our computers and in stores. We don’t compare prices between stores anymore; we use our phones to bring the store to us. Whichever way you look at it, the world of retailing has undergone astonishing change in the past five years. And not just in Western economies, the digitally empowered shopper is a truly global phenomenon. Virtual stores, perfected in Asia, are everywhere. The “endless aisle” is common in Europe as digital meets physical merchandising and in the US online retailers are building new distribution networks to provide sameday home delivery across the entire nation.

Technology has changed consumer expectations about shopping and retailers need to respond. Stores are porous; your prices leak out as shoppers price-match and your stock is easily compared with others. Worse still, those pesky GPS units tell your in-store customer where the same product is available near-by, and maybe at a better price. It seems that consumers have more information than retailers and they are beating them at their own game.

Increasingly retailers are realising that location matters. Location analytics may be the way to retake control of information and make small changes which can deliver big benefits. Location is a way to link search and price comparison transactions to stores, stores to social media, merchandise to populations and markets to individual customers. Location is a digital lingua franca, a way to improve

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data analysis of customer and store information at any scale and across many different business activities. Your POS system gives you real-time statistics that help you understand which products your customers like and what sells well, but how do you know what you should stock in the first place, how much and where? Location analytics delivers the answer retailers may need to turn anecdote into action.

Take social media analytics or “socialytics,” a term coined by IDC. Most retailers know that cross-channel customers are more profitable than their single-channel customers. The crosschannel consumer is more social and strongly influenced by online opinion, from their network of friends and memes that can be found throughout the Internet.

While analysis of social media and reviews sites can tell you which products are hot and which are not, a retailer wants to understand where the products are hot and why.

This is where location analytics comes in. It makes this analysis more accurate, faster and cheaper. Using location we can mine social media to find out where those options and status comments are

coming from and compare them to our preferred personas, demographics or psychographics. We can combine loyalty programme, consumer sentiment and other data together to create a giant focus group of opinion rather than just watch the social stream flow by. Because we have a geographic context (the location of the tweet, check-in, purchase or search) we can associate the stream to a specific place. Now we really start to understand the products and services our customers want in a store and just how far they are willing to go to get it.

The fundamentals of retail remain the same despite the Internet; it’s about the right product, in the right place at the right time and for the right price. Armed with new insight and better knowledge, retailers can figure out how to best reach valuable shoppers. For example, much has been written about the evils of ‘showrooming’ where customers test products in store then go online or buy it cheaper somewhere else. Physical stores are an asset to retailers because they provide a hands-on experience that simply isn’t possible online. The people who come into the store already have a predisposition to buy so the trick lies in keeping the shopper in-store and converting their interest into a purchase.

Digital technologies such as QR codes or barcodes can complement the traditional retail experience in-store by adding more product detail and an enhanced shopper experience. Rather than letting the shopper compare the product online with other nearby stores

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48 or etailers, why not enable the shopper to access stock information and price comparisons exactly where they are - in your store. If you can back this virtual experience with a real world engaged, experienced and knowledgeable sales assistant, you have a greater chance of making that sale. The trick is to combine the best of the real world with the expected benefits of online shops. Digital technology has the potential to transform shopping experiences. In May 2012, Retail Systems Research (RSR) published its annual report “The 2012 Retail Store: In Transition”, which highlighted opportunities for improving the in-store experience. For the mega retailers or category killers educating and empowering in-store employees via technology was a ubiquitous priority.

They saw this as a prerequisite to staying relevant.

For mid-sized retailers providing more specific authority to the store manager was imperative. The way stores are designed and planned, as well as what products are inside them is now very much localised. Each store is tailored to the local community and their needs, aspirations and desires. Improving the convenience and quality of the customer experience via direct local action and offers also helps overcome competitive pressure. A simple example is to allow the store manager to respond to local conditions and events like this year’s heat wave in the US. By dusting off the barbecue stock, featuring umbrellas, sun block and warm weather merchandise in prime locations, the store can gain considerable sales uplift – a good outcome for the customer and the store as well.

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The more forward-looking retailers recognise the link between cross-channel inventory and customer synchronisation.

When location analysis is combined with social media analysis it can direct customers to a specific store rather than to a brand. Staples like in-store rewards and coupons, are being replaced with new location-enhanced marketing strategies that deliver information to store and customer-owned devices. By synchronising customer information across channels and locations, retailers are able to match products and the number of products in a store with the types and number of customers that are likely to shop there. The new wave of analytical technology is enabling retailers to locate and sell from anywhere within the company across any channel.

The increasingly bitter battle between traditional retailers and their online-only counterparts is driving retailers to treat inventory as a shared resource. The backrooms of stores are becoming a network of online distribution centres and online inventory is now part of instore fulfilment.

Building a more integrated experience across channels promises rich rewards.

While many online-only companies have a highly efficient set of warehouses near to major population centres, they often suffer a net loss in the cost of delivery, which erodes revenues and the benefits of mass purchase. If a traditional brick and mortar retailer can improve sales per square foot and increase volumes through better execution strategy and enhanced merchandise management, they can outcompete the online-only retailer within their local market. Shifting how traditional retailers get merchandise to customers offers big payoffs in the long term; especially if the company can begin fulfilling orders locally, directly from the store or encourage the consumer to collect from the store itself. Once again location analysis has turned geographic distribution into an economic asset.

For retailers success is dependent on improving their customer-centricity.

Digital technology has meant that the consumer can always find a better price or more compelling offer but it’s also empowering retailers to attract and retain those customers in a traditional store setting rather than letting them shop online. The Internet has changed conventional retail and shopping models but location analytics is helping retailers more effectively harness the power of digital, turning data into actionable intelligence and insight into competitive advantage.

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49

Redefining retail in an internet environment

Friedrich Fleischmann, GfK

Friedrich Fleischmann is the global director for Retail at GfK in the Consumer Choices sector. Having graduated in economics from Nuremberg University, he has more than 20 years of experience in marketing. Since starting his career in 1988 as a market research consultant for GfK Handelsforschung, Friedrich has worked across a number of diverse industries. From 1991 to 1999 he was an executive within the office and stationery market, during which time he assumed various positions in international sales and marketing. Friedrich rejoined GfK in 1999 and spearheaded several operations within the Retail Department. He held the position of Head of International Retail Services until 2010 and was promoted to Global Director of Retail in January 2011. In this position he is responsible for international retail cooperation strategy and management. Friedrich is also Chairman of the Global Retail Committee and his work continues to help build on GfK’s solid reputation as one of the leading market research companies in the world. “GfK is a truly global research company, with more than 11,000 experts working to discover new insights into the way people live, think and shop, in over 100 markets, every day. The Company is constantly innovating and using the latest technologies and the smartest methodologies to give its clients the clearest understanding of the most important people in the world: their customers.

In order to maximize growth potential, it’s important to combine online and traditional retailing, creating an omni-channel environment. This is vital when looking at the customer’s journey as today there are many different ways for the consumer to find out about and purchase a product. This article explores multichannel retailing, highlighting why this is an essential approach to adopt.

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50 It’s no secret that the impact of online shopping is having a major influence on key consumer goods markets around the world – it is transforming the ways in which customers find out about and purchase products. To keep up with this trend, retailers must now implement effective e-commerce strategies. This should be an integrated part of their business plans and offer a seamless buying process for customers, whether they are choosing to shop offline, online or both simultaneously.

Most of us love tradition. It reflects reliable, well-known experiences and memories. But sometimes, this stance becomes a problem when we are confronted with new ideas. When faced with complex theories and methodologies, a lot of us tend to judge them in a black and white manner. And in some instances, we simplify decisions down to what is right and what is wrong, or who is a friend and who is an enemy. This line of thinking is reflected in the commonlystated belief that “the Internet is killing traditional trade”.

Throughout the last decade, too many manufacturers and retailers adopted this mentality and went to great lengths to work against the Internet. However, if they had put the same amount of effort into figuring out the huge opportunities the Internet offers, some discussions on this would be redundant and many of these players would have performed better.

In many cases it is the change of paradigm which makes it so difficult to grasp the opportunities of the digital

world. Owners and managers usually have everything under control and they know the best ways to handle tough situations. With the Internet, however, control of its communities, communication and information facilities is not what they have been used to over decades in the analogue world.

Now, it is important for companies to jump on the Internet bandwagon and take advantage of what it has to offer.

Businesses must use their expert staff to share the responsibility of utilising its features within their organisation. They must also use their marketing intuition to give space and chances to new people who can provide significant help during this migration process.

Among the most important success factors for retailers are shop location and high customer traffic. Worldwide, there are now more than 2.26 billion people connected to the Internet, meaning there are many places, platforms and communities for retailers to penetrate.

As we know, the rate at which Internet retailing is sweeping across key global economies is remarkable. And it is not going to stop anytime soon.

Encouraging sales in the first half of 2012 have highlighted the growing success of online purchasing throughout Europe*. Year-to-date figures (JanuaryJune) have shown there has been an overall increase in consumer spending online, with internet sales accounting for 16.6% of the total Technical Consumer Goods (TCG) market**, which includes products such as LCD TVs, digital cameras and mobile phones.

So, what should retailers be striving for when developing new strategies? The

answer lies with multi-channelling. Today, the ability to operate on multiple platforms is fast becoming the blueprint for success – now, more than ever, it is essential for retailers to multi-task between traditional and Internet sales.

The demarcation line between offline and online is disappearing. A so called “omni-channel approach” is set to rule the game, covering all aspects of how consumers want to inform themselves, want to be serviced and how they want to shop. Since there is no “one fits all” recipe, every retailer should decide where they want to focus their activities within an omni-channel approach. Being aware of this competitive environment is also vital for success and for reacting to new challenges. Established retail organisations must adapt to the new environment or they will find themselves at the end of their lifecycle sooner than expected.

To become a truly global player in this ever-changing market, businesses must look to expand by implementing an international and national omni-channel growth strategy. One of the main difficulties for retailers is the cost implications of developing a role for offline activities. These will continue to be high. Purchasing or renting a space on the high street, renovating shops, ordering stock and training staff does not come cheap. The challenge is to look past these costs and come up with ways to get the best out of online and offline channels. We are starting to see Internetonly brands make the transition into the physical world, demonstrating that when combined effectively, an omni-channel approach can play a crucial role in increasing sales. It is not a question of either, but of both.

*AT, BE, CH, CZ, DE, GB, ES, FR, IT, NL, PT ** CE, IT, OE, MTG, Photo, Telecom, SDA, Personal Diagnostics, MDA

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THE CONNECTED WORLD We help you to optimize all touchpoints between your brand and the consumer - from monitoring social media to web mining, from online behavioral tracking to online ad tracking, from website evaluation to e-commerce.

GfK brings together traditional and digital research expertise providing a 360o understanding of online and offline behavior. apac@gfk.com

Growth from Knowledge

www.gfk.com

52

Smart cash management at retail is touchless cash management

Richard “Rick” Friese, Glory USA

Richard “Rick” Friese is the President / COO of GLORY (U.S.A.) Inc., the leading world manufacturer in the design, manufacture and distribution of technology solutions for banks, financial institutions, the gaming industry and retail. Working together with the parent company GLORY LTD., he is responsible for overseeing business and operations across a broad range of business verticals including banking, gaming and retail. Rick joined GLORY in 1995, and 15 years later, became the first GLORY American executive to be named to the Board of Directors of GLORY (U.S.A.) Inc. He began his career as a Cash Vault Manager for the banking business segment, and held various positions such as Corporate Sales Director, Vice-President System Sales, and Senior-Vice President of all sales. Prior to joining GLORY, Friese worked for various Fortune 500 companies including IBM as Business Development Manager in their integrated services support group, and Okidata as National Sales and Product Manager. Friese holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from Mt. St. Mary’s College and served in the US military achieving the prestigious rank of Captain, United States Marine Corps. Rick also serves on various business committees to establish best practices in sales and marketing. We asked Rick to explain the advantages of Touchless Cash Management for Retail IT subscribers. GLORY (U.S.A.) is celebrating 30 years of doing business in the US this year.

Retailers who want to achieve cost-savings and streamline operations to reduce payroll, need to make Automated Cash Management solutions a capital expenditure priority today. Research has shown that the savings gleaned from cash management automation goes directly to the bottom line. Sales audits are more efficient, there are major reductions in shortages, increases in time savings, improved internal processes and a measurable improvement in profit margins. Installing an Automated Cash Management Solution also greatly enhances security by reducing the vulnerability to loss. Cash Recycling Machines and other Automated Cash Management Solutions are a user-friendly and ideal way to implement unlimited network monitoring and settlement. In addition, they provide the ability to enhance customer engagement by reducing the actual transaction time, allowing more time with customers.

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53 Retail is dynamic, an industry with diverse segments and large and small currency transactions unlike any other.

As such, retailers have unique processing needs requiring customised solutions to get maximum performance with a minimal amount of manual processing.

In an era of higher operating costs and fewer people to do the job, retailers should seriously consider “touchless” cash room solutions to automate the time-consuming cash office tasks that are prone to error, vulnerable to loss, and inefficient.

Many retail establishments that automated other processes decades ago, have been slower to recognise the immediate advantages to the bottom line of implementing an affordable and innovative solution to cash management through automation. An investment in cash recycling machines and other automated solutions creates easy to use and easy to implement unlimited network monitoring and settlement. If senior managers want to achieve cost-savings and streamline operations to reduce payroll, automated cash management solutions are the first thing to consider as a capital expenditure. The savings they provide go directly to the bottom line. Sales audits are more efficient, shortages are reduced, cash transactions are more accurate, profit margins are improved and system security is greatly increased.

The right choice when purchasing office automation cash management products can be made only after careful examination and analysis of the present needs of a retail establishment. These must be made taking into account any future plans for expansion. Within the

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myriad product solutions from the leading manufacturers of office automation there are viable solutions to fit the size, scope, and structure of the small, mid-size or “big box” client. The product of choice may depend on the limitations of the existing infrastructure and existing software. An experienced manufacturer’s representative will be able to assist with this and will be able to conduct a needs analysis to ascertain how to coordinate existing systems to work with the new technologies available.

The representative may be able to arrange a trial of the product on site so the client can make sure that this solution will work as predicted.

The most innovative type of retail cash management solutions provide a secure and closed system for cash handling, centralised control of cash inventory, integration with POS systems and optimisation of all cash process for retail stores. When choosing a system, be sure that it is flexible enough to fit the size of your store and various business segments. The best choice may be a product that can be adapted by adding optional modules for increased capacity as sales volume grows.

Systems designed to reconcile cash register information from POS systems to balance cash register as well as export to accounting systems are also critical.

Look for a product that is highly configurable to suit the business requirements of your situation.

Combining the power of a PC and the ability to interface with the office automation manufacturer’s peripherals are also important. The most desirable solutions are designed to handle cash,

coin, cheque, miscellaneous media, coupons and credit card receipts to balance a cash register. Retailers need a product that can import data from a POS system to balance the register comparing the verified amounts with declared amounts. The top solutions are ones in which cheques are encoded, endorsed and verified, coupons are recorded and verified and custom exports can be configured and exported as required. Office automation, if chosen correctly, can handle pickups, register balances, cash advances, change funds and bank deposit functions of retail cash rooms and alleviate the need for manual handling of such procedures, thus saving time and improving the bottom line.

In conclusion, the decision to move up to cash recycling and office automation is a big one, but it offers big rewards.

Once the automated processing system is in place, there will be an immediate increase in both retail floor and back office accuracy and efficiency. By eliminating the need for manual counting and re-counting, you can achieve “touchless” cash management. Once your operation is a “touchless” operation, you will spend those critical payroll dollars at the front of the house, using them to staff the floor with people interacting with customers and generating sales as opposed to spending money on behind the scenes tasks better handled by machine.

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54

Optimising the customer experience Four key principles for understanding and meeting - the needs of omni-channel consumers

Scott Welty, JDA

As Global Vice-President of Retail Industry Strategy, Scott Welty is responsible for strengthening executivelevel relationships with JDA’s retail customers and key prospects. With widespread experience, Welty has held several leadership roles at JDA Software and within the retail industry. With a core focus on business process optimisation, he has helped hundreds of companies select the proper solutions to attain increased revenues, profits and efficiencies. He holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of Toledo. JDA Software Group, Inc. is the leading provider of innovative supply chain management, merchandising and pricing excellence solutions worldwide. JDA empowers more than 6,000 companies of all sizes to make optimal decisions that improve profitability and achieve real results in the manufacturing, wholesale distribution, transportation, retail and services industries. With an integrated solution offering that spans the entire supply chain from materials to the consumer, JDA leverages the powerful heritage and knowledge capital of acquired market leaders including i2 Technologies, Manugistics, E3, Intactix and Arthur. JDA’s robust services offering, including complete solution lifecycle management via JDA Cloud Services, provides customers with leading-edge industry practices and supply chain expertise, lower total cost of ownership, long-term business value, and 24/7 functional and technical support.

Successful retailers must focus on creating great customer experiences. The good news is that most retailers have a lot of information about products, customers, shopping histories and more at their fingertips to help them recognise and fulfil customer needs. Retailers have the opportunity to use that data and insight to optimise the customer experience and foster loyalty and profitability using four key principles. The four key principles for understanding and meeting the needs of omni-channel customers are 1) enhance customer connection, 2) break down channel barriers, 3) build profit intelligence into experience strategy and 4) translate loyalty into long-term success.

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55 Today’s retail environment bears little resemblance to the competitive landscape of five years ago. Connected consumers - armed with laptops, tablets and smartphones - are transforming the traditional retail experience based on their unprecedented access to information.

Whether they are checking prices right in the aisle, using brick and mortar stores as a “showroom” to check out a potential online purchase, or turning to the Web for reviews and opinions - in essence, the omni-channel consumer is more connected and better informed than ever.

Successful retailers must focus on creating great customer experiences.

More than ever, there is a greater need to understand, anticipate and meet omnichannel shopper needs.

These sophisticated shoppers are much more demanding and much less patient with lacklustre service, out-of-stock products, late deliveries and other risks of the retail experience. Today’s customers expect retailers to be just as informed and connected as they are, which places new demands on the entire retail supply chain.

The good news is that most retailers have a lot of information about products, customers, shopping histories and more at their fingertips that can help them recognise and fulfil customer needs. To foster long-term customer loyalty and profitability, retailers have the opportunity to use that data and insight to optimise the customer experience by adopting four key principles.

Enhance customer connection The most crucial realisation for retailers is that everything begins and ends with

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the consumer. Merchandise, promotions, pricing and other aspects of the customer experience must be based on a highly detailed understanding of consumer needs that goes far beyond high-level shopper demographics and addresses the individual consumers shopping through various channels.

To prevent consumers from using retailers’ brick and mortar stores as showrooms before making online purchases from competitors, store employees should be empowered with technology tools that enable them to easily recognise shoppers, access their personal information, make product recommendations and encourage customers to “buy now” during in-store visits.

This may include the power to negotiate price, personalise offers, propose alternative delivery options and accommodate “on the floor” checkout on the spot. Many of today’s leading retailers are using advanced solutions and personalised interfaces to enhance customer connection and leverage it as a competitive advantage. For example, hardware and home improvement leader Lowe’s offers a robust “My Lowe’s” feature on its website - and on mobile devices - that allows customers to upload paint colours, room dimensions and other information before, during and after they shop. With a full purchase history at their fingertips, customers can also access protection plans, warranties, owner’s manuals and other key information that enables them to get the most out of their Lowe’s purchases.1 The new “My Lowe’s” tool was designed with real-world customer needs in mind,

based on market research and data collection. This consumer-centric tool allows both Lowe’s and the customer to contribute to creating optimal retail experiences.2

Break down channel barriers Nothing is more frustrating for consumers than browsing a retailer’s website, filling a shopping cart, and then discovering that items are not available or have a different price in-store. Adding to that frustration is the lack of information on item availability at their local stores. No matter where they are physically located or on which channel they are shopping at the moment, customers want a seamless shopping experience across all shopping channels - mobile device, company website and brick and mortar stores - as well as the ability to make a purchase anywhere, anytime.

Yet many retailers have failed to create a consistent experience across their different channels. Not only should the “front ends” be aligned - such as design, branding, pricing and shopping options - but also the back-end systems that enable order execution and control

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56 inventory flow, shipping and other logistics. Few companies can claim multi-channel alignment today, but this is quickly becoming a competitive imperative.

Build profit intelligence into experience strategy Winning customer satisfaction can be expensive. It simply isn’t sustainable to go to all lengths for all customers all the time. A sound customer experience strategy defines how service goals can be achieved while still achieving profitability goals. Not every retail transaction ends up being profitable, but applying one-size-fits-all profit protections to every transaction limits the ways in which retailers can satisfy customers. Because retailers must build flexibility into the omni-channel shopping experience, they must also build profitability rules and automate the administration of those rules to every unique transaction instantly. For instance: What options or incentives are available to a premiere customer? For a new customer? For a high-dollar transaction?

For a high-margin transaction?

Successful retailers will employ technology that quickly determines winwin scenarios for every customer and transaction using a predefined strategy and rules. An agile supply chain, connected technology systems and intelligent cost-to-serve modelling are key enablers of combining high levels of delivery flexibility and shopper satisfaction with long-term profitability.

Translate loyalty to long-term success The value of shopper loyalty simply cannot be underestimated in today’s ultra-competitive retail environment. For the past few years, most retailers have been focused on competing based on low price — but in today’s omni-channel world, this low-price model limits strategic options. Retailers must instead work toward building a unique value proposition that reduces the role of price in the purchasing decision.

Shoppers must feel they are receiving the right combination of value, product and service which results in a long-term feeling of loyalty to a particular retailer.

For example, luxury retailers like Louis Vuitton and Burberry are thriving, even in a challenging economy, by offering customers unique products and a special shopping experience that they

perceive as valuable. These retailers’ high-quality offerings, high-profile brands and high-end retail stores promise customers an optimal experience and build long-term brand loyalty that vanquishes any price concerns shoppers might have in today’s economy.3 What these retail pacesetters have in common is a narrow focus on consumer needs - and a flexible, innovative approach to delivering an excellent experience. While many retailers are accustomed to focusing on merchandise plans as a starting point, retail leaders know that the consumer is the focal point. By defining consumer profiles, segments and strategies first, achievable merchandise plans can then be developed with appropriate supply chain capabilities and constraints.

For retailers that begin with customer satisfaction as a foundation for everything they do, many of the challenges presented by alternative channels and competitive retailers will fade away — and their brand will emerge as the best choice in an increasingly competitive marketplace.

1 N. Zmuda, “Lowe’s to Debut New Campaign, Tagline,” Advertising Age, AdAge.com, September 15, 2011.

2 J. Ericson, “Lowe’s: From Customer Data to Customer Loyalty,” Information Management, Information-Management.com, November 30, 2011.

3 T. Carr, “Louis Vuitton, BMW tower over competitors for global brand recognition,” Luxury Daily, LuxuryDaily.com, March 20, 2012.

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57

In the cloud? So 2005.

Built for the cloud? Now that’s 2012.

Iain Watson is Executive Vice-President of Products at Predictix, where he is responsible for product direction for the company’s cloud-based merchandising suite. Retailers, wholesalers and brands make better forecasting, planning, assortment, pricing and replenishment decisions with the Predictix merchandising software suite, designed from the ground up to handle the demands of big data, omni-channel retail and retailers’ unique forecasting and planning needs. Predictix is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. Iain Watson, Predictix

At a time when many retail vendors are simply cloaking traditional applications in the mantle of the cloud, applications architected for the cloud from the ground up are resonating with the world’s largest and most successful retailers. While traditional applications “in the cloud” provide only the same functionality as yesterday’s tools, applications designed specifically for the cloud take full advantage of the latest science and the power and flexibility of the cloud to handle Big Data and answer retail’s toughest questions in a fundamentally better way.

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58 The cloud is everywhere these days, from Microsoft’s “to the cloud” commercials and Apple’s iCloud to the NRF Big Show in New York, where it seemed nearly every retail technology vendor touted its cloud offering. But study most cloud announcements and marketing spin closely, and today’s cloud narrative mirrors the mid-1990s, the last time people were so abuzz about a new technology that would revolutionise business. Back then, every company rushed to be on the Internet. But what did that change?

Simply this: “brochures” on the web, the same old content in a shiny new browser. Experts raved about how people could now find any information they wanted, “pull it” from the web, and instantly give anyone and everyone global reach. All true, yet far from the promise the web would fulfil.

Those early movers jumped on the web’s most obvious (and easy) implication, which did not require a complete re-thinking or re-architecting of what came before it. Yet the true impact of the web (which is still playing out) only started taking shape when people began to envision and deliver entirely new technologies and business models made possible by the web.

Simply putting an existing application on the cloud, however, does not make that application any different or any better.

It’s the new “brochure on the web.” Being “in the cloud” is a step, but not a leap; delivering old applications on the cloud will never yield transformational value.

The cloud’s true impact can only be achieved when one envisions and delivers solutions that are “designed for the cloud.” What might these solutions look like? Let’s take two examples that are familiar to retailers: forecasting and price optimisation. In a world of limited, expensive, purchased computing power (the “pre-cloud” world), anyone building a forecasting or price optimisation application has to make difficult trade-offs to get a “good enough” answer, since solving for the best answer is prohibitively expensive. After all, even a “good enough” answer costs millions of dollars in hardware alone for a large retailer.

Even with such large investments, forecasting runs still take many hours over the weekend (and the hardware sits idle the rest of the week), and running a single “real-time” pricing scenario can take half an hour to return an answer to a user, a painfully long time for someone trying to make many decisions over the course of a busy day.

Being “in the cloud” is not enough Viewed this way, today’s cloud frenzy is no different. Retailers have accepted the most immediate benefit: put an existing application in the cloud, and eliminate the need to purchase the related hardware. With that application accessible from the cloud, you (kind of) get a version of the “anytime, anywhere” access expected on the web.

Now imagine a world where you can call on unlimited, cheap, on-demand computing power. You call up 10 or 100 servers on the fly, only for the time you need them, for a few thousand dollars a month. The savings are without a doubt substantial. Yet these savings, as compelling as they are, are no more

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than the “brochure in the cloud” value.

However, when forecasting and pricing solutions are expressly designed for the cloud, you can truly leverage the power of the cloud. How? At such low costs, you can afford to call on far more computing power, exactly when you need it, and run analyses that would never be practical or even feasible on purchased hardware. By applying much more sophisticated science, and calling up far more computing resources on the fly, you can solve for the best answer, and if needed, get that answer in seconds. When applications are “of the cloud,” retailers can begin to see truly transformational results.

A forecasting solution developed specifically for the cloud can consistently achieve 30-50 percent more accurate forecasts and deliver real-time pricing answers in seconds – much better results than are possible with traditional solutions. Those better results drive real business benefits: higher sales, higher margins, fewer stock-outs, better performing inventory, lower inventory investments with higher service levels, faster decisions and higher customer satisfaction.

The transformation the cloud can bring will take years to play out; those companies that bet early on the cloud are already demonstrating how being “of the cloud” can bring truly new and better solutions to the table. Even they have only scratched the surface, and will continue to find new ways to leverage the power of the cloud. For those companies heavily invested in the legacy technologies that pre-dated the cloud, the transition will test their willingness to abandon their current solutions (and their lucrative maintenance streams) in order to develop entirely new solutions for the cloud. It’s going to be an interesting ride

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59

Five ways retailers can leverage product information to increase corporate profits in today’s economy

Mikael Lyngsø is the CEO of Stibo Systems, a worldwide provider of and global leader in strategic information management technology and solutions. Over the last 30 years, the company has been helping growth-directed executive teams in the manufacturing, distribution, retail, travel and hospitality, automotive, and grocery industries manage their strategic information on a global scale.

Stibo System’s base of market-leading companies include GE, Sears, Siemens, Target and Thule.

Mikael Lyngsø, Stibo Systems

Retailers today face an intensely competitive marketplace with unprecedented challenges and opportunities. With the emergence of a greater variety of channels, an abundance of product options and easily accessible online price comparisons, consumers now demand better service and lower prices. The ability to ensure that the right product is available at the right place and at the right time is critical. Organisations that can react faster tend to come out on top.

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60 However, operational information is typically siloed – residing and evolving independently in multiple applications, sales solutions and spreadsheets where it cannot flow efficiently. Worse still, an alarming number of critical business decisions are based on information that is most often inaccurate or incomplete.

Previously, IT professionals would turn to their ERP system vendors hoping for a quick, cost-effective solution to manage the increased volume of information.

What they soon discovered was that ERP vendors lack the ability to manage every business unit’s information as it flows across both internal and external channels. Today, retailers have come to realise that to manage their information assets they need a combination of technology, philosophy and process. In essence they need to adopt a strategic information management approach that leverages a master data management (MDM) platform in order to manage operational information as it flows through the business. As today’s business environment becomes increasingly challenging, C-Level Executives are looking to strategic information management processes in order to drive value added initiatives including:

Speeding time to market Reducing the time it takes to introduce new products has become a top priority.

By speeding time to market, retailers can generate revenue earlier, increase margins and establish a sustainable competitive advantage. In fact, studies

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have shown that high-performing companies on average generate 61% of their sales from successful introductions of new products and services. According to a study, companies that experience an 80% revenue growth from new products typically double their market capitalisation in a five-year period. The process of developing and introducing a new product can be inherently complex. Even the simplest products today can have hundreds of attributes, all derived from multiple systems that reside both within and outside the organisation. Introducing a new product also requires the coordinated efforts of dozens of individuals within the company – not to mention multiple, geographically dispersed external partners and suppliers. An MDM platform combined with a strategic information management philosophy enables organisations to streamline the process of gathering all product data from their suppliers and partners. It cleanses and manages that data centrally, allows for branding and versioning of the information, and feeds all business systems needed to consume that data. As a result, retailers can share more accurate information with its websites, e-commerce applications,

marketing initiatives, POS systems, customer service applications, and other channels with more speed, reliability and security. It also ensures that all sales channels have the information they need to educate customers and sell products faster and at a higher return.

Reducing product returns Product returns represent one of the most overlooked and significant causes for profit and margin reductions. The typical product return involves so many steps and has such a far-reaching impact that the total annual costs now affect 2% to 3% of the average retailer’s sales according to a report. And this doesn’t even address the impact on customer loyalty. A recent study has shown that 25% of consumers who return a product are unlikely to buy that brand again. A number of recent studies, including an analysis by Accenture, discovered that most returned products do not have a defect at all, but are returned due to false or insufficient product information. Needless to say, these inconsistencies lead to consumer dissatisfaction and frustration. Having a strategic information management process in place can reduce product returns by managing correct product information across the supply chain.

Optimising inventory levels Inventory accuracy is a staggering problem that leads to costly challenges.

Studies have found that merchants generally only have accurate inventory information on 35% of their items.

Research has also shown that 47% of out-of-stock items with poor forecasts result in inconsistent, inaccurate and incomplete data being housed in supply chain, merchandising and inventory systems. An MDM platform allows the organisation to centrally manage all of its product operational information and

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61 automatically feed it to each consuming system, sales channel and business process individually. This approach provides a single, consistent view of product information without forcing business units and suppliers to have to standardise on the same system or data format.

Streamlining the on-boarding process There are two common obstacles retailers face when delivering products to market: ensuring that the product information they are acquiring from suppliers is correct and second supplying this information across multiple channels to support the selling of the product itself. This on-boarding process is often cumbersome, error prone and time consuming—resulting in a costly, manual approach to correcting the information.

AMR Research recently concluded that companies could potentially reduce their supplier management costs by nearly

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85% just by improving information visibility with suppliers. For someone charged with managing hundreds of vendors and tens of thousands of products, the efficiency costs alone are staggering. In fact, after implementing an MDM initiative based on a strategic information management approach, a major global retailer was able to reduce its average on-boarding costs from more than $200 per item to less than $3 per item.

Operational knowledge as a performance improvement tool Over the last two decades, businesses have worked feverishly to optimise their physical supply chains. Virtually every discussion about improving the supply chain has been centred on the flow of products from raw materials to consumption.

Improving upsell and cross-sell conversions By taking a holistic, full-cycle approach to managing product information, sales and marketing teams have the opportunity to improve cross-sell and upsell conversions. Online channels can also provide more relevant product links, recommend complementary or similar products, and improve product categorisation for easier browsing and increased sales conversions.

Additionally, this level of information flow and control helps support an improved cross-channel experience. Customers today want to use their smartphones to check local inventory. They want to research and compare products online, and receive detailed and accurate answers about an item they saw in the company’s latest catalogue or website before making a trip to the store.

However, a growing number of retailers are now taking a similar interest in optimising the flow and management of the information related to these products.

CEOs understand that integrating their critical data information into one management platform can completely change the playing field in their respective industry. Not only are they improving their over-all profitability, they are also breathing new life into businesses that are often caught in a downward spiral of reduced discretionary spending, higher customer expectations and tougher market competition.

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Integrating department applications, POS applications and advanced barcoding technologies into PC-based scale technologies

Mr. Rob Weisz, Bizerba North America

Rob Weisz is Director of Retail Systems for Bizerba North America. His responsibilities are product management, sales, marketing and service for the Retail Systems business unit. Weisz has over 20 years of progressive retail technology experience with a primary focus on the grocery industry in North America. Weisz has a computer science background and has managed software development, QA, product support and marketing teams with his previous employer. Bizerba provides state-ofthe-art PC-based scale hardware and software for the next generation along with comprehensive services, all from a single source. Close to the user, flexible for their needs, ready for the challenges of a global economy.

The world of Fresh continues to change at a rapid pace. Retailers are focused on the best in class perishable departments while trying to adapt technologies that can improve their optics in front of the consumer.

Whether it be mobile smartphone strategies, recipe management, shrink management, reducing out-of-stocks or enhancing the customer experience by allowing them to check-out in the department instead of going to the traditional check-out lane just to purchase one, two, or three items.

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63 How do you address all of these needs so they can be synchronised on one focal device? By integrating department applications, POS applications and advanced barcoding technologies into PC-based scale technologies. This is the vehicle to solve this challenge. Let’s start with department applications. They are so many different components of dayto-day operations that have to be managed. Whether it be display case planograms, suggestive selling prompting to improve sales, production planning interfaces to suggest stocklevels, access to company messages or advertising based on consumer buying trends. This is where the latest generation of Bizerba software comes into play. The state-of-the-art K-software and K-apps allow Bizerba, third party software companies and the retailer the ability to seamlessly integrate apps.

Highlights: - Modern Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) - Fast and flexible development - Future proven - Graphical user interface is independent of the scales SW - Interface can be adapted for specific customer workflows - Intuitive workflows which reduce training costs - Interface can be modified simply with WYSIWYG tools - Future-proven concept to extend SW functionality and business logic - Fast response and development time elimination of development bottlenecks - Simple integration of (existing) third party system (loyalty, digital signage, etc.)

- Reduced complexity and operational costs Last but not least the most advanced Bizerba K-software feature is the ability for any third party application to capture a scale event in real time to make decisions. This is the power of the PCbased scale, not the hardware technology that is expected to be first in class today.

It is the ability to have the killer app(s) to improve workflows where it matters most, in front of the customer so they think the

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store they are shopping in is the best experience out of all the choices they have in today’s environment.Bizerba to date has integrated over 25 different applications that interact with our core.

Next let’s talk about integrating POS into a PC-based scale. Retailers are always looking at ways to synchronise their data.

They are also looking at ways to ease the check-out experience and reduce capital expenditure.

some key features: - Weight can be applied so the POS can capture velocity and ensure price integrity - The lot can be applied for traceability purposes in case of recall - The shelf life can be applied to stop the product from being purchased if out of date - Operator ID can be applied to track department activities - Serial number can be applied to identify when the package was packed and produced Dynamic and Static QR codes: - Drive cooking instruction / recipe portal information - Producer and product information - Lot number - Promotions - Nutritional information - Coupons

Bizerba and POS synchronisation: with our K-OEM software developer’s kit product allows a third party scale application to integrate with our weigh / print / display with standard OPOS and UPOS interfaces. This allows the perishable departments to interface with the POS pricing database and promotional engines without a need for any software or middleware. We have worked with leading companies to deliver this functionality. Bizerba and POS checkout abilities: with our flexible software and hardware platform, the department scale can easily become a cash register by integrating “Check Out” onto the main scale screen. The method then takes the operator to the in-store POS application and the required peripherals are attached via USB to Bizerba’s hardware. Last but not least, let’s finish with Advanced Barcode Technologies: Bizerba has been working with the GSI and other coding standard organisations along with ARTS to ensure we support all these new technologies in our K-software and related products. RSS14 Databar: supported across our line of products to enable retailers to capture much more than item number and price. Here are

The bottom line benefits of harnessing this technology to the retailers are: - Improved sales and profitability - Reduced shrink - Improved customer service - Ease of implementing and harnessing technology - Improved health and wellness communications - Improved freshness perception - Labour retention and training - Improved serviceability of equipment - Reduced cost of ownership We are not providing scales, we are providing technological and industry insight expertise for fresh goods management. The scale architecture is only a consequence. Embedded mobile devices were once the standard – business requirements have changed.

Welcome to the PC scale revolution.

Fresh departments are one of the most important locations in a grocery store because you have an active audience that is shopping for the focal point of their meal. This is an incredible opportunity to focus on your consumer in order to increase and maximise your sales volume. Bizerba is committed to this technology and to being the global leader in this field.

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Product data synchronisation between companies worldwide

Daniel Lynch is Account Manager and Sales Engineer at Edicom’s New York office. He studied Economics and Computational Linguistics at the City University of New York. His areas of expertise include EDI, GDSN and eInvoicing compliance in Latin America and the European Union. Edicom is a business dedicated to creating eCommerce solutions, be they EDI, GDSN or eInvoicing, across a variety of sectors and regions. With offices in the US, Spain, Italy, France, Mexico, Brazil and Argentina, Edicom actively serves close to 10,000 clients worldwide. Among them are Unilever, Proctor & Gamble, Johnson & Johnson, Toys “R” Us, Carrefour and Pfizer.

Daniel Lynch, Edicom

More and more distributors and suppliers worldwide are connecting their B2B platforms to the GDSN (Global Data Synchronisation Network), a data transmission system that enables companies around the world to exchange and synchronise product information through a common standard language which overcomes the logistical and cultural barriers that sometimes appear in international trade. Let’s take a good look at GDSN with a brief history as well as learning about its benefits and architecture.

The current business environment is characterised by crucial factors that determine success or failure: the increasing competition between companies within a sector and high levels of demand from increasingly knowledgeable end consumers who demand swift attention and a high degree of satisfaction.

In this complex setting, business partners,

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suppliers and distributors must use the technological tools currently available with the common goal of improving their customer satisfaction strategies. With precisely this objective, GS1 has developed an electronic communications system that enables distributors and suppliers to share updated information on their whole range of products and

services in real-time, regardless of their physical location.

Previously, nearly all B2B communications occurred via electronic data interchange (EDI) technology, applied by companies on a daily basis to engage in different types of trading and logistical transactions, such as purchase orders, invoices or ASNs, but with a final

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65 outcome of substantially enhancing the quality and availability of the products at point-of-sale. For many companies, this gives a competitive edge that can ensure the satisfaction needed to gain consumer loyalty.

The basis of EDI messages such as 832s and PRICATs is the possibility of synchronising product information with your trading partners, along with other private and direct connection options through proprietary networks where a few suppliers and distributors specify the technology and formats to be used to link up and synchronise their product details privately. However, although efficient and sound, these proprietary networks will not have the global, public nature of a network such as GDSN, which embraces the entire distribution industry through implementation of the same standard language and implementation details, common to all trading partners in the network. A single language that crosses borders . The format developed by GS1 to implement the different messages exchanged between business partners is a series of XML schemas known as Catalog Item messages.

These messages are sent via electronic data catalogues, known as Data Pools, which are the key to a system linking vendors and distributors in a single global product registry.

The components that allow this B2B communication system to run with such high levels of quality information exchanged are: GPC (Global Product Classification) This is a system which arranges the products uniformly under the same classification criteria, providing suppliers and distributors with a common language to group their products similarly all over the world. It includes, for example, the use of homogeneous weights and measures systems for all business partners, avoiding the confusion or clerical errors that usually affect international trade.

Data Pool GDS network operations are based on the exchange of structured information between Electronic Catalogues or Data Pools. It is important that the companies thoroughly populate the Data Pool fields with their Retail IT | Year 2 | Issue 07

product attributes to ensure the desired quality and cleanliness of the information.

This provides interesting details such as the GTIN of the products, different attributes (weights, dimensions, prices, colours, sizes, discounts, hazard or expiration information, etc.), or location data of the companies and their logistics platforms (GLN).

Global Registry GS1 A global register of product references stored in the Data Pool of each company.

It takes the item attributes and identifies the catalogue where the data is kept, acting as a validator that certifies the Data Pool and quality of information published. In addition, it implements a communications module linking the subscription requests from users for subsequent synchronisation between the partners. The retail sector is the ultimate beneficiary. The possibility of real-time access to accurate and consistent information on items allows for the delivery of products swiftly and efficiently which, in a sector with high rotation and aspects such as product eligibility, is highly advantageous.

What additional benefits can the distributors/retailers (subscribers) and suppliers (publishers) of product data gain from the GDS network?

Main advantages for distributors: - Catalogue item data updated in realtime - More accurate and error-free orders - Greater product availability at pointof-sale - Savings on administration and management costs by automating item data reception processes - Logistical efficiency by reducing excess goods (safety stock) - Possibility of expanding the supplier database - More effective point-of-sale promotions thanks to updated product data - Elimination of language or cultural barriers by categorising products under the same criteria (different systems of weights and measures, etc.).

Main advantages for suppliers: - Simple management of changes

and authorisation of new items - Direct communication between trading partners, with no need for local intermediaries who make doing business more expensive - More visible presence of the company and its product catalogue on an international level - Elimination of errors in goods shipments and discrepancies in billing by providing clients with a full and permanently updated catalogue - Removal of linguistic or cultural barriers by classifying articles in a single, standardised format (weights and measures, sizes, etc.).

- Ability to optimise scheduling of production processes in the short and mid-term - By reducing the administrative burden and workload, sales teams can focus on promotional and product sales tasks.

Future of the GDS network The GDS network is becoming increasingly widespread in the EDI market. Given its presence in different sectors with major suppliers and distributors of international stature such as Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Disney, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer and Target, the acceptance and adoption of this technology by major information hubs seems evident, although small and medium-sized businesses still prefer to rely on pointto-point network systems linking them directly to the partners with whom they trade their products.

It is an efficient and profitable communication system for businesses that need to align the data in their product catalogues, which is why we believe that before long the list of subscribers and publishers is bound to grow to include small and mediumsized businesses from all sectors.

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