According to IGD, 54.5p in every £1 spent on UK retail comes from the grocery sector. This fiercely competitive arena is arguably the most cut-throat of all retail sectors. Nowhere is it more imperative to engage customers at the point of sale.
The move towards omni channel retail strategies, where customers demand access to consistent, detailed product information across all geographies, at any time in any store, has further added to these complexities. Combining these with the traditional goals of streamlining costs, improving operational efficiency and achieving compliance goals leaves grocery retailers with a formidable challenge.
Pierhouse understands these complexities and has been operating within the grocery market for the last three decades, delivering smart, engaging, in-store signage solutions to retailers to drive growth. Retailers using the NetTickIT® solution report sales uplift by as much as 30% whilst reducing POS production, wastage and in-store labour costs resulting in improved operational effectiveness. Sophisticated automation enables staff to run in-store promotions quickly and simply, providing a flexible, dynamic framework. It can be deployed to any geography, providing accurate, relevant and localised content in multiple languages and currencies.
Waitrose is the sixth largest grocery retailer in the UK posting gross sales of £6.11bn in 2013/14. Their store portfolio totals 320 including 55 convenience shops, 7 Food & Home stores, 1 Waitrose Food, Fashion and Home shop and 28 stores at Welcome Break Service Stations. They have a total selling space of over 5.5m sq ft and employ 64,000 partners. They are renowned for their high level of customer service, fresh quality food, and the long-term relationships which they establish with suppliers. Pierhouse has built a long standing relationship with Waitrose and was selected as their strategic signage management partner to support the growth of its business and to introduce new ways of communicating with its customers.
Waitrose wanted a single solution to support shelf edge tickets, information tickets and promotional point of sale advertising. Future innovations were also an important consideration such as electronic shelf edge labels, digital screens, mobile and other new technologies, all key components of an omni channel strategy.
Pierhouse offer a flexible platform which was a natural fit for their requirements. James Stacey, the Waitrose Project Manager for the Strategic Signage Management System, said “We chose NetTickIT® because it best met our current and potential future requirements. The quality and user friendliness of NetTickIT® also made it stand out. The Pierhouse team demonstrated that they really understand retail and have been very supportive in understanding and responding to our specific needs.”
The solution is capable of providing a fast reaction to price and promotional changes, providing price agility and speed to market. This gives buyers greater freedom in product selection, whilst guaranteeing that product tickets would be available on brand and price compliant.
The Midcounties Co-operative is the largest independent co-operative in the UK with gross sales of £738 million. It has almost 9,000 colleagues across 450 sites. It has an enviable reputation for their deployment of technology for the benefit of both customers and store colleagues alike. There are over 200 retail stores, most of which are community focused, located in villages and areas in towns often ignored by other retailers.
The Midcounties Co-operatives chose to develop and produce their own point of sale materials to advertise promotional lines. After researching the market extensively The Midcounties Co-operatives chose to implement Pierhouse’s NetTickIT® solution for printing their in-store colour POS.
Peter Westall, Head of Central Operations at Midcounties, said: “We looked at how we could make our systems more efficient. The Head Office application allows us to monitor printing in-store and ensure consistency across our estate. It also means stores which vary in size and range of stock need only print out tickets for items that apply to them, which reduces waste.”
“We are hugely impressed by the simplicity of in-store execution as well as the professionalism of the IT project team. Retailers always demand better, faster, easier and more cost effective in-store solutions we can confirm NetTickIT® delivers exactly to expectation!”
NetTickIT® can grow with the needs of the retailer. It provides fast, seamless integration with existing systems, and can dramatically improve a retailer’s ability to react, bringing big data and omni channel retailing projects to reality at the shelf edge without the need for expensive IT investment. Working across multiple devices, it ensures control, compliance, reporting and agility. High impact tickets across paper and digital formats can also be deployed including augmented reality, QR Codes and product reviews, keeping retailers competitive and relevant to their customer base. Pierhouse has a proven track record in grocery and the wider retail market with installations across 60 countries. It offers a platform for growth helping retailers succeed in today’s competitive market.
Tel: 01252 735000
Email: sales@pierhouse.co.uk
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