Case Studies Ensuring Merchandising Compliance from 35,000 Feet

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	Ensuring Merchandising Compliance from 35,000 Feet

Ensuring Merchandising Compliance from 35,000 Feet

Technology Category	Functional Applications - Inventory Management Systems Functional Applications - Remote Monitoring & Control Systems
Applicable Industries	Retail
Applicable Functions	Business Operation Sales & Marketing
Use Cases	Inventory Management Remote Control Retail Store Automation
Services	Software Design & Engineering Services System Integration
Challenge	As the vice president of product at Lolli and Pops, Jessica Mennella leads the buying team and is responsible for much of the visual merchandising at the company’s stores across the United States. Each store location has a wide selection of confectionery SKUs, and for its scooped sweets and bulk items, stores have up to 350 bins or more. Re-assorting and setting the stores can be a difficult challenge, involving many meetings with Jessica’s planning team, and often requiring a lot of travel. On a flight from Chicago to San Francisco, Jessica found herself chatting online with her planner. As they discussed 10-15 stores, each with a slightly different layout that had been planned to roughly 80 percent, they struggled to finish and to fine-tune the layout, facing issues like where to visually place dark chocolates in a store filled with sours. Read More
About Customer	Lolli and Pops is a purveyor of sweetness whose stores are stocked to the rafters with sweets from around the world, sourced from both famed producers and local artisans, changing daily based on batch size and availability. Lolli and Pops measures the quality of its sweets not only by their origin, but by the memories they evoke and the smiles they create. The teams in over 40 locations across the United States are committed to sweetening their customers’ day. Read More
Solution	The RetailNext merchandising solution allowed Jessica to observe snapshots of stores, displays, fixtures, and product assortment. Despite low-bandwidth airplane Wi-Fi, Jessica was able to go in-store and see how stores were laid out, pulling up still image snapshots from the locations, taking screenshots, and emailing the images –annotated with notes -to her planner. Upon arrival, Jessica and her planner had finished the exercise, finalizing the merchandising layout in every store. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Functional Applications - Inventory Management Systems

Functional Applications - Remote Monitoring & Control Systems

Applicable Industries

Retail

Applicable Functions

Business Operation

Sales & Marketing

Use Cases

Inventory Management

Remote Control

Retail Store Automation

Services

Software Design & Engineering Services

System Integration

Challenge

As the vice president of product at Lolli and Pops, Jessica Mennella leads the buying team and is responsible for much of the visual merchandising at the company’s stores across the United States. Each store location has a wide selection of confectionery SKUs, and for its scooped sweets and bulk items, stores have up to 350 bins or more. Re-assorting and setting the stores can be a difficult challenge, involving many meetings with Jessica’s planning team, and often requiring a lot of travel. On a flight from Chicago to San Francisco, Jessica found herself chatting online with her planner. As they discussed 10-15 stores, each with a slightly different layout that had been planned to roughly 80 percent, they struggled to finish and to fine-tune the layout, facing issues like where to visually place dark chocolates in a store filled with sours.

About Customer

Lolli and Pops is a purveyor of sweetness whose stores are stocked to the rafters with sweets from around the world, sourced from both famed producers and local artisans, changing daily based on batch size and availability. Lolli and Pops measures the quality of its sweets not only by their origin, but by the memories they evoke and the smiles they create. The teams in over 40 locations across the United States are committed to sweetening their customers’ day.

Solution

The RetailNext merchandising solution allowed Jessica to observe snapshots of stores, displays, fixtures, and product assortment. Despite low-bandwidth airplane Wi-Fi, Jessica was able to go in-store and see how stores were laid out, pulling up still image snapshots from the locations, taking screenshots, and emailing the images –annotated with notes -to her planner. Upon arrival, Jessica and her planner had finished the exercise, finalizing the merchandising layout in every store.

Impact #1	Jessica was able to observe and finalize store layouts remotely, reducing the need for extensive travel.
Impact #2	The solution allowed for real-time collaboration between Jessica and her planner, improving efficiency.
Impact #3	Annotated images provided clear communication and documentation for future reference.

Impact #1

Jessica was able to observe and finalize store layouts remotely, reducing the need for extensive travel.

Impact #2

The solution allowed for real-time collaboration between Jessica and her planner, improving efficiency.

Impact #3

Annotated images provided clear communication and documentation for future reference.

Benefit #1	Reduced travel time and costs associated with in-person store visits.
Benefit #2	Increased efficiency in finalizing store layouts, reducing the time taken from days to hours.

Benefit #1

Reduced travel time and costs associated with in-person store visits.

Benefit #2

Increased efficiency in finalizing store layouts, reducing the time taken from days to hours.

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Overview

Ensuring Merchandising Compliance from 35,000 Feet

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit