Articles

Written by: Dan Wittner, chief customer officer, RBM Technologies

The green revolution has taken hold of the retail industry at a rapid pace. Practically every retailer offers organic or green products to consumers, promotes the use of reusable shopping bags or employs energy saving practices in their store operations. But while the bulk of retailer efforts towards sustainability have focused on the store front, retailers can also take key steps to green their back end.  In particular, retailers have a unique opportunity to help improve sustainability efforts throughout their merchandising and in-store marketing campaigns.

A key component of any retailer's marketing efforts, in-store campaigns can also be a tremendous source of inefficiency and waste.  In most cases, retail corporate headquarters don't have a clear idea of what is happening at the store level in terms of P-O-P requirements and specs. Many retailers still operate using a hodge-podge of communication and tracking tools to document each store's attributes, such as spreadsheets, emails or other documents. These tools rarely capture the unique and evolving features of each and every store, leading to a great deal of guesswork for corporate offices planning campaigns and consequently, the shipment of inaccurate quantities or incorrect versions of P-O-P and campaign materials to stores.  

Not only does this process cause a huge amount of wasted time and effort from both store and corporate staff who then have to reconcile these inconsistencies, it also increases campaign costs and produces a great deal of waste. On average about 30% of P-O-P materials received by stores end up not being used. Because of their timely and customized nature, these materials cannot be reused at a later date or by a different store and are thrown out. With most retailers executing twenty or more in-store campaigns a year, that very quickly adds up to a staggering amount of retail merchandising waste.

By implementing new technologies and practices, retailers are not only able to increase productivity and reduce operating costs, but more importantly, reduce paper and material waste and eliminate other unnecessary processes. For example, by implementing a centralized merchandizing platform and executing campaigns in a single environment, retailers can very quickly take the "guess work" out of the merchandising process and streamline communication with stores online. These tools allow for corporate headquarters to accurately track each stores unique attributes down to the most detailed requirement. They also allow stores to easily communicate their requirements up to corporate in a timely and efficient way.

Having a clear, accurate picture of what is happening at the store level is the most critical component to efficiently planning campaign material distribution. With this knowledge, retailers are able to create a localized P-O-P kit for each store — ensuring each location receives a customized shipment of P-O-P materials that is precisely suited to their location. This results in a significant reduction in wasted materials, and an optimized campaign execution process that is correct the first time, and every time.  

By harnessing a tool that helps to capture the uniqueness of each location in their store network, and by streamlining their communication with each store, retailers can very quickly incorporate sustainability into their merchandising process and drive efficiencies in their operations at the same time.

SOURCE: Integrated Solutions For Retailers Magazine