EPoS Case Study - Stratford Garden Centre
Profile
The Company
As they were using Multi Retail at their other garden centre at Nether Whitacre near Birmingham, Open Retail Solutions were the obvious choice when the Stratford site was purchased in 2006.
Originally a nursery, the site has been extensively developed and Open Retail Solutions have been able to provide hardware and software solutions for each phase. These include a toy shop, cafe, table service restaurant, kitchen, homeware department and latterly a farm shop with integrated scales. All these enhancements work from the same database.
This is a another customer with whom we have a strong working relationship and who has enabled us to develop software around their retail needs. They find it useful to have a partner who can provide all their needs without having to use multiple suppliers.
Problem
As the site has developed so have our working practices. All the systems had to be scaled up to work the new way being more flexible and saving us time. The size of the operation meant we would have to put in place a management structure, we couldn’t rely on family alone.
The shop has both product sales and food service and we didn’t want to get two separate systems to learn and control. After opening we needed a system that could take us further as we developed and grew.
Solution
Weigh Label scales are used on the butchery & deli counter and these produce a barcoded label that can be scanned by the tills. The office system has been set up to transfer the products and prices to the EPoS tills and weighing scales. Pick the button that relates to the goods being purchased or barcode scan the item and the pricing is done by the till, so simple.
They started with a café and then later added a separate restaurant with a menu choice and offering table service. The main point was to serve a wholesome menu quickly and efficiently. More recently they added a tablet table ordering and a kitchen printer for the meals, but print off the drinks on a bar printer. The food and drink choices are set up on the till using touch menus with all the sub options, and you just enter the customers order. Its really easy.
The range of functions and ways of serving has vastly increased by using EPoS tills. Account discounts and promotions, deliveries and integrated credit cards making service more efficient. We can add and change products during the trading day. The sales are being collected all day long so we know what is selling and keep an eye on what we might be running out of and so need reordering.
Once we get the new prices it takes no time at all to enter these in and get them downloaded into the tills and scales.
We can add shop items to your food bill and vice versa and issue promotions relating to the whole business.
We not only manage what we buy and sell but we also account for what we use in the kitchen as own use transferred via the till .
Quote
“We have worked hard on getting the basics working well like till sales, and ordering with goods inwards. After that we focused on stocktaking , wastage and own use. We have been able to develop with Open Retail a full set of management reporting. We use the Open To Buy module religiously now as well as a targeting system for sales and stock levels, it reports our actual performance and we tweak our plans through the year and therefore get no shock at the end of year”
Helen Lloyd
