Electronic Shelf Edge Label & Epos Head Office

The Ultimate EPOS Synergy between Electronic Shelf Edge Label & Epos Head Office

Both Electronic Point of Sale (EPOS) & Electronic Shelf Edge Label (ESEL) technologies have been available to retailers for quite some time. It is true to say that EPOS has been adopted by the majority of retailers in the majority of sectors at this stage, and until recently ESEL’s were the preserve of the few.

However, these parallel retail technologies are forming an unbeatable alliance in delivering the ultimate efficiency gain to progressive retailers willing to develop in a competitive market and grow their business.

The following article will not only provide you with key information on both elements of this technological alliance, but it also outlines how Retail Solutions EPOS is continuing to deliver value for money and operational efficiency through our close collaboration with dynamic companies such as MarketHub – a market leader in the provision of ESEL’s.

ESEL’s – Electronic Shelf Edge Labels

In recent years, one of the most dynamic and conversation-provoking products within the industry has been Electronic Shelf Labels. These “electronic” versions of traditional price tags use e-ink to display a price and are connected to the EPOS product file database. This makes changing in-store prices as easy as typing a new price into the POS software and clicking ‘update’.

Therefore, troublesome and often inaccurate paper labels are replaced with a digital solution and in so doing, saves labor, enhances the management of those frequent price changes, and even provides a better consumer experience.

In the context of fierce competition and a need for synchronization with e-commerce, real-time price changes today represent a strategic advantage and require maximum responsiveness and reliability.

Intelligent electronic shelf labels are the nerve center for the store of the future. They are the foundation for countless applications, offering more precise and refined management, optimizing costs and inventories, reducing out-of-stocks and the waste of perishable products, and so much more.

Some of the many benefits of ESEL’s are:

• Cost reduction. No more manual price changes
• Enhanced sales & increased profitability
• The immediate reaction to market situations
• Simplified processes for store personnel
• The use of highly modern technology improves stores appearance

Accurate Pricing

Shoppers lose trust in a company if the in-store prices are not aligned between the price displayed and that charged at the point of sale. Accurate pricing is heavily correlated with enhanced margins.

ESEL’s allow you to streamline your promotional prices, audit trails, and price check, whilst making amendments very easy. Maintaining each of these elements keeps your prices accurate across the board and ensures your customers see your optimal price.

Shelf Edge Influence

The shelf edge is known to be one of the most important sales influencers. Most purchases are made at this point — so the priority must be to make sure your pricing information is accurate.

With paper labels, changing prices is quite prone to human error. It’s also a slow process, and by the time you finish re-labeling, prices might have already changed and products merchandised in multiple locations may show conflicting prices.

With ESEL’s these changes are easy, so you can capture more sales at the shelf edge. You can react competitively to price changes; enable instant promotions, track which promotions work, and protect margins on the time-sensitive stock. You can even create offers based on where a specific customer is standing in the store with just a few clicks.

Retail Solutions Enterprise – Head Office Functionality

To compliment an already impressive portfolio of EPOS products, Retail Solutions have developed the ‘Head Office’ application for our retail customers with multiple store locations.  ‘Head Office’ centrally manages the sales and stock reporting across all stores – saving time and money, enhancing accuracy, margins and profits.

This software has revolutionized multiple store management as it allows for stock, cash and staff control from one location, and at the same time provides management with up-to-date information on overall performance. Some of the key features of our head office software include:

• Central product maintenance
• Central price control
• Central purchasing
• Managing different pricing/product mix In different locations
• Individual & consolidated branch reporting
• Central customer control
• Management accounts by branch
• Branch comparison analysis tool

Efficiency is gained in this environment by removing the necessity to perform repetitive administrative functions in each branch, and rather execute them from one central location.

Conclusion

Right now, two advanced, independent retail technologies; ‘Retail Solutions EPOS Head Office’ and ‘MarketHub’s Electronic Shelf Edge Labels, are being adopted simultaneously by the most progressive retailers to save time, labour & money whilst enhancing pricing accuracy, margins, profits, and consumer experiences.

Who are we?

Retail Solutions is a market-leading EPOS provider with over 25 years of business experience. Our leading sectors are convenience stores, supermarkets, forecourts, and pharmacies.

We are dedicated to providing your store with the most up-to-date and reliable point of sale hardware, along with software management tools to help you manage your business effectively.

To find out more about what we do, get in touch to chat with one of our knowledgeable consultants:

Contact us!

About the author:

Pádraig Nolan is a Sales Director of Retail Solutions Ltd. You can follow him on LinkedIn!