Retail TNT

Each day, the world moves a little further forward and our outlets – at least, those that have not succumbed to the recession – are not any different. In these tough times, shops would like to seek out that delicate balance between cost-effective and engaging shopfittings, nevertheless it can be dangerously easy to go for cost-effective over engaging, and vice-versa, thus spoiling the full equilibrium.
Say a shopkeeper decides to go for a cheap set of shelving, which could not leave them out of pocket, but will not see them create that much more money – while quality of products, also demand for those goods, is crucial to any retail business, it is unlikely that customers will feel compelled to require wares from shelves that look as if they need been bought second-hand. On the other hand, attractive shopfittings may well attract customers, giving them confidence that they’re shopping for from a top quality retailer, however if the owner has paid an arm and a leg for their fittings, can they have sufficient demand to really create a profit on these goods? We tend to are told that you’ve got to pay money to create money, but in these fraught times, it might not be such a smart strategy. This can be where slatwall becomes an intriguing option.
Slatwall, as its name suggests, could be a special kind of shopfitting consisting of panelling with a series of slats at regular intervals, permitting retailers to display their product on an easy-to-clean, straightforward-to-maintain set of ‘floating’ shelves. The shelves are specially designed for the slatwall, so can easily be fell into the panelling without the need for brackets, permitting additional house for displaying things, and a more engaging display system. Worried the shelves are getting a very little dusty? Take them off, slide them out of the slats and offer them a clean.
The shelves return in an exceedingly selection of neutral colours, from the quality white, cream or grey, to wood effects, in maple, cherry, beech, o.k and ash, and such a vary is doubtless to contain a shade to suit into most search decor schemes. Furthermore, there are even ‘credit crunch shelves’ – plain shelves while not any edging. While these floating shelves can certainly look a lot less attractive than the traditional shelves, they’d be ideal for a seasonal Christmas search to attach to their slatwall, and fill with discount merchandise around the vacation season.
However, with the cheapest slatwall shelf priced at ?10.ninety five on its own, or ?9.85 during a pack of twenty four, they are reasonably priced enough to justify selecting the standard shelves over the credit crunch version. Of course, the wood impact shelving is additional expensive, with cherry the cheapest at ?12.20, and maple the priciest, currently being sold for ?15.25. Even these higher prices can be whittled down by bulk-buying; a pack of 24 shelves might seem sort of a larger investment, but would offer additional display space, and let’s face it – the bulk of shops will need additional, instead of less, than 24 floating shelves.
Of course, slatwall and also the floating shelves do have drawbacks. Without any brackets, the shelves don’t have that further support, so it is important to confirm that your shelving is not overloaded with product – whereas heavy duty floating shelves could solve this downside, the additional value, and truth that, after all, still do not have brackets could mean that while they’ll be ready to be loaded up with further wares, they may still suffer the identical drawback as the normal shelving – too much weight could bend or maybe break the shelves, leaving the retailer needing to interchange them. Thus it is vital to evaluate what your business needs before creating any purchase – ten minutes of deliberation could save hours of stress in the future.
Therefore there you’ve got it; as the planet moves more and further forward, our shops don’t seem to be way behind – not solely do we have slatwall to make additional space and act as a less expensive alternative to traditional shopfittings, however we can even optimise this house using floating shelving.

I started in retail when I was 13 years old. My first job was in sales at Pals Music Company, my neighbors dads record store in downtown Hattiesburg, Ms. Sales were a simple thing then. A customer, generally, had heard a song on our local radio station, WXXX, and came in, usually the following Friday or Saturday, and wanted to hear a bit of it on the built in record player. If it was the right song it was usually a sale. Every Friday I got paid in my choice, records or cash or both. I usually chose both.

As years went by, and finally after college, I took jobs in various industries, but always seemed to migrate back to retail. Now I am a cartoonist. In September of 2006, I opened my first online retail store which sold (and continues to sell) tees, mugs and such bearing my offbeat cartoon images.

I had gone back to college from 2002-2006 to learn Internet technology and business, but even it did not prepare me for what was to come. How does one deal with customers in which, more often than not, there is no human contact?

Four years have now passed since I opened my first online shop, and I now have four more and over 200,000 licensed gifts and tees. Since I do not stock inventory, I use manufacturer/dropshippers who print and deliver my goods, so I have to choose carefully. With my core manufacturer, I made certain I have access to all my customers names and mailing addresses so that I can stay in touch for sales, promotions, etc. If you are able to do that, please do. But dont expect that kind of respect from the major online PODs (Print On Demand) firms such as Zazzle, Printfection, Threadless, Cafe Press and the other big dogs. Here are my five steps to online retail survival and even profit.

1. Become an expert. This does not mean know it all or guru. It simply means to catalogue useful information and purveying it to others through blogs and article marketing. Eventually existing customers and new ones come to rely on you for good info and google your name. Writing blogs such as this often come from a combination of both reading and experience, but mostly experience.

2. Make good use of Twitter, facebook and other social networks. Many try to dictate the right and wrong way to do this. In reality, what works for Fred will probably not work for Barney. Social media is truly not a one-size-fits-all world. Many well known brand businesses use the totally personal approach of having a person trying to juggle all the balls in the air engaging in one-on-one dialogue 24/7. Other companies have so much information, they use a real human person to tweet all the while having pre-scheduled news tweets going using such systems as Hootsuite or Twaitter. These are also ideal for smaller or mid-size firms that may be on a limited budget but want to have an online presence throughout the day and night. It is particularly effective for my firm since about 50% of our orders originate from Europe, and are processed when we are asleep.

3. Think globally, act locally. This is one that I procrastinated for a long time, and my wife found a way for me to want to give it a try by creating a very attractive thank you packet that we sometimes leave with someone in the service industry who has treated us well. The presentation she created is so unique, it has already proven effective even after only handing out a few of them. We have noticed large orders originating from our own hometown. I dont spend as much time on this as I believe I should and plan to utilize it more often. I am used to working online but my goal is to balance that. I will report again in a few months to let you know how it is working.

4. Price within reason. This time the dot.com bubble appears not to be busting. More and more people are appreciating the convenience of shopping online. But just like in physical stores, people like a good price. One has to make a profit to stay open, but one has to price it within reason so that the market can afford it, or the market will go somewhere else.

5. Dont jump the gun when opening. Make sure your shop has enough inventory. When I say inventory I dont mean ten or twenty items. Whether you are using a POD manufacturer or making your products locally or dropshipping someone elses or becoming an associate, fill your page with salable images. I did not start selling until I had a few hundred items in my shops, but it is different for everyone. Now that there are thousands, they are picked up by all the major shopping channels such as Google Shopping, The Find, Shop.com, etc. People rely on these sites for useful retail information and comparison. Most people do the opposite but fill your shop with merchandise, then open the doors.

The stationery department in an freelance retail business responds well to attention nonetheless it is usually the poor cousin when it comes to labour and capital investment. A little investment in re-jigging stock can drive sales growth. I have seen this initial-hand in my very own news agencies and in others. Here are some suggestions that have worked for others:
Decide what you stand for. Your stationery department must have a focus. It could be brand, vary, value or something else. Whatever you stand for, it will guide each call you make. If it will not guide every call, you’re not standing for the proper thing. I’d suggest you not represent being the retailer of last resort. There are too many retailers who suppose like that already. You cannot retire on profit created from selling a obscure stationery item a couple of times a year.
Eliminate dead stock. When assessing stationery in retail businesses, I usually notice that 30% of stationery in a news agency is dead. Print a report of stock things which haven’t sold for six months. This report should embody the price of current stock holdings. In a mean news agency we have a tendency to typically notice this to be around thirty% of all stationery stock holdings. Have a look at the list carefully. Do you really need to hold these items which don’t seem to be selling?
Restock to serve your customers. Determine the space which would become available by quitting this stuff and arrange on how this space can be best employed in the business. Now would be a sensible time to talk with stationery wholesalers and others who guide your stationery decisions. Stationery wholesalers can give a top sellers list for your region. There might be extensions to current ranges you may think about or whole new categories.
Clean up. Once you’ve got a commercially viable use for the area, quit the things in an exceedingly method that deals with this quickly – any money is best than none that is what you’re obtaining now.
Refresh. Use the chance to reinvest the look and feel of stationery, re-value all stock if price has been a problem for you. Re-train your staff. re-educate your customers. Re-launch.
Manage by touch. Take every item off the shelf and place it back. This process of touching every stationery stock item can have you ever review your position on stationery.
Obsess about what you stand for. Bear in mind, your business must represent something. With stationery, it could be brand, range, value or service. If customers don’t understand that you just represent one thing they can not suppose concerning you after they would like to buy stationery. Whatever you opt to stand for, pursue it relentlessly.
Stationery responds well to attention, especially in independent retail businesses where service is personal and shopping is convenient. Offer your stationery department attention and expect good rewards in return.
Can these simple ideas turn stationery sales around? I do not know. They need worked in alternative news agencies and they may work for you. They are not dangerous ideas and, if followed, can do no harm to your business.

Profit in any business requires an increase in income and decrease in expenditure. The same theory applies to the retail industry. To make profit in retail requires an in increase sales and reduction in shrinkage. This concept has so far been non-existence in the retail industry where the focus has always only been on increase sales and hoping that the problem of shrinkage will miraculously disappear.
Retail shrinkage occurs as a result of poor or non-existent loss prevention policies and procedures. Therefore, it is imperative that any retail organisation that wishes to remain profitable include loss prevention in its standard operational practices.
Loss prevention is the series of activities that are geared towards the reduction or elimination of all potential loss within an organisation. In the past, loss prevention has been confused with security. While security is a part of loss prevention, security is reactive, basically geared towards identifying shoplifters and employees suspected of stealing, loss prevention is centred around all the activities that are responsible for store loss. It can be known loss such as damages, returns and errors or unknown loss such as shoplifting or employee theft. Preventing shrinkage is simple if we understand the sources of the loss. Last year, UK retail industry spent 771 million on loss prevention, despite this spending, retail shrinkage rose by 5.4%. This has remained the story of loss prevention in the UK for many years. Shrinkage reduced by a few percent one year and increase by several percent the following.
What is the reason for this, the answer lies in the way loss prevention funding is allocated. Even though the levels of funding differ from one organisation to the other, the principle remains the same: spending more for less return on investment (ROI).
The Global Retail Theft Barometer report stated that for the 12-months ending June 2009 crime cost UK retailers 4,063 million. This is broken down as follows:
Customer theft 1,767 million (43.5% of all shrinkage)
Employee theft 1,479 million (36.4% of all shrinkage)
Distribution chain theft 175 million – (4.3% of all shrinkage)
Administrative error – 642 million – (15.8% of all shrinkage)
Total Shrinkage – 4,063 million – (100.0% of all shrinkage)

Total loss prevention spending for the same period was 771 million slightly down from the previous year of 785 million.
Broken down as follows:
Contract Security – 270,621,000.00
In-house Security – 162,681,000.00
Security Equipment – 223,590,000,00
Cash Collection – 61,680,000,00
Other LP Spending – 52,428,000.00
However, in this same period, shrinkage as a percentage of sales rose to 1.37% a rise of 5.4% from 2008 figure of 1.30%.
This brings us to the central thesis of this article: Why is retail loss prevention measure ineffective?
The answer lies in the way funding is allocated. To produce the desired result, retailers first and foremost need to determine the source of loss and allocate funding according to the ratio of loss and the ROI.
The below table outlines this point better, it shows last year retail spending on loss prevention and their return on investment:
Measures: Spending: ROI Achieved:
Trained Employees – 6.8% – 50%
Security Personnel – 56.2% – 2%
Security Equipment – 29% – 45%
Signs & others – 8% – 3%
Customer related theft accounts for only 21% of retail shrinkage the remaining 79% can be broken down into cashier cause 32%, followed by general employee cause 24%, receiving 10% and the remaining 13% is the result of damage and error. But the interesting point that needs to be noted is that even though 79% of retail shrinkage in caused by internal activities, retailers spent more on combating customer related theft than on employee cause.
56.2% of loss prevention resources were on security personnel that produced only 2% ROI, 6.8% was spent on staff training that produced 50% ROI. It is not difficult to see why despite the huge spending on loss prevention, retailers have not been able to affect their shrinkage level. There is a direct correlation between loss prevention spending and the ROI. Until such time that retailers get the balance right, loss prevention spending will continue to produce negative result.

How to make loss prevention effective?
The following are measures when implemented can lead to massive reductions in shrinkage levels and increased profits:
Measure the Scale of the Problem
Analysis daily profit and loss report
Complete top management involvement
Create awareness of the problem
Continuous education and discipline of employees
Inspect What You Expect
Set Measurable Targets
Take Advantage Of Technology
Develop the act of flexibility in approach
Change from present paradigm

Loss prevention is a science and like any science, it requires a systematic approach. Loss prevention personnel cannot approach it with cross fingers praying for the best. Gone are the days when retail crime such as shoplifting was seen as teenage leisure activities, or conducted by drug addicts. Many incidents of shoplifting are now carried out by Organised Retail Theft rings with levels of sophistication never before seen in the retail industry. We as loss prevention experts along with law enforcement agencies have to wake up to this fact and try to build our own capabilities to respond accordingly.
Increase sale does not necessarily mean increase profit the quicker retail executives crabs this concept, the sooner they will be making sustainable profit.

Do I need to buy a Barcode Package? This is a common question, so we thought we would provide some simple answers.

Most people asking this question are wanting to obtain a barcode number for a retail product they have created. They are usually being asked by a retailer to put a retail barcode number on to their product, and theyre not sure where to start.

Most independent barcode companies, such as Barcode Limited in New Zealand, offer retail barcode numbers in a variety of forms, including as a barcode package. A barcode package usually contains a unique retail barcode number, a guarantee certificate and barcode images in a variety of formats. Thanks to the wonders of the internet, you can order a barcode package like this online, and it will be emailed to you, usually within a few hours.

The barcode images you receive are the actual barcode picture, consisting of vertical black lines and spaces, with the barcode number written underneath. These barcode images are usually emailed to you in several different formats, such as .eps, .bmp, .pdf, .jpg or .tiff. Of these formats, the most accurate, and hence the best to use, are .eps and .pdf. When printing your barcode, it is important to have the edges of the lines as clean and sharp as possible. Hence, it is advisable to use a very accurate image format, such as .eps which is vector based. However, some graphics packages, which you might be using to produce your packaging artwork incorporating this barcode image, have specific image format requirements or limitations. Hence you will need to choose the format that works best for you, when you are inserting the barcode picture into the artwork for your packaging. If your packaging has already been printed, you can print the barcode picture onto sticky labels instead.

Companies like Barcodes Limited NZ will send the images to you in the standard size of 25mm x 37mm. Officially you can safely reduce them to 80% of this size (ie to 20mm x 30mm) when putting them onto your packaging. If you make them smaller than this, it makes them difficult for barcode scanners to read. If you like large barcodes, you can officially increase them to 200% of the standard size.

If you buy a barcode from a reputed Barcode Reseller, you will receive a unique number that will not expire, and that only you have the legal right to use. You can use your barcode worldwide. It is a one-off purchase & there are no future fees.

Can I just get a Barcode number without images? is another common question. Some people do not need barcode images, they only need a unique barcode number. If you are selling on Amazon, a barcode number is all you need. If you purchase your barcode from Barcodes Limited, then yes, you can just purchase the number without any images, saving yourself some unnecessary expense. And, if you buy just a barcode number and then later find out that you need images, it is easy to go back to the barcode company and order images.