Project Description
Store Operations Assessment Unlocks Hidden Potential for Discount Retailer
Client Challenge
The client is a small-format value retailer with nearly 20,000 stores across the US, focusing on convenience and price as the basis for competitive advantage. To stay competitive, the company runs a very lean store labor model. During low-volume hours, stores often have only one employee on staff. This operating philosophy necessitates extreme precision and efficiency in the design and execution of store-level processes, and the client struggled with achieving expected performance levels. This challenge was further exacerbated by increased competition in the value retail sector.
The client needed an objective perspective on thoroughly assessing and improving its merchandising and inventory management store processes.
Parker Avery Solution
The Parker Avery Group’s store operations experts evaluated the company’s store performance and generated recommendations using the following approach:
- Reviewed current store operations process documentation to ensure an understanding of the retailer’s ‘as-is’ process design
- Conducted detailed time studies, produced variance analysis to the current labor model, and provided recommendations to both update the labor model as well as store process efficiency opportunities
- Conducted structured store visits across multiple store layouts, sales volumes, and geographies consisting of process execution observations, associate interviews, and assessments of inventory and overall store conditions
- Synthesized findings into a series of recommended initiatives designed to optimize labor, improve inventory management process execution, and strengthen business results
Results
As a result of Parker Avery’s store operations assessment, the client plans to design and implement a combination of the recommendations and internal merchandising, supply chain, and store-focused initiatives. The client expects to:
- Establish process and technology enhancements aimed at improving store inventory accuracy
- Enable a reduction in in-store inventory levels while improving the in-stock positions of core merchandise
- Improve the labor model via process improvements in key areas of the store where significant variances were revealed
- Drive a decrease in store planogram reset and promotional activity and allow for increased focus on customer service within the stores
Are your store operations processes as efficient as they should be?
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