From endless aisle and click-and-collect to self-serve and returns anywhere, customers expect a seamless and unified experience. But if you can only access rudimentary sales and inventory positions, you’re prevented from offering the ‘buy anywhere, fulfil anywhere’ services that are best for customers and most profitable for you.
Managing inventory is one of the most challenging processes for retailers – no matter their size. It’s also the largest cost. It’s a balancing act to strike the right stock levels and adjust those levels as your business changes. Understocks lead to missed sales and dissatisfied customers, and overstocks tie up your capital and result in markdowns that can hurt your margins.
Some retailers struggle with the fundamentals of inventory control, such as stock taking, demand forecasting, planning and receipting.
And in a world where online and offline channels are blending into a single brand experience, customers expect access to products wherever and whenever they want.
Unify your inventory
To provide the purchasing and fulfilment options you need for frictionless experiences that delight customers and reduce costs, you first need to get tight control of your inventory.
A unified commerce platform gives you a single, accurate and up-to-date view of inventory so you can be sure that you have the right product at the right place at the right time.
With unified inventory management across all locations, you can make better decisions about what stock to order and how to make it available in your physical, mobile, online stores and call centres.
You can react to trends quickly, and forecast demand based on historical data, sales forecasts and seasonal variations. And with the platform’s open architecture and APIs, you’re free to add new features, channels, apps and services that will increase customer satisfaction and benefit your business in many ways:
Increase sales with ‘endless aisle’ capabilities that let you sell products stocked in any location and have them delivered direct or collected by the customer
Reduce inventory costs by moving stock to the right location when it’s needed and cutting your overall stock requirements
Lower fulfilment costs by delivering direct to the customer using store-to-door, warehouse-to-door, click-and-collect, kerbside pickup or optimised sourcing
Reduce overselling or underselling with real-time inventory updates that remove the issues of selling unavailable stock or having more stock than listed online
Turn locations on and off for endless aisle fulfilment based on the stock mix and quantities or surges in online shopping
Offer more purchasing and fulfilment options to customers so they can locate items in-store, buy online, collect in-store, reserve online, receive the same day or at a time and location of their choice
Optimise your product range by matching stock to each store’s location, community and demographics while still giving access to your complete range via endless aisle
Extend your range across more sales channels such as marketplaces, in-store kiosks, shoppable screens, pop-up stores, concessions and mobile devices.
Retailers reaping inventory benefits with the Infinity unified commerce platform:
GAS optimises inventory for improved profitability
GAS completed a lightning-fast nationwide Infinity point of sale implementation. Site owners now have the tools to manage inventory and run more profitable businesses.
Night ‘n Day gets tight control of inventory
By simplifying inventory management with Infinity, convenience grocery retailer Night ‘n Day cut costs, freed up time and increased net profit to around $12,000 per store each year.
This post was orginally published January 2020 and updated on 18 July 2023
If you’re struggling with inventory accuracy and are looking at how to build a foundation for frictionless customer experiences, talk to us about how to start with a single view of inventory.
For more on how a move to a unified commerce strategy gives you the flexibility and agility you need to keep in step with consumers’ changing needs, download our new ebook.
