Five Ideas:
Retail
November 2009
The recent unveiling of Oracle Retail 13.1.1 brings wide-ranging enhancements across Oracle Retail store, merchandising, and retail planning and supply chain solutions—plus the launch of the new Oracle Integrated Inventory Planning Suite. Read more about this new release, plus what experts are identifying as new trends in the industry (and what you should be doing differently).
“With our new integrated inventory planning suite, retailers have an unprecedented ability to offer customers the right product, in the right amount, in the right place, and at the right time.”—Duncan Angove, senior vice President and general manager, Oracle Retail
“Social media is being leverage in multiple ways by retailers. The Retail CMOs (Chief Marketing Officers) I have been speaking and working with are using social media as a marketing / campaign channel. I am seeing retailers offer promotions through Twitter and Facebook. I am also seeing retailers using social media as another way to engage and service customers more effectively. Some retailers are actually asking - through social channels - customers what products to carry....The other thing I see retailers doing -- or wanting to do - is leverage technology to make better sense of what is being discussed (good or bad) in social networks and then having some way to respond using social media or direct interaction (calling or e-mailing customers - especially members of a loyalty program).”—Mike Dominy, director, retail industry strategy at Oracle
“By embracing social media [within our organization], we're showing our customers that we are living and breathing the same challenges that they face every day.”—David Dorf, director of technology strategy, Oracle Retail
“For us it's simple: we are increasing sales and profit by optimizing our inventory. We were given the directive to save the company $265 million and we realized that with inventory optimization tools, there is that kind of potential and more. Using [Oracle's] Replenishment Optimization we have taken the waste out of DC inventory and we continue to bring DC inventory down. We have probably saved an additional $50 million in the DC’s in addition to the initial $120 million”—Hunter Cole, vice president, planning, AAFES
“If [distributors] aren’t being efficient with inventory, our product won’t get to the people building decks. We need to get product out more quickly, so they can carry less inventory. Companies such as Lowe’s and Home Depot are very particular about how much inventory they carry, and with cash flow an issue for smaller lumberyards and dealers, it’s important to turn inventory more efficiently....In manufacturing, big-time ROI comes from improving manufacturing operations, and that’s what Trex is teeing up for. It now has both the technical and accounting structure in place to support that.” —Trex CIO Kirby Miner
