What is a Retail Management System?

At daVinci Retail, we’ve always been focused on helping retailers buy inventory smarter and faster. Previously, that meant assortment planning, and managing the assortment procurement process from creation to purchase-order.

That’s what has made us the ideal solution for many retail organizations around the world for more than a decade. But our customers are looking for more. Because while assortment planning is a central piece of the buy for multi-channel, multi-door retailers, many SMBs have been asking for a retail management system that works for them. In addition, merchandise planning has come up time and again from our customers as critical, and retailers need a platform that can manage both.

We listened to those needs, and we’ve expanded the scope of what we do, introducing daVinci’s Retail Management System to help you get your purchase orders right. In a way that better meets the needs of retailers today—and tomorrow.

In keeping with our central mission to help retailers solve challenge of the buy, we are taking a holistic approach to buy management, recognizing the need for merchandise planning alongside assortment planning. and now buying for the single channel retailer.

Merchandise Planning

This approach allows us to serve the needs of both merchants and financial planners and bridge the gap between the two.

Where a financial planner could previously use daVinci for buy creation and quantification of the process, a separate platform was required for financial planning.

Not anymore.

Our retail management system encompasses the entire process, from merchandise planning to assortment planning, to purchase orders.

It sounds so simple and so logical. But it’s a whole new daVinci, and it’s a whole new world for daVinci users.

Buying

For many digital native retailers whose sales channel is online, we are answering your call. We know that as a retailer, you have to buy merchandise. You need a buying solution, but don’t need to assort your merchandise to multiple channels and locations.

We took the same features and benefits of assortment planning and tailored it to your needs. With a centralized cloud solution, your team gets to work from anywhere while management gets instant access and visibility that’s critical to running an efficient and successful business.

Defining what a retail management system is

We define a retail management system (aka Buy Management System) as a technology solution that helps you manage your buying process, from merchandise planning through purchase orders. It still includes assortment planning, of course, but assortment planning is now tightly coupled with financial planning—from one central location. It automates manual tasks like data entry, tracks, and reports on all buying data to give the organization a 360-degree, real-time view, and helps derive the proper buy quantity for any item, giving buyers and planners more time to focus on their core responsibilities and managers more information to make better decisions.

See also: daVinci’s Buy Management System

Understanding the benefits of a retail management system

There are any number of technology solutions clamoring for your capital—some are must-haves, some are nice-to-haves. For a modern retail business looking to compete in increasingly challenging market, a retail management system falls into the mission-critical category. Here are three reasons why:

1. Improves information sharing and collaboration

A retail management system  breaks down work done in silos.  No more spreadsheet silos, or data stored on individual buyer desktops where no one else has access or visibility; no more duplicate data entry or endless follow-up emails asking where the latest report is.  A retail management system provides a central database where your planners, buyers, and managers can share and access the same information. Multiple people in the organization can now access, plan and manage from a centralized data source, in real-time. You’ll have the current plan, in-season and historical sales data ready at hand, allowing for easier and more strategic planning.

2. Adds automation and increases efficiency

Manual data entry and re-keying information over and over to different systems, and the inevitable data entry errors that are inherent with such tasks, cost companies untold hours of productivity every year. A purchase management system automates many of these tasks, and reduces others to simple point-and-click activities: for example, you’ll no longer have to re-key purchase orders.

3. Helps you get your purchases right

With all of the information a retail management system provides at your fingertips, you’ll have greater visibility into buy unit/dollar quantification and roll ups, and be able to spot trends that your stores are experiencing in sales—and with financial and assortment planning and buying tools in the same system, you’ll be able to tailor your buys far more effectively. You’ll know which product does best, in which region, at what time of year, and you can order and allocate accordingly—before the trend has passed.

Invest in a Retail Management System for your business

As more companies look to learn more from, and take advantage of, the data housed in their own systems, retail competition will only increase. Turn your data into a competitive advantage and slot “invest in a retail buy management system” into your business plan.

See also: Confessions of a Retail Buyer