As fashion apparel brands and retailers work to create compelling in-store experiences to lure shoppers — especially as brick-and-mortar stores shift in relevance — technology companies have devised new ways to help.
Enter Oracle Retail’s latest inventory cloud service, which aims to help businesses “more easily track, access and manage inventory” while in-store. The end goal, according to a spokesman for Oracle, is enhanced customer satisfaction. And in today’s Millennial-driven shopping landscape, where instant gratification is key, this focus on a boosted consumer experience may prove to be indispensable.
“Having the right item in the desired size and color is often the difference between a sale and a disappointed customer, but with merchandise spread between dozens or even hundreds of stores and online inventory in warehouses, this can be akin to finding a needle in a haystack,” said Jeff Warren, vice president of Oracle Retail. “As retailers’ inventories grow more complex, finding that elusive item can be time-consuming for store associates and frustrating for customers.”
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The firm’s features offer what the spokesman called a “store up” approach, described as “[providing] the ability to have visibility into inventory at a detailed level within the store, combined with a view of warehouse inventory, [which] enables stores to influence inventory sell-through by requesting it directly from the warehouse.”
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According to Warren, brands and retailers who aspire to distinguish themselves in today’s crowded marketplace would be wise to take note.
“Streamlining inventory management with a ‘store up’ approach makes it faster and simpler to find the right shirt or dress, and also helps retailers sell through offsite inventory,” Warren said.
The launch comes as a part of a growing business trend in retail, focused on the reimagining of the retail environment due to evolving — and increasingly difficult-to-meet — consumer expectations.
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