First and Only On-Demand Retail Management Suite Automates Multi-Channel Sales Across CRM and ERP Functions with Real-Time Visibility
Enables Mid-Sized Retailers to Lower Costs, Manage In-Store, Point of Sale and Online Sales in Real-Time, and Provide Great Customer Experience
SAN MATEO, Calif.—February 11, 2009—NetSuite Inc. (NYSE: N), a leading vendor of on-demand, integrated business management software suites for the mid-market enterprise and divisions of large companies, today announced NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite, a new vertical suite for retailers in North America. The new NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite allows companies to use one on-demand retail software solution to easily manage multiple locations with a sophisticated point of sale (POS) system, seamlessly integrate new or existing Ecommerce operations, provide a great customer experience across all channels, and gain real-time visibility and business intelligence across the company. These capabilities enable operational excellence, including the ability to gain visibility across an organisation's complete processes for inventory management, orders, customers, accounting, marketing, POS, and customer support across all channels. For more information about NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite, please visit www.netsuite.co.uk/retail.
"The business environment is currently very challenging for retailers," said Janet Suleski, Research Director, Retail at AMR Research. "For many retailers, multi-channel is the technology Shangri-La they have been seeking. NetSuite is throwing its hat into the solutions ring with the launch of its new Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite, putting small and mid-sized retailers one step closer to achieving the true multi-channel integration. NetSuite is a welcome addition to the field of technology providers exploring the best ways to unify channels and provide complete visibility to customer activity as the mechanism for providing the best possible service." (Source AMR Research, Inc., "NetSuite Joins Pursuit of the True Multi-Channel Experience")
According to a recent research report from the analyst firm AMR, retailers are experiencing a major evolution toward third-generation systems. As many as 46% of today's retailers plan to upgrade to their third-generation platform by 2010. Only 7% of retailers have already completed this transition, while 34% plan to stay with their first- or second-generation systems. (Source: The State of Cross-Channel Operations: 2008, AMR Research)
Limitations in traditional software have forced many companies to either build home-grown applications or use multiple silo software solutions to manage multi-channel sales. Applications from vendors such as Microsoft and Sage were originally designed a decade before the rise of the Internet. As a result, it can be very difficult and costly to extend them to support Ecommerce for a Web business. New applications from vendors such as Demandware and Volusion are designed specifically to build Ecommerce websites, but result in isolated, bolt-on systems that are difficult and costly to integrate into core business processes such as accounting, fulfilment, inventory management, shipping and marketing promotions. Consequentially, retailers lack tools to enable them to expand into Ecommerce and tie it into the rest of the businesses; lack of tools for real-time customer relationship management; and lack of real-time visibility and business intelligence across business functions.
In contrast, NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite launched today was designed to overcome those barriers in the retail market.
Essential Tools for Today's Retail Multi-Channel Environment
NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite enables merchants to achieve operational excellence. NetSuite offers many "first and only" capabilities that are critical to retailers, including:
"We believe that NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite allows mid-sized retailers to achieve operational excellence and provide their customers with a much better customer experience — capabilities that weren't previously available to them because of their high cost and complexity are now available thanks to NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite," said Baruch Goldwasser, Etail/Retail Business Manager at NetSuite. "NetSuite's low cost and intuitive interface allows retailers to leverage the knowledge they gain by serving customers every day and transfer that knowledge into a much larger market. It wouldn't surprise me at all if a mid-sized retailer somewhere in Iowa became the next Wal-Mart using the tools we are making available to them — it's that powerful"
Today there are a number of businesses that have already taken advantage of NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite. These businesses include:
EcoBox (www.ecobox.com), Austin, Texas
EcoBox sells both new and used boxes and other packing material to individuals and businesses. By keeping used but serviceable boxes in circulation, the company estimates it has kept one million boxes from being discarded. To expand its reach beyond a single warehouse location, EcoBox opened its first retail store in February 2006. But its Peachtree-based accounting system offered no integration and no point-of-sale capabilities. Two years after initially adopting NetSuite to manage its operations, EcoBox adopted capabilities developed by NetSuite partner OnSite to improve its point-of-sale capabilities, which brought an added level of efficiency and accuracy to the company's warehouse and two retail locations. NetSuite's multi-channel Retail Management Suite has lead to faster and more accurate transactions, helping EcoBox double the amount of business it does beyond driving distance of its stores, reflecting a greater online reach.
"NetSuite has been a phenomenal fit for our business," said Dale Malone, Managing Partner, EcoBox. "Overall our transactions are 20 to 30 percent faster with NetSuite's multi-channel Retail Management Suite, and the barcode scanning has certainly improved our checkout accuracy. My nightly closeout takes only half the time."
Wrigleyville Sports (www.wrigleyvillesports.com) Chicago, and (www.thepittsburghfan.com) Pittsburgh
Because of strong performances by the Chicago Cubs and Pittsburgh Steelers, including this month's Super Bowl win by the Steelers, daily order volumes at Wrigleyville Sports' Web site and three retail locations have as much as quadrupled on a year-over-year basis, and the mounting order volume has been smoothly handled by the NetSuite's multi-channel Retail Management Suite. The company's previous point-of-sale solution, Retail Star, mandated an expensive credit card processor and order processing was slow and labor intensive. With NetSuite, multiple Chicago and Pittsburgh inventory locations are now fully integrated with finance, marketing, sales and shipping — with real-time reporting across all of these areas. The flexibility in payment processors has enabled Wrigleyville to negotiate better discount rates
Order and UPS shipping automation has allowed five full-time employees to be reassigned from order processing to customer service. And NetSuite's scalability is easily handling large spikes in volume, such as after the Steelers' recent big victory.
"We were initially concerned about the speed of NetSuite, or what would happen if our Internet access went down, but we have put those fears to rest," said Trey Carlstrom, Co-Owner, Wrigleyville Sports." We have smoothly processed almost 3,000 transactions in a single day, and a failover switch keeps us connected in case a cable or DSL fails."
Market Share Inc. (www.sunsetlimousines.com) and (www.gwnow.com), Guilford, CT
Market Share Inc. operates GetWirelessNow, a chain of eight cellular retailers in Connecticut and Rhode Island, as well as Sunset Limousines. Market Share needed to consolidate and analyse customer and accounting data from several cellular phone stores as well as a limousine business, but manual reconciliation of multiple merchant accounts was wasting hours every day, and order and return processing could take upwards of five minutes per transaction. With OnSite and the NetSuite Retail Management Suite, now all of Market Share's business interests roll up to a single account and reporting mechanism, accessible from anywhere; 600 hours per year of manual accounting integration has been eliminated; order and return processing times have been reduced by 75 percent; and accuracy of transaction amounts has been increased by eliminating the need to key amounts into a credit card terminal.
"Our average sale had been taking five to six minutes but we are now down to a 90-second process," said Chris Corcoran, President, Market Share Inc. "With the NetSuite Retail Management Suite, our customers are more satisfied, and our employees love it, because they can help the customer faster and move on to the next sale."
Distribution Video & Audio (www.dva.com), Palm Harbor, FL
Distribution Video & Audio, a 20-year old company, is the country's [largest][confirm] wholesaler of entertainment closeouts. DVA came on board with NetSuite in 2007. [Now with the NetSuite Retail Management Suite, DVA can transform into a point-of-sale system — when DVA opens its doors to the public and its 40 employees change gears and turn their desktop computers into cash registers. Starting at 5 a.m. on those days, DVA employees welcome over 2,000 consumers eager to get their hands on the latest box-office hits that fill pallets and pallets and in their warehouse.
"Our customers may not know the difference, but we know it's the NetSuite Retail Management Suite — NetSuite combined with OnSite's point-of-sale integration — that makes those two wonderful but hectic days possible," said CEO Brad Kugler.
Availability and Pricing
NetSuite Multi-Channel Retail Management Suite is available now. For more information about the new offering please visit www.netsuite.co.uk/retail.
For more information about NetSuite Inc., please visit www.netsuite.co.uk.
NOTE: NetSuite and the NetSuite logo are registered service-marks of NetSuite Inc.