Tuesday, June 24, 2008

09.00 Registration

09.30 Opening remarks from the Chair

09.40 Adopting a strategic plan for storing and managing data
Tom Devine, director of consumer sales, Vodafone

10.20 Effectively using business intelligence to drive sales and improve your bottom line
David Llamas, IT director, Harrods
10.55 Morning refreshments

11.25 Identifying actionable points based on results from your business intelligence system
David Oliver, partner, Retail and Consumer Goods, Diamond Management & Technology Consultants

12.00 Using business intelligence to accurately plan for future sales
Björn Weber, retail technology analyst, Planet Retail

12.35 Lunch

13.35 Panel discussion: Examining the right IT platform for your business-critical needs
Mike Wilks, IT integration programme manager, Mosaic Fashions
Björn Weber, retail technology analyst, Planet Retail

14.50 Integrating human capital management into your company’s business model
Andy Cole, head of learning and development, Dollond & Aitchison – The Opticians

15.20 Reducing shortage through fraud analysis
Robert Jennings, head of loss prevention, Boots

15.50 Closing remarks from the chair

16.00 End of conference

Multiple brands, one truth

In the past decade, Mosaic Fashions has gone from being a single-brand fashion business to owning eight distinct brands. Behind the scenes, this has led to a significant IT project, as diverse systems have been replaced with a standardised IT platform.

Mosaic Fashions IT integration programme manager Mike Wilks has run the initiative to “deliver a coherent set of systems across the entire group”. This includes its business intelligence tools. It uses Cognos for financial reporting, and Business Objects’ software as the tool to provide both pre-defined and ad hoc reports. Using data from its other business applications, Wilks says it is important to have one version of the truth in a multi-brand business.

Wilks will be taking part in the panel discussion on IT platforms at the Business Intelligence conference at Retail Solutions.

Clever thinking

One of the hottest applications within business intelligence is retail demand intelligence (RDI). By forecasting consumer demand, retailers are better equipped to make decisions on factors such as pricing, inventory and staffing levels.

Global Retail Insights vice-president of research Scott Langdoc says that, while it has been 10 years since these applications emerged, it is only recently that retailers have got to grips with what they can do.

He believes that there is no better way for a retailer to differentiate its brand while achieving financial improvements than RDI. RDI goes much further than reactive reporting – retailers have always built demand forecasts – and the latest applications act as a central analytics platform.

Langdoc says that his ideal strategy is the deployment of a common “engine” that generates a store/SKU-level, real-time forecast to drive pricing, markdown, inventory, sourcing and staffing decisions.

Examples of results achievable include:

  • Pricing – Merchants can see 3 to 5 per cent gross profit improvement and 2 to 4 per cent improvement in gross sales.

  • Merchandise planning – Some merchants have seen 5 to 12 per cent sales improvement from store demand-specific allocations.

  • Markdowns – Retailers can experience up to 45 per cent faster inventory sell-throughs, with 5 to 15 per cent profit improvement.

  • Product sourcing – A 5 to 15 per cent reduction in supply chain logistics costs has been achieved.

In a challenging economy, embracing RDI will separate leaders from languishers, says Langdoc.