Northern Retail is rolling out a Java-based messaging system providing real-time messaging and a 300 per cent improvement in response rate for some customer-facing transactions.
The company, formerly the retail arm of Northern Electric and the subject of a recent management buy-out, operates 29 shops across the Northeast and Yorkshire on a franchise basis.
It has replaced an ageing X.25 TCP/IP communications system - with response rates for stock and sales queries often taking up to 20 seconds - with a SonicMQ messaging system from Progress Software.
Communication needs between Northern Retail, which is responsible for marketing and stock management, and the individual stores are complex.
Progress, already used by Northern Retail for sales and inventory databases, suggested SonicMQ Java Message Service and provided some sample code and basic set-up. Northern Electric was able to handle the rest of the development in-house within two months.
The system is now being rolled out to all branches and Northern Retail is planning to add online credit authorisation and instant product updates.
No comments yet