When New Balance, a leading global athletic products company based in the UK’s Lake District, upgraded to a Cybertill EPoS system it united the business and transformed several key areas.

As a specialist in running and outdoor shoes, New Balance is well located among the picturesque outdoor runs and trails of the area and enjoys much visitor interest to its stores. In fact a high proportion of tourists, who holiday in the Lake District, make up a good portion of the store’s cliental, however this also means that repeat custom is infrequent. This was a problem until Cybertill came along.

Greater customer reach
With Cybertill’s customer relationship management (CRM) and mail order elements within the EPoS system, New Balance no longer relies on passing trade. Instead it is now able to reach its existing customers by collecting visitor information at the point-of-sale and sending regular communications by post or even email. Debbie Harrison, New Balance’s sales manager explained, “We ask all clients if they want to be included in our database and receive our monthly special offers. Cybertill has made this so easy, at point of sale we capture their details. Then each month, via Cybertill, we send them our monthly special offers newsletter. This regular communication and on going collection of data at point of sale ensures that mail order sales are much more profitable since using Cybertill.”

United operations
Although the New Balance factory and stores operate nearby to each other, they no had business wide system and as a result they actually worked very separately in terms of stock control and reporting to head office. This made stock holding inefficient and also meant that warehouse replenishment and transfers were never smooth running. When head office needed to check on the figures, the count had to be made over night by each store, compiled together and then sent to the office the next day. Debbie pointed out that this was hardly ideal and that “before Cybertill our head office always had to wait at least 24 hours for sales information and stock replenishment across the estate was inefficient. Also transferring stock between stores was a nightmare, as we could not see what each store was holding, so stores were constantly on the phone to one another, so transfers were very rarely made.” Now, it’s easy and all the data is there and up to the minute.

Getting stock right
The issue of having no business wide system showing instant visibility of stock also caused difficulties in store as well as behind the scenes. With no easy way of knowing what the other stores held in stock or what the warehouse was holding, transfers couldn’t be managed effectively and product sizes and ranges were very limited. Debbie commented about the new system, “Arranging transfers is fantastic we don’t have to call between stores you simply look on Cybertill. Before you had what you had, now we can transfer or place back orders on the system, so the client always gets the right product.” Thankfully New Balance now no longer needs to turn a customer away or suggest an alternative product.

Healthy rivalry
A surprising benefit to come out of the Cybertill EPoS installation that New Balance hadn’t expected was competitiveness across stores and sales people. “Cybertill has brought out the competitive edge in each store and sales person. Before using Cybertill, the outlets, in effect, traded in isolation. Each store and sales person had no visibility of other stores’ sales performances. Since deploying Cybertill all stores can see exactly what the other stores are turning over so they are all working to be number one. This also helped with interaction and communication between stores too,” said Debbie.

Keeping finances on track
The benefits of Cybertill are found business wide including in the accounts department at head office. “It’s so easy for finance, they simply log onto Cybertill and they can download live sales figures and format them as they like. This has saved them hours of work a day. It is also easier to reconcile differences as well against any discrepancies – on what has been banked against what is said on Cybertill. They don’t necessarily even have to speak to the stores,” explained Debbie.

With the support of Cybertill’s EPoS system, New Balance is now looking at future plans for store expansion.

Want to find out more about Cybertill’s EPoS system? Read our supplier interview.