News

Now which blue bucket was it?

November 1, 2005

In retail, labor is a key issue that affects all aspects of the business. Labor impacts profitability, customer satisfaction and the ability to attract new customers and retain existing ones.

Labor's effect on profitability comes from three areas: the cost of employment, the cost of training and the cost of turnover. In retail, turnover typically approaches 100 percent per year. In the food and beverage industries this number is even higher. That means it is very hard to keep a staff of well-trained employees on hand to serve customers.

While someday we may see a completely digital store that doesn't have any human employees, self service technology today can help solve many of the problems associated with turnover. The Henry Company has deployed kiosks at Home Depot stores to help increase sales of their famous blue-bucket roofing and asphalt compounds. In the past, guiding the customer through which blue bucket to buy was entrusted solely to the in-store sales staff - but not any more. Now all Home Depot stores also have easy-to-use self-service kiosks that provide expertise and guide customers to the correct product.

David Villafana, vice president of marketing for the Henry Company, said the ability to have a self-service device beside their product - a device that is always present, always ready to answer questions and constantly gives the same accurate information - is key to increasing sales and keeping customers loyal to the brand.

More than DIY

Assisted selling devices are becoming prevalent in all of retail, not just in do-it-yourself stores. They allow product knowledge to be centralized in self-service devices rather than in employees who will probably be on the job less than a year. That means labor costs can be reduced by either reducing staff or no longer requiring a highly paid expert to handle customer issues.

Training costs are decreased as well because the same self-service device that educates customers also can train in-store staff with different and more advanced content than what is presented to the consumer. In addition, assisted-selling devices also increase profit by ensuring that customers purchase the right product the first time, reducing returns.

Customer satisfaction is another area where assisted-selling self-service devices can be helpful. Keeping customers informed and empowering them to make the correct buying decision is important to customer satisfaction.

A self-service device not only provides information, product comparisons, product recommendations and cross-sell and upsell of products, but it also can be used to attract new customers and retain existing ones. Promotions modules can be added to the device to attract new customers, either by an instant coupon or an easy-to-play fun game that rewards winners. Combine that with customer loyalty programs and the self-service device keeps customers coming back.

This article appeared in the Retail Kiosk & Self-Service Executive Summary, Fall 2005.