What challenged your retail journey fuelled ours!
Spreadsheet Dependency
More often than not retail stakeholders in India prefer to keep their ‘bahi-khatas’ otherwise known as ledgers in accountancy terminology for their upkeep of day-to-day financial dealings. Traditionally a red-coloured register with white threads to wrap the accounts tight is a preferred choice. However, with the wave of technological advancements, the current favourites remain MS Excel sheets and ERP systems (for the ones that are a wee bit more tech-savvy and open to change than the others). But with an expanding enterprise stems the need for multiple layers of documentation making the upkeep and storage a tedious and strenuous task; especially when the law of the land requires you to preserve data of a minimum of 8 yrs. at any point of time for evaluation. Moreover, with an ever-increasing database physical upkeep becomes rather impossible leading to our next challenge, Scalability.
Scalability
Every entrepreneur eyes expansion, the end to this expansion being undefined. Hence, a healthy network of stakeholders is indispensable. Handling the transactions physically makes scalability the Achilles’ Heel of the entrepreneur’s expansionist endeavours. Adding insult to misery is your presence in multiple geographies. Here is where a unified cloud platform comes handy and tackles the ever-growing bahi-khata or storage (in the case of Excel sheets) expense at bay. However, even with a unified cloud store for all your transactions, one cannot guarantee data segregation bringing us to our third challenge; Data Segregation.
Data Segregation
Single merchandise has multiple facets, for instance, while manufacturing a T-Shirt, from its Neckline to Colour to Size to Length to Print to Buttons to Type, all these details are important and require bundling for efficient production and delivery. Now, imagine all these details times the order received from one Retailer alone! The permutation and combinations can be infinite however physical spreadsheets can’t be. Here is where the need for a database arises that guarantees data listing in an efficient yet comprehensible manner. But can this heterogeneous database be used to provide a unified view of the data from multiple data cubes, databases, or flat files?
Data Integration
Why would data integration be ever perceived as a prerequisite in the retail industry?
In an industry where the primary objective is to efficiently manufacture finished products with minimal wastage while maximizing output at a fairly rewarding margin, how can the integration of its Warehouse, Tech Pack, Billing Cycles, Payments, Dues, Stock Lots data be of any use!
If someone were to say integrated data allows you
- real-time visibility into your warehouse’s stock count,
- access data that dictates demographic preferences
- streamline billing cycle
- visibility into changing market trends
- dictate consumer behaviour
- reduce operational and warehouse expenses
- arrive at an optimal decision faster,
would that change the perception entailed so far?
End-to-end visibility into your ecosystem and stakeholders with a clear understanding of your consumers’ psyche is what will justify your business’s ikigai. Although a disruptive proposition, one tends to wonder if all these are technological jargon beyond a common businessman’s reach and understanding leading to us arriving at our fifth challenge: Moving past a mental block that tags Retail Tech as complex.
Mental Block
Above other things, it is the most difficult to resist and overcome comfort, especially comfort born out of years of repetitive practice of a regime. This regime handed down over generations substantiates the efficacy of the system but fails to stand the test of time, especially with increasing competition. With competitors adapting to competitive schemes, one must adapt to the changing times with current day advancements to stand a chance to compete on a level playing field. Moving past this hesitancy to adopt digital retail tech owing to the complexity of its demeanour will decide the scalability, continuity, and seamless functioning of your enterprise. If it’s any motivation, reminding oneself that change is the only constant and your competitors are constantly changing their ways of operation will push you to take that leap of faith.
Seeking answers to shared issues? Contact us at Intrakraft.com to explore solutions tailored to your needs.
