A lifestyle store in Northampton has invested in state-of-the-art software to improve their customer experience.
Bell of Northampton on Kingsthorpe Road has introduced a new retail operating system and advanced inventory planning solution to streamline in house processes.
Brightpearl automates the administrative side of the business, creating a higher degree of speed an accuracy in everything from stock transparency across all channels to data input. This, in turn, gives the Bell of Northampton team more time to improve and add products on the website to offer bigger and better things to the customers.
Customer service then, is greatly improved for the customer as a by-product of Bell using the system.
Key personnel undertook remote training sessions led by Brightpearl and then went on to train their colleagues so that the entire Bell of Northampton team were up to speed.
All staff using the system have been given continual “on-the-go training” which allows them to learn practically and get a firmer grip on the software through trial and error. It also allows the management team to deal with fringe issues and circumstances as they occur.
Before Brightpearl, processes were manual across all aspects of the Bell of Northampton operation. All data was keyed in by hand for orders and for processing despatch labels.
Now that the programme has been connected to the store’s website, it assists with the receiving and despatching of goods and generates shipping labels automatically – something that was previously done manually and individually at a great time cost.
Bell of Northampton managing director Lee Ferris said: “Previously, the way we did things could have meant a tripling of data entry for customer information across the systems in play. This amounted to a lot of time wasted in superfluous administration and this has now been brought to an absolute minimum.”
Their accounts package will also be connected to Brightpearl so payments and reconciliation will be easier across all channels.
Bell of Northampton, which has been operating in Northampton for more than 100 years, puts its longevity down to constantly evolving and reinvesting in the business. They have already seen measurable results with speed and efficiency since introducing Brightpearl. The system also frees up staff to be able to provide a better customer experience for visitors.
Lee added: “Brightpearl enables us to focus our manpower effectively. The paradigm shift as such is to save time with automation coupled with transparency of stock allocation and handling over manual guesswork. It’s not really what we couldn’t do, it’s how we were doing it.
“As we develop a deeper understanding of the system and discover the nuances of the it, we will flex and evolve to better our processes even further over time.”