Sewell Retail

Knowing the company
For more than two decades Sewell Retail has been a core division of the Sewell Group. Today, it operates 12 high quality fuel/convenience retail outlets at the heart of communities throughout Hull and East Yorkshire.

The retailer has developed a reputation as a customercentric business that consistently delivers top quality, a wide range, great value and a quick, friendly service which, combined, meet the needs of the local community. In recognition of this, Forecourt Trader magazine named the company "Forecourt Trader of the Year" in 2009.

Defining the strategy
However, the organisation lacked centralised control of its stock. It also did not have real-time visibility of its sales data.

Most significantly, this meant that margins were determined by the group's individual outlets, and this inconsistency was negatively impacting on the group's bottom line. It also meant that the company was less responsive to changing purchasing patterns than it wanted to be.

More noticeably to its customers, queuing time was longer than Sewell desired, which not only reduced sales rates but potentially put off prospective purchasers and undermined repeat visitation.

Choosing the solution
Sewell Retail decided to trial Torex POS as it is designed specifically for forecourt and c-store traders. Written in pure Java and based on an open platform, it offers all the benefits of modern technology, including flexibility,
scalability and low cost of ownership.

The Torex Prism for back office system at each store integrates with the POS and all Sewell facilities (car wash, fuel gauges and pumps, EFT unit). It automatically dispatches data from these facilities to the Torex Prism for Head Office management system at Sewell's head office, which is seamlessly integrated with the company's Sage accounting system.

David Craven-Jones, Operations Director of Sewell Retail, said, "Our research convinced us that Torex has the best offering in this market. We installed the solution the week before Christmas: a brave move running up to the busiest weekend of the year! However, the installation went smoothly and our cashiers were surprised at how easy Torex was to use."

Since then, the Torex solution has delivered some notable benefits, convincing Sewell to roll it out company-wide.

At the point of service, the system is quick, allowing the cashier to focus on customer engagement.

Because all promotions are automatically and simultaneously dispatched to all tills, cashiers can discuss current promotions with all customers. Sewell can even configure receipts to excite customers with special promotions.

It can also produce individual receipts for Fuel and Shop Goods as needed by customers for expenses. Further, because each transaction has a unique barcode, sales staff can now efficiently locate records for refund purposes.

Such capabilities not only improve customer relations but boost promotional sales.

Mr Craven-Jones said, "With Torex, our customer experience has been vastly improved. Our promotions are always up to date, and the fast, easy-to-use POS machines have noticeably reduced queuing time, encouraging cash to move more quickly through the tills."

Importantly, the system also helps Sewell control Age Restricted lines such as Alcohol and Tobacco, by prompting cashiers to check and record the ID of anyone who appears under 25.

Achieving return on investment
Mr Craven-Jones said, "Not only has the faster system increased sales rates, but the linked promotions and multi-buys we're now able to run have increased shop sales by up to 6 percent.

"Strategically, the integration between the facilities, individual back offices and head office has also vastly improved the accuracy of stock data and the efficiency of reconciliation. This helped us to control ordering and standardise pricing, reduce stock holdings and increase cash flow and profits.

"These combined benefits are every retailer's dream!"