Salon Today - August 2008 - (Page 29)

INVENTORY MANAGEMENT Often owners’ ﬁrst area of retail-minded attention is inventory. With increasing sophistication, software is transforming traditional inventory control (simply policing quantities needed to stock shelves) into true inventory management, a distinction Maple says is pivotal in gaining a retail edge. Inventory management is more complicated and varies from program to program. For example, STX software breaks down retail sales into four percentage categories, listing products that account for 60 percent, 20 percent, 15 percent and 5 percent of total retail sales. Maple sees too many salons ordering extra inventory in the last category, even though those products account for such a small piece of the pie. Until Maple runs the reports for salon owners, they typically have no idea they’re tying up their money in slow-moving items. Meanwhile, all of the older products are losing potency on the shelf and often baking in the sunlit window. “It’s the old 80/20 rule,” he says. “Usually “It’s the old 80/20 20 percent of your products are generating 80 rule Usually percent of your money. You should be bas- 20 percent of ing your minimum quantities on sales history. your products are Otherwise it’s just haphazard.” generating 80 Pagliano explains that a good way to forepercent of your cast what will sell best in your salon in the next two weeks is simply by looking at what money. You should sold best in the past two weeks. Milano Retail be basing your Software calculates any change in the period minimum quantities that you designate and automatically rec- on sales history. ommends quantities based on the product’s Otherwise it’s “growth factor.” Newer software programs focus on the other just haphazard.” end of the spectrum, too, helping you identify —Jon Maple your poor sellers. For example, Harms offers the Slow-Moving Inventory Wizard. If look- cently added a program that monitors how ing at the numbers convinces you to drop the many people bought an item once, how many product altogether, with a push of the button twice and so forth,” Scudder explains. Those you can ask the “Wizard” to price the item at ﬁgures can help you plan a promotion or determine whether people who use the product a discount and, eventually, faze it out. Responding to a user request, Harms re- once are likely to purchase it again. > http://www.millenniumspasalon.com http://www.millenniumspasalon.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Salon Today - August 2008

Salon Today - August 2008 Contents Editor's Note Reception Roundtable Decor Down to Business Get with the Program Products Owner to Owner

Salon Today - August 2008

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