Business Information Systems Of The Drugstore Retail Industry

For Trader Joe’s, they are able to demonstrate the importance of each responsibility in the management process by establishing a plan to serve quality products with natural ingredients, inspiring flavors, and buying direct from the producer whenever possible,. They also organize their stores to limit its stock, carrying about 1,500 to 2,000 products compared to retail mega-markets with 25,000 to 45,000 products. Through leading, Trader Joe’s support their future leaders by hiring managers only from within the company. Future leaders enroll in training programs called, Trader Joe’s University that foster in them the loyalty necessary to run stores according to both company and customer expectations. Lastly, Trader Joe demonstrated the responsibility in controlling by placing standards to sell natural based ingredient products, as well as striving to offer the highest quality type foods.

Trader Joe’s is a major food retailer who has developed quite the name for themselves. It has well over 350 stores in over 32 states and is expected to continually grow over the next few years (Bond, 2012). For over 50 years, Trader Joe’s has been providing quality customer services, products and a unique shopping experience for its customers. They have come a very long way from when they first officially opened their doors. Trader Joe’s started when its founder Joe Coulombe wanted to find a way to differentiate his 7-Eleven stores (Schermerhorn, Osborn, Uhl-Bien & Hunt, 2012). In the food retailer industry, Trader Joe’s has developed a process that works well and

1. The grocery industry is a commoditized industry, which makes it difficult for grocers to sustain through differentiation. Buyer power is high and thus, cost leadership and operational efficiencies are critical. There is fierce competition amongst various grocery stores, with the main players such as Loblaw and A&P holding multi-banner stores in various market segments. Traditional grocery stores also lose some of their market share to drug stores, convenience stores and other retailers who have entered the industry. Threat of substitutes from fast-food and take- away outlets is not as prevalent, since many grocery stores have started stocking ready-to-eat meals and have deli services available for consumers. Competitive

In the United States, the food retail industry is absolutely massive. According to Statista, this industry brings in nearly 5.27 trillion dollars annually and 594.4 billion of that is from grocery store sales. In this market, the 20-ton gorilla in the room is Walmart, racking in nearly 20% of the entire market at around 118 billion dollars in 2013 according to the Harvard Business School case study. Following Walmart, Kroger and Costco own the biggest next largest slices bringing in 76 billion and 71 billion respectively. In this highly competitive market that has some of the smallest margins of any industry it can be tough to get ahead and even tougher to grow. However, Trader Joe’s has managed to pierce what was once a very small world

SMW’s current accounting information system is a cutting edge relational database system through Microsoft Access with internal controls set to adequately prevent and detect errors and fraud. This relational database system tracks sales orders, shipments, accounts receivable, cash receipts, purchases, accounts payable, cash disbursements, inventory levels and other relevant accounting information. The system’s output is compliant with Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). The database processes currently in use at SMW are described below.

Operating on very thin profit margins, players in the supermarket industry traditionally either focus on a premium segment or follow a discounter strategy at the low end. Premium players address educated and more price elastic consumers who value healthy, natural and organic food; the share of perishable items for these players is normally distinctly higher. Players that focus on a discounter strategy offer a higher share of simple necessity items and value price competitiveness over premium features like healthiness or organic origin. Independently of the focused customer group it is imperative for players in the supermarket industry to be cost efficient and optimize operations

Every retail location carries a variety of products that distinguishes it from other stores in the same chain. Not surprisingly, it is difficult to achieve economies of scale. Supply Chain Mackey describes his consumers as being “part of a cult”. Whole Foods believes that the company’s emphasis on perishables and locally-sourced produce differentiates their stores from run-of-the-mill supermarkets and attracts loyal and devoted customers. However, “fresh produce” is one of the most challenging product categories to operate due to limited product shelf life and high cost of spoilage. Whole Foods has tried to circumvent most of the problems inherent in supplying fresh produce to its stores by sourcing locally and having short and flexible supply chains. In the case of fruits and vegetables, Whole Foods has buying relationships with local farmers who supply the store with seasonal produce. Thus, if one farmer is unable to produce a sufficient amount of yellow corn or heirloom tomatoes, the shortfall can be made up by another farmer. Although challenging to perfect, these short supply chains are agile and difficult for other big retailers to duplicate.

The threat of substitutes in the food retail industry can be high among the ‘Big Four’ as switching costs are relatively low and products can be similar. However, most have their own private labels and also target slightly different markets, such as Sainsbury’s having more upmarket positioning and Tesco’s cost leadership. Waitrose offers unique and differentiated products, which are, in the eyes of the consumer, significantly superior. No other supermarket offers such premium quality products with great service and such a large range of organic products as Waitrose, so this makes them extremely difficult to substitute. (Euromonitor, 2008).

Loblaw Companies is one of the largest food retailers in Canada, owning well maintained brands such as NoFrills, Real Canadian Superstore, and Shoppers Drug Mart. With its focus of fresh produce, real Canadian pork, and low prices on other instore food products, Loblaw’s had created well-established branding for themselves in the local communities. However, in the past few years, Loblaw’s Companies have faced an ever-growing competitive market, with other retail competitors such as Walmart, Costco, and Drugstores expanding in the food retail industry. It is sourced

The increased number of IT investment is applied in organization. It is clear that information technology has become the competitive fact in world business. Collaboration is the new trend in business world. No one can deny the importance of information technology application. Besides the profits outcome, the impacts of information technology deployment also create commitment, trust and value. Advanced information system can improve each steps of business process. It enables people to share information, performance task simultaneously and making decision efficiently. IT companies designed different products to satisfy each step of business operation in terms of manufacturing and human resources. Seminole should apply this new IT infrastructure to business operation. Firstly, company can use the transaction processing systems (IPS) to keep track of all business activities and transaction of the organization such as payroll and employee record keeping. IPS also shows all information from internal and external operation. Secondly, Business intelligence systems are designed for decision-making support. Management information system (MIS) is a system that helps managers to keep track of company performance status, which purposed for decision-making and evaluation. Decision-support system (DSS) is purposed for future business decision-making. Thirdly, Enterprise application systems are designed for integrating business process from different functions, such as supply chain

Trader Joe’s operates over 340 stores in 9 states were they “buy direct from suppliers whenever possible, bargain hard to get the best prices and then pass the savings on to the customer” (Trader Joe’s, 2013, para. 4). Whole Food’s Market is the “world’s leader in natural and organic foods, with more than 360 stores in North America and the United Kingdom” (Whole Food, 2013, para 2). Trader Joe’s and Whole Food’s Market have managed to take original ideas and spread them throughout the nation to many different customers. Although they differ not only in the technique in which they decide to bring products to their customers but also in term of inventory management and supply chain organization. These two companies have become so successful in my opinion, not by what they differ in but what they have most in common, which is their commitment to their loyal customers, employees and undeniable quality in their products they sell. Through their loyalty to their customers and employees in addition to their irreplaceable value

Walmart is a billion dollar retailing machine. Through the decades, Walmart has combined many different types of information systems in to their day to day operations. Walmart is known around the world for their continuous improvements and implementation of new information systems to remain on top of the retail industry. The information systems used by Walmart play a major role in their continued success. With their use of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), Walmart is able to send and receive instantaneous data to their networks. This is why Walmart has been able to remain competitively priced and control their inventories. This paper will show how Walmart has used many different information systems during the course of its history to manage both capital and human resources.

2) Having a complete understanding of the market and the company’s competitors is crucial for a business to flourish. If a company invests in a certain information system that helps it to stand out in the market in comparison with its competitors, while gaining from that initiative, this adds strategic value to the company. As a startup, SmoothPay had to utilize different strategies to aid in penetrating the market, while minimizing the costs of doing so, and that was achieved using Information Systems. Transaction Processing Systems (TPS) are implemented by SmoothPay as a way of increasing their strategic value, giving them the upper-hand over their competitors. TPS is a “computerized system that performs and record the daily transactions necessary to conduct a business.” (Laudon & Laudon, 2006). According to the case study, “Merchants were provided with a number of items during the installation process. Depending on the point-of-sale system used by the business, SmoothPay would deliver an integrated point-of-sale solution or a stand-alone payment terminal.” (Halliday & Dong, 2016) By implementing this information system, SmoothPay was able to initiate the payment process and organize the different financial transactions made with all

Organizations like Target, has integrated ERP system implemented, which helps them connect their Retail Department, HR department, Inventory Department, Courier Department together, which helps in many way to establish a strong identity in the market. An average transaction from one customer can trigger multiple functions and multiple departments. Let us say Sally walks into Target looking for a bottle of bleach. Her steps are finding the correct bottle, placing it in her basket, and then take her basket to the checkout. The checker scans the bottle of bleach totals the transaction and Sally uses her debit card to finish the purchase. Straight forward and we probably repeat this process daily. Yet the same transaction triggers multiple behind the scene operations. After the transaction is complete the software responsible for inventory minus' that bottle of bleach. During the evening, a report is sent to the replenishment team, they use scanners to find products in the warehouse, and daily counts to replenish the correct

In this project, we hope to clearly convey the current situation of the company ALTS, the changes it wishes to implement and the factors