The past two years have been difficult for many in the retail industry. Much of the industry experienced intermittent shutdowns and even in the periods when they were open had lower foot traffic then pre-pandemic. 2022 is looking better, in most of North America the Covid pandemic is ending and along with that the restrictions that were keeping away shoppers. Go to any mall in any metropolitan areas and you can see the re-opening of society leading to a consumer spending bonanza. For brick-and-mortar businesses that had a difficult time during Covid this is a great opportunity to capture profits, however, 2022 offers not just opportunity but also challenges.

2022 is also poised to be the year with the highest inflation since 2008. This could easily eat into a business’s profits eliminating the potential opportunity of the increased consumer spending in 2022. One of the key costs that is driving this inflation is the cost of labour. Wages have increased during the pandemic and are continuing to increase due to a tight labour market. With labour being the number one cost for many businesses making sure it is used efficiently is key to staying out of the red, but that is easier said than done, so how can business make sure they are using their labour effectively?

It can be very difficult making staffing businesses in a retail location. Customer volume can be highly variable based on time of day and what day of the week it is. Never mind bringing in the factors of seasonality and holidays. All these factors complicate staffing choices and mean that businesses often make staffing decisions based on feelings and intuition instead of hard data. This leads to situations where a store is overstaffed or understaffed compared to customer volume. A store being understaffed can cause potential customers to leave without purchasing and being overstaffed means you are paying staff that does not really need to be there, obviously, both these outcomes are not ideal. Business analytics are the key to avoiding these outcomes.

By integrating modern business analytics tools into your business, you can track your customer traffic, see which employees are the most efficient at helping customers and use predictive AI to set employee schedules that leave your store perfectly staffed. If you are looking for a system that does all this and more look no further than the INEO Welcoming System. With the INEO Welcoming System’s patented AI and analytics dashboard you can make the staffing decisions that will drive your business in the year to come. The Welcoming System can measure and track key analytics to help drive your business and assist you in making informed decisions. In addition to measuring volumes of foot traffic to determine when your store has higher numbers of customers, the Welcoming System can also track customer satisfaction score, income level and languages spoken by using big data and patented AI techniques. To learn more about the INEO Welcoming System, click here.

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