Costcutter Case Study
“Daisy was keen to understand our business and IT strategy, enabling them to develop a scalable and future-proof system
for us.”
The Costcutter Supermarkets Group is a franchise operation, with more than 1,550 convenience stores throughout the UK. Costcutter offers independent retailers a package of professional support and advice to enable them to thrive in an ever more competitive marketplace.
Business Needs - In Brief
To improve network connectivity and introduce electronic and automated systems to improve efficiency and reduce overall costs.
Solution
Daisy recommended a private MPLS (multi protocol label switching) network and full security solution.Outcomes
Daisy’s solution has improved efficiency right across Cost Cutter’s business, reducing costs and considerably improving service.Business Needs - In Detail
With its legacy infrastructure, Costcutter found operating its helpdesk costly and ineffective. An improved network would mean the majority of support issues could be automated or managed remotely. Getting promotions in stores quickly, the ability to view real time sales and managing security were all growing business requirements.
Kevin Widdrington, IT Director at Costcutter said, “we needed a system that would enable these processes to be handled by head office, reducing the amount of time investment needed from the individual stores. C-PoS helps us to manage and run price and product promotions, however, in order to implement these at store level, many tasks had to be replicated by every one of our retailers, which is extremely time consuming.”
Solution
Kevin Widdrington continued, “We identified Daisy as a strong player in the retail IT sector with excellent credentials. The Daisy offering would mean we had access to a one-stop shop for all our VPN (virtual private network), hosting and security requirements at an extremely competitive price.” Daisy provided a private MPLS (multi protocol label switching) network and a complete security solution.
OutcomesSince implementing the Daisy solution, Costcutter has seen significant cost savings, as well as dramatic time-saving benefits and increased efficiency across essential procedures.
Kevin Widdrington comments, “One of the major benefits is the secure link we now have across our entire store network into C-PoS at head office. It is reliable and gives us the ability to analyse sales and stock data, and has eradicated time-consuming processes. A specific example of this is promotions. Every retailer used to spend approximately seven hours every three weeks setting up leaflet promotions in store. Thanks to the speed and capability of the new Daisy system, we are able to complete the promotions set up at head office and send this out to all stores, reducing the time it takes to implement in-store promotions to just 15 minutes. That’s a huge time and resource saving for us and our stores.”
With the scalability and security of the new Daisy network, Costcutter stores now have an online ordering system with the ability to receive delivery notes and invoices electronically. Kevin Widdrington continues, “This has reduced time-consuming administration processes and our stock checking and audit procedures have considerably improved.”
“By implementing Daisy’s MPLS network, we were able to remove the cost of traditional dial-up and gain quicker access to stores, allowing us to support more outlets with the existing levels of staff that we have at the C-PoS Helpdesk. The new network is vital to the effective running of Costcutter stores. Security is of paramount importance to us, and as part of the solution, Daisy provides a range of security features. A managed firewall, anti-virus and anti-spam services are all included to protect the network and Costcutter’s sensitive data.”
