WOG Markets is one of the leading chains of convenience stores based at petrol stations, airports, and railway and bus stations in Eastern Europe (499 locations). The chain serves about 250,000 customers daily. WOG Markets attract consumers as a place to chill for travelers, grab a snack with a delicious coffee, as well as buy the necessary travel stuff. WOG has been a market leader for the last 20 years due to its well-organized business processes, which the company optimizes constantly.
Challenge: Reduction of the manual work of creating planograms
The planogram design was a time-consuming task, especially during assortment rotation. Communication with the stores was really poor. The manager of each location managed merchandising processes according to their own criteria. Notifications about planogram changes as well as reports on their implementation were done manually and sometimes not done at all, which resulted in huge delays.
Planogram optimization was the first and foremost task for the managers.
Two solutions were offered:
- Hire more people, which significantly increases labor costs.
- Launch a system that would automate the planogram creation process and control its execution.
The choice was made in favor of a high-quality IT solution. The main goal was to find a vendor capable of completing the main merchandising tasks:
- simplifying planogram creation;
- centralizing merchandising management – don't hire additional staff;
- gain control over the goods layout;
- implement merchandising performance analytics throughout the chain.
“All the tasks the company had were carried out by the new LEAFIO Planogram Optimization Solution. The WOG team highly valued the planogram design, analytics block with reports generation, as well as a mobile application where managers set tasks to control layouts.
The key advantage is a constantly developing cloud-based system. The solution matched the price and quality demands and met all merchandising management needs.
It's much more than just planogram modeling. It is a comprehensive tool that has provided a new approach to managing merchandising in a store chain at WOG.” – Olga Gorbatenko, project manager at WOG.
Process: Merchandising Management System Implementation Is Not That Big a Deal
The system pilot was introduced at 22 stores in several stages. First, the team set up automatic data exchange between the ERP and Leafio and then verified the assortment. The specialists involved in the project created templates for retail equipment made all category planograms, and created custom formats. Floor plans were loaded automatically into Leafio.
Stores were connected to email notifications as well as to the chatbot to monitor current tasks. Email and chatbot notifications were replaced by a mobile application released by the Leafio team resulting in up-to-date planograms for 22 gas stations along with the established feedback. The central office could control the store layout and the task fulfillment.
Within three months of cooperation, both the vendor team and the retail chain team have launched a merchandising management system at 22 stores. The system was then scaled to other locations.
Result: A New Layout Approach at WOG
“The process of full interaction has now been launched. Stores are automatically informed about planogram changes. The central office receives feedback on the results of the completed tasks. We accessed a tool to control the task fulfillment in stores,” Olga Gorbatenko, Project Manager at WOG.
Interaction: New Level
The mobile application is highly valued by the staff and management. The flexible permissions settings, for instance, make the planograms visible for certain managers and helps focus on the task. The management monitors the work plan throughout the chain and controls the fulfillment. No time is wasted - the system is cloud-based, and the information is updated in real-time.
Stores are automatically informed about planogram changes, and the central office receives feedback about the prepared layout. Currently, both the headquarters management and the employees are satisfied with the solution results.
Managers are scaling up the created planograms to several stores using formats. Any changes in the planograms are done swiftly due to the efficient merchandising analytics provided by the Leafio system.
The following results were achieved:
- the data is stored in one system;
- the data is exchanged daily with up-to-date information on balances, sales, and assortment;
- access to the gas stations and planogram analytics;
- a threefold 'shrink in time' to create planograms;
- no manual data work resulted in reduced labor costs and prevented additional recruitment costs;
- access to control the task fulfillment.
The assortment optimization with the access to the merchandising tool is worth highlighting. Reports are tracking the best and worst selling goods, as well as analyzing the goods turnover in stores.
Leafio is a cloud-based store layout management service. It is a perfect IT solution that works on any device with internet access. The WOG team uses the Leafio mobile application on data collection terminals and the same device is used to receive goods. The system allows you to build any form of the floor plan and fill it with all the necessary equipment and goods layout to control task fulfillment in stores.
INSPIRED BY NATURE. ACCELERATED BY AI
