We were in the middle of an installation at a new client and one morning, the owner asked an unexpected question. He told us that he had just gotten his monthly numbers and his Diesel sales were off. He asked us if we could find the reason why since we had just installed our Data Docks at several of his stores. The answer was easy to identify and if we had been a few days further along, the system would have notified him automatically.
The first place that we checked was StoreKeep’s Fuel Pricing module. This feature tracks the fuel prices at each store and compares them to the prices at local competitors. Within minutes we noticed that one store had Diesel priced $0.25 above its competitors, pricing them “out of market”. We could see that the price remained unchanged for over two weeks and later learned that it had gone unnoticed because it was the most remote location in their chain. After looking at additional data from the store, not only had they lost fuel sales, but in-store sales were also down by 3%. This was a costly oversight indeed.
Small human errors can add up to big numbers if they go unnoticed. StoreKeep’s Fuel Pricing module can be used to identify and correct these types of errors in real-time, before they add up:
- Receive Alerts when Fuel is priced Out of Market – Each operator can set a threshold that determines when they receive alerts about their fuel prices relative to the market price of their competitors. The StoreKeep Fuel Pricing module monitors prices and sends out alerts in real-time. So, if the threshold is set at $.05/gallon, the operator would receive an alert as soon as the StoreKeep detected that their price is $.05 above or below the competition.
- Oversee Price Changes from Headquarters – StoreKeep integrates directly with POS & pump controllers so that your managers can receive confirmations that price changes have been executed at each store.
- Track Market Prices in Other Regions – A price restoration normally starts outside of your local area. The Fuel Pricing module will allow you to track stores in other regions and send you notifications when a restoration is on the way so you can stay one step ahead of your competition.
Two months later, I was speaking with the same client and heard some fantastic news. He told me that he had just purchased ten additional stores and wanted us to install StoreKeep right away. Initially, he had been tentative about buying this group of stores because they were so remote. However, once he had experienced how StoreKeep gave him real-time visibility into store operations from anywhere, he was confident that the acquisition would be a success.
