Ryman chooses Nucleus IS - Stock Audit to overhaul loss prevention

Ryman, the business stationery brand owned by celebrity retail entrepreneur and BBC Dragon Theo Paphitis, has selected the Nucleus IS - Stock Audit solution from Zetes to improve stock accuracy and better identify stock loss across all 235 Ryman Group outlets nationwide.

Ryman selected Nucleus following a competitive tender during which a number of alternative suppliers were carefully evaluated. Zetes won the selection process because of its proven track record in retail and the well known reliability and functionality of its Nucleus suite of applications.

Ray Winter, Head of Risk Management at Ryman said, “I have used Nucleus and Zetes previously and even though we went to tender to explore what else was available to replace our existing stock audit system, they still came out top in the marketplace.”

Reconciling stock levels in real time

As part of the implementation project, Zetes has developed a dedicated interface to enable Nucleus to communicate directly with Ryman’s central stock management system and accurately upload routine stock counts to reconcile back office data in real time.

“Upgrading a stock auditing system is a complex project because it has to interact with other business systems. Plus it involves learning new processes and training not just those staff physically handling the equipment, but the entire branch teams at our stores. Zetes has excellent training skills which make a huge difference to the overall success of any implementation,” says Ray Winter.

Minimising shrinkage

Using Nucleus, Ryman anticipates that in addition to improved stock replenishment management, the company will be better placed to equip individual stores with the required security systems to minimise shrinkage.

“All retailers have issues with stock loss and the records need to be reconciled regularly,” says Ray Winter.

With a system like Nucleus to manage stock auditing, Ryman are better able to properly identify which other loss prevention measures they should employ. These requirements vary by store and data from Nucleus will help Ryman assign KPIs and plan their strategy.