Welcome to Retail Checks and Balances, a podcast that takes you behind the scenes of the bustling world of commerce and culinary delights to help you grow your business and win. Join us as we explore the fascinating stories, trends, and challenges that shape the retail and hospitality industry, from cozy corner cafes to sprawling shopping malls and everything in between. And now, here's your host, Kevin Spencer.

Welcome again to Retail Checks and Balances. Today, we're going to talk about this evolution of technology called electronic shelf labels. You know, this has been around for quite a while, but a lot of people are, you know, trying to analyze what's the real return on investment. And I think that's what we have to kind of put in position today for you. You know, ESLs, as they call them, are digital displays that typically attach to the store shelves. It can display product information, pricing, promotions, and even inventory levels in real time, meaning that It can show you how much stock, it can show you any promotions. I mean, some of these ESL manufacturers have even gone the extra mile of having them blink or put the promotion in color. I mean, you have monochrome, you have full color labels, and then there are four color labels, different types that can really showcase the solution itself. And it's useful for both retailers and customers. What are the main benefits of ESL? I would say there are several benefits to using ESL. First and foremost, they improve operation efficiency. Since ESLs can be updated remotely and automatically, retailers can change prices and promotions across all their stores in their chain, or even a single store, and save time and resources compared to manually changing the paper tags. As we know, in some cases, this can take sometimes three hours or two hours or less per day. you want to utilize your resources much better for stocking or something else that they can add more value. And this is how you analyze the cost of paper, the cost of labor, the cost of inefficiencies with price queries by customers, because the labor wasn't changing in time. You want to make sure that the valued experience of the customer is always there. And this is definitely a big, big, big advantage. I can imagine how much time and effort it would save, especially store employees. These days where we lack labor, we want to utilize our labor, much more efficiency and much more productivity can happen within store. And the ESLs enhance the accuracy and consistency. With paper tags, there's always a risk of human error, whether it's from misprints or even outdated information. It doesn't even need to be the employee's fault or something like a batch didn't update to get the new pricing. ESS can eliminate these issues by ensuring that pricing and product information are always up to date and consistent across the store. And this is a good point. As I said, ESS can also improve the customer experience, meaning that you draw customers to these tags and you can put whatever information you want to reach out to them. in the tag. And of course, that will depend on the size of the tag. I mean, there are tags that go in various sizes where you can push as much information as possible. Promotional information, buy three, get it at this price. Or, you know, you get a coupon if you buy five, something like that to create that valued experience. And as I said, it provides more information than just a shelf tag, such as even reviews on the products. You know, we can throw in nutritional information, which makes shoppers get the opportunity to make informed purchasing decision without needing to seek the assistance of staff. Additionally, ESLs can enable dynamic pricing strategies, allowing retailers to implement personal pricing or respond quickly to market changes, for example. whenever employees go out and say, oh, we're selling this particular item at $6, but our competition across the street is standing at $5.50. We want to be able to probably get into that and change the price quick. So at least we're competing and we don't have to wait a long time for that to change. You know, how fascinating it is that ESLs can empower both retailers and customers alike. And of course, there are challenges and drawbacks associated with implementing ESLs. Like any technology, there are challenges to consider. One concern is the initial cost of implementing ESLs, as well as the ongoing maintenance and support costs. Additionally, ESS rely on wireless communication networks. So ensuring a reliable and secure network infrastructure is crucial for this operation. So that's what we have to consider as an important factor. And we got to roll that investment. And I'm just saying the return on investment could be two years or three years, depending on how many tags you put out throughout the store. And you don't have to put it everywhere. My humble opinion is that you put it on items that change prices rapidly. You know, in some cases we talk about fruit and produce that, you know, that price fluctuates more or less a lot or any items that change prices, you know, and that's what we got to focus on, you know. And, you know, despite these challenges, you know, ESL offer a lot of potential benefits for retailers. As technology continues to advance, we expect to see even more innovative applications of ESLs, further transforming the retail landscape per se. And one of the things I think that is very important to consider in the landscape of things is that, as we go forward, of course, wouldn't you like to see I am shopping in this item, the person who's stocking the shelves forgot to put more items. So let's say it has two items on the shelf and you see in stock they have 100. So then you know you can just walk up to, instead of thinking and it's gone, you're gonna walk up to a staff member and say, this says you have 100 in stock. And they can say, oh, sure, I'll go to the back and get it. So that's that experience you can create by customers and retailers working together to get this going. Another thing I've seen in some cases, and it's still introductory in some aspects of the word, I mean it's out there, is that some people kind of invest in cameras that can look across the shelves to see if there's an empty space and then allude somebody saying, hey, there's an empty space, we need to restock. So at least now you are being proactive to get that stock on the shelf and make sure that the customers are getting what they need and you don't lose those particular sales. on a promotion aspect, you can even make the ESLs interactive and put a QR code on there and you can scan that QR code and see much more information on the product. If there's any specials that you wanna promote to this particular customer, and this is where loyalty comes in there. You can say, all right, you buy three of this, you're gonna get this. And that doesn't have to be on the label, but it's interacting with the customer via their cell phone. So these are things that, can mask the opportunity or put it in perspective that it can be a great investment to put in electronic shelf labels. And then, you know, with the ESLs I've said, the battery times are are very, very good based on the information I've received. It's between five, sometimes seven years based on the type of tag. And it's easy to change where you have, you know, from the paper tag perspective, and I'm saying paper tag is bad, it's still relatively there because you got the person walking the shelf and they have a belt printer and they print that instant tag and put it on the shelf. but that depends on your operations and how much resources you have to make sure that your tags are up to date. And we got to remember with any technology or any new innovation that it's studied properly. Don't just drop it in there. Try to understand from your staff, understand from your customers, what this impact, what would it bring to you? and with anything you know we learn or we as we go along the way of implementing this strategy it's gonna see if it's a positive one and it should be a positive one because it's it's gonna drive so much more as I said before than just being an electronic shelf label. Thank you very much. I hope this was very insightful for you to push forward and take a look at what that technology is and just learn all about it. If you wanna implement, then make sure you got a good professional that's gonna help you do that analysis and stuff like that. Thank you very much. Have a good day.

Kevin Spencer

Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you consume podcasts, so we'll get updates as new episodes become available. And if you feel so inclined, please leave us a review. Until next time, friends.