9 Questions to Ask Before Paying for New Retail Technology
At NRF 2019 Retail’s Big Show, over 900 vendors vied for the attention of the retailers in attendance. Retail executives’ inboxes are filled with sales pitches from technology vendors promising to transform their business. But not all retail technology is worth its weight in gold. In fact, bad retail technology, or simply retail technology that […]
High Impact, Low Ask: How CB4 Creates IT Department Heroes
CB4 is a tool for retail store teams, but it requires the buy-in of their counterparts in IT. In our experience working with retailers, we’ve found that operations leaders are reluctant to go to IT with a big ask, knowing that the team is drowning in work and delivery is slow. In order for ops […]
How CB4 Mitigates Loss Across Retail Chains
Despite advances in retail loss prevention, shrink continues to plague brick-and-mortar retailers—to the tune of $100B in 2017, according to RetailDive. With a global shrinkage rate of 1.82%, the problem is even more significant in the US, which has a national shrinkage rate of 1.85%. Fashion and accessories retailers are the hardest hit, with a […]
How Customer Feedback is Driving Our Product Strategy in 2019
In 2018, the number of store managers using CB4 more than tripled from the previous year. As our client roster expanded, we had the chance to do store visits with all different types of retailers—fashion, convenience, grocery, pharmacy, and more. Our clients are innovators in their field, dedicated to enhancing their stores’ performance and deepening […]
How CB4 Keeps Convenience Stores Competitive
One indicator of the health of an industry is the intensity of the competition within it. Nowhere is that truer than in the convenience store business. Relative to other retail channels, the convenience vertical has recently seen tremendous growth. In 2018, a whopping 84% of convenience retailers reported in-store sales increases. Along with this growth […]
The Lost Sales Calculator: What It Is & Why We Built It
At CB4, we live and breathe retail. That means connecting with our customers and other retailers whenever we can to learn about their successes, the challenges their stores face, and how they’re adapting to the demands of 21st century brick-and-mortar. One question we love to ask retail leaders is: “How much revenue does your chain […]
How CB4 Retailers Use Tech to Enable Store Managers
As shoppers grow increasingly knowledgeable about the products they buy, the demands placed on store managers continue to pile. With a quick search on their phone, shoppers can find the best prices, the flavors/colors/sizes, and the local sellers of any product they want. Heck, they can even have it on their doorstep free of charge […]
Kohl’s x CB4 NRF Panel: How to Satisfy Mission-Driven Shoppers
Kohl’s VP of Technology, Shweta Bhatia heads up the retailer’s in-store learning labs. These labs test innovative technology solutions and then scale them across Kohl’s entire chain of 1,000+ stores. Bhatia had this to say about her philosophy: “We focus on two things: Keeping it simple and making it actionable. Making it simple is the […]
How CB4 Improves Communication in Retail
Teamwork and communication in retail settings can seem like an unwinnable battle. Your average sales associate or store manager often feels like corporate employees sit in a castle in the sky. Likewise, store managers are swamped with back-office work, and may lose focus on training initiatives that their associates need. Opportunities for relationship-building are few […]
3 Things We Learned Working with Convenience Store Managers
No matter what your role or industry, you probably use some kind of software at work. At CB4, we’re no different. And like you, we’ve used our share of great and terrible software, and learned a lot from it. The most important thing that we learned—great software companies understand their audience and build their software […]
