“As soon as you start measuring something, you will get better”

As the largest food supermarket chain in Sweden, ICA has 1,450 shops that serve 10 million customers per week. In order to offer customers a more interesting shopping experience, management recently introduced digital signage in their shops.
“As a result, we can prove a sales increase of between 30% and 60% per week for advertised products,” said Fredrik Holmvik who is responsible for ICA Media.

Still, that wasn’t enough. “We wanted to add more value and offer the stores even better service by introducing a new, combined service,” he said. Customer Flow Management (CFM) from Qmatic was introduced, and integrated with the digital signage solution. With queuing information visible on the media screens, there is a compelling reason for customers to keep looking. They want to keep an eye on their place in the virtual queue.

“When there are additional reasons to look at the screens, the content messages will really get across,” Fredrik Holmvik said. “I believe there are another 10 or 15 shops that would want the combined Qmatic-ICA Instore-TV right away and we are offering it to them via Q-Matic and ZetaDisplay.”

The digital signage solution, also called Instore TV, is currently running in 100 ICA Kvantum shops. It shows 25,000 films each year on 1,700 digital screens displayed within the shops. Large companies such as Coca cola, Unilever and Scan regularly advertise on the screens.

“As the statistics generated by the Qmatic system clearly show number of customers in the shop at any given time, I could sell advertising space per day, or per hour, and offer the advertisers the best and busiest spots. That would be an interesting next step for ICA Instore-TV,” Fredrik said.

No queues at all
The first store to trial the combined Qmatic – ICA Instore-TV is ICA Kvantum in affluent Hovås outside Gothenburg.  With around customers 15,000 per week, the store has seen a healthy growth since it opened in 2008. The shop is open 7 days a week and there is considerable pressure to give excellent customer service to a growing number of discerning customers.

“In order to give the best quality service, we cannot have any queues at all at the deli or the checkouts,” said store owner Claes Ottosson. In order to manage the customer flow and offer a better shopping experience, Claes decided his store should be the first to invest in Qmatic’s CFM system integrated with Instore-TV from ZetaDisplay.
 

Management benefits
“I expect to save money on the system,” Claes said. “If I save only one man hour per day, it will easily pay for the investment.” In reality Claes will probably save much more by using the statistics generated by Qmatic for staff planning and scheduling.
“I also expect to get higher revenue as better planned staffing and more flexible waiting will generate increased sales,” he said. ”Also, as the customers can keep an eye on their ticket number for the deli whilst shopping, they will inevitably spend more money.”
 

“The Qmatic system also gives me more control over my organisation. The statistics show me number of customers per day, what time they come in and what hours the deli is particularly busy. For example, last Friday we had 27 customers during a 30 minute period, which is fairly busy. We can also see the transaction times; at the moment they are quickest on a Friday and longest on a Sunday.”

The statistics are not really a surprise, more a confirmation of what Claes Ottosson already knew. But now he’s got proof. “As soon as you start measuring something, you will get better,” he said.

Staff benefits
With an LED screen showing waiting information at the food preparation area, the staff can now work undisturbed.

“They can get on with preparing the food behind the doors and still see how many customers are waiting for service. If the number of customers starts to add up, the staff can get out there and help serving. Otherwise they can finish what they are doing without having to constantly check if there are customers needing service.“

Customer benefits
For the customers in the store, the benefits of both the Qmatic system and the digital signage are obvious. The customers can keep doing their shopping while waiting their turn at the deli. “Qmatic combined with digital signage is also a modern system that looks professional,” said Claes. “It all adds up to give us a better image and a more pleasant experience for our customers.”

How it works
A Solo queuing system is strategically placed by the deli counter. As the customers walk up to the area, they take a ticket and a short advertising message flashes up on the Solo screen. This advert can be linked to the messages on the media screens to ensure best impact. There are two LED displays showing the staff number of customers waiting; one placed in the food preparation area and the other opposite the counter.

Three of the many media screens in the shop display ticket number being served as well as the current marketing information messages.
 
Statistical reports generated by the Qmatic system can be cross referenced in any number of ways, showing customer volumes, waiting times, service times per month, week, day, hour or any other measure that may be useful for the store. The reports are web based and can be accessed from any internet connection.
 

Wireless platform for digital communication
As supplier of ICA Instore-TV Leif Liljebrunn is CEO of ZetaDisplay. He sees the combination with Qmatic as added value for his client ICA. Instead of constantly watching and waiting at the automated queuing system, customers are free to wander around and browse other sales zones. The integration with the CFM system is a fairly straight forward operation although the system is based on a highly complex 5GHz wireless network for Instore-TV.

“ICA has very high demands on their wireless networks,” said Leif Liljebrunn. “There are several networks within the shop, all competing for air space. They needed a solution that was reliable and robust. At the same time it must not be in conflict with any other network in the shop and also totally secure. Our Digital Signage Platform is very sophisticated but easy to integrate with Qmatic.”