Shopko and Pamida: Systems triumph or tragedy

Shopko have invested an information system called markdown optimizer from spotlight solutions to help them price leftovers so that they will more efficiently in each individual store. This new software allows the company to price leftovers to suite each store, for example by the season, geography or previous records of that particular store. Without this system all markdown prices would have to be done by hand and all prices would be the same for each store. This is not very efficient as it costs a lot of money to have staff go through each item and change the price, and some products sell better in some stores than others at different times. The result is that before the new system Shopko had a high amount of losses which the markdown optimizer has resolved.

Pamida’s distribution centre consolidation project is very important to both pamid...