Qmatic Delivers One Year ROI at National Grocer's Deli Counters

Because of their tremendous volume of foot-traffic and counter-based sales, this national grocer engaged QMATIC to develop a solution that would improve their employee productivity, get their customers out of queues, shorten wait-times and deliver better overall customer service. QMATIC delivered.

The problem
Managing foot-traffic was a problem for this national grocery customer. Because of the large - but unpredictable - volume of counter traffic, they were having difficulties staffing their counters appropriately. Sometimes the customer would staff three employees and experience very light traffic and at other times they would have a single employee and have an unexpected rush of customers. The result was wasted man-hours and unhappy customers.

Investigating
The nature of their counter traffic was such that they could become overloaded with customers at any hour of the day, but because of a lack of data the traffic patterns could not be accurately predicted. The direct result of understaffing was an estimated loss of over $40k annually per counter location.

Solution
QMATIC designed a multi-faceted queue management solution ("QMS") that helped the customer gather real intelligence on their customer’s shopping patterns. With real data available they were able to staff the counters appropriately and deliver better customer service.

Key features of the solution:
Audible Alerts. Because of potential that there would be no employee behind the counter when a customer arrived, QMATIC developed an alert system that integrated with the QMS.

When a customer arrived and took a ticket a discreet, audible alert would be played that alerted the staff that there was a customer waiting for service.

System Thresholds. Understaffing the counter was a critical issue that was resulting in lost sales. Because abandonment was a significant problem, QMATIC integrated an alert system that notified management when a threshold level of customers had been surpassed. In response management could reassign employees on a temporary basis until the rush of customers could be served.

Usable Data.The system collected key metrics, like wait times, customers in the queue, and numbers of customers served at different times of the day that were valuable in accurately predicting staffing needs.

Benefits of QMATIC implementation:
Revenue Increase: As a direct result of the implementation of the QMATIC QMS, counter-sales increased by over $50k per store in the first full year of the system’s operation, customer abandonment declined due to more efficient customer service, and active-waiting sales increased by removing customers from physical queues.

Employee Productivity. With the integrated alert system, employees were no longer tied to the counter area and could perform other duties when customers were not waiting for counter service, like stocking shelves and displays, and maintaining the counter area.

Increased Revenue per Man-Hour. Because the QMATIC QMS increased sales and improved employee productivity, the customer saw a significant increase in revenue generated per man-hour.

Perception of Faster Service. Even when customers were not actually helped more quickly they perceived that they were completing their counter business more rapidly.

Overall Positive Response. Customers overwhelmingly (90%) approved of the QMS implemented by QMATIC. Their perception of shorter wait-times and a system that managed their wait was a great benefit to their customer service strategy.

Results at a glance...

• 90% of customers liked the new system
• 93% of customers perceived receiving faster service
• Increased counter-sales revenue by over $50k per year in installed locations
• Counter-abandonment was reduced by 8% in QMATIC locations
• Reduced staffing costs by 18% in QMATIC locations