Tracy Mathers Shoe Studio

“With our new POS solution provided by Futura and NCR, we are able to more efficiently run our business and meet our customers’ needs.” - Tracey Mathers, Founder and Proprietor, Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio.

The Customer

Established in 1991, Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio is a chain of five stores in Queensland, Australia, that specialises in footwear aimed at a niche market of discerning shoppers who want quality footwear with an edge.

Tracey Mathers is founder and proprietor of the stores. She is the granddaughter of the founder of the historic Mathers Shoes Footwear Company. After beginning her career as early as age 14, she is a seasoned retailer. Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio now employs 28 people.

Over the past 16 years, Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio has maintained its success through differentiation from its competitors. Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio not only offers the latest fashion trends and elegant products but also really knows its clientele, thus focusing on providing excellent customer service. Tracey Mathers travels overseas regularly and sources footwear from countries such as Italy, France, Germany, Spain and America.

The Challenge

Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio was facing challenges in maintaining its level of service due to an outdated point- of-sale (POS) system that no longer met the store’s needs. This system lacked inventory management functions and did not provide accurate merchandising information, thus hindering the ability for employees to make sound buying decisions. Employees were tracking sales history and seasonal trends manually.

Tracey Mathers realised this aging DOS-based system had far exceeded its ability to be effective and that it was essential to upgrade the POS solution to stay competitive in a continually changing retail industry.

The Solution

Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio evaluated an array of solutions before selecting one that combined Futura Retail Solutions’ software and merchant management system along with the NCR RealPOSTM 30 hardware solution, including NCR peripherals such as displays, printers, keyboards, scanners and cash drawers.

Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio chose Futura’s software solution because it provided the right fit for the organization’s business needs and had a proven track record in retail. The system satisfied Tracey Mathers’ love of statistics and provided an operating system that would enable Mathers to continue to automate certain processes such as consolidation. Additionally, the Futura software would speed up the process of stock management.

NCR was chosen because it provided a retail-hardened solution representing quality and reliability and provided all of the stores with a standard operating environment, lowering the total cost of ownership.

The strong relationship between NCR RealPartner Futura and NCR provided the growth, stability and long-term view in product roadmap that Tracey Mathers Shoe Studio was seeking.

Futura and NCR implemented the solution in six weeks – delivering it on time and within budget.

Solution Benefits

Tracey Mathers commented, “Futura and NCR have helped us gain a significantly better understanding of our business and enabled us to see what is working really well and what is not. We are operating much more efficiently and are no longer making the same mistakes as we did with our old system. Due to this system, emotion is no longer a factor in our decisions since we can now see which suppliers most effectively work with us.

“With the automation and reporting capabilities of this new and improved system, we have been able to increase sales as well as our gross profit margin, as we are putting more dollars where they need to be for the greatest return. We now have the information that makes it obvious when stock is not moving, so we no longer wait until the end of a season to mark down slow moving merchandise and can do so in a much more proactive manner.

“Overall we are extremely happy with our choice of Futura and NCR. We not only have a system that will enable us to provide the outstanding customer service our customers have come to expect, but we also have a POS solution that will still be the answer as we continue to grow.”