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🚀Calibrating Checklists and Teams

Whenever possible, Bindy recommends a gradual roll-out where some users/districts are trained, feedback is collected, the forms/workflow adjusted, and the program iteratively expanded by training another batch of users/districts. We call this step “calibration”. In a retail and hospitality environment, a checklist is a collection of brand standards and best practices. What goes on the … Continue reading 🚀Calibrating Checklists and Teams

🚀 Who Benefits from Site Visits?

Retail audits, store visits and hotel assessments are proven to protect the brand, drive brand standards, increase customer satisfaction and mitigate risks in multi-unit retail and hospitality. How exactly will retail audits conducted with Bindy benefit you? Here are some of the benefits you can expect from regularly visiting and auditing your sites with Bindy. … Continue reading 🚀 Who Benefits from Site Visits?

🚀 Mystery Shopping vs. District Managers

Some swear by it. Other won't go near it. Mystery Shopping certainly has its supporters but also its detractors. In this article, we go over the key differences between mystery shopping and district manager led assessments. Let's dive in. District manager-led audits focus on the process A mystery shopping program and district manager audits ultimately … Continue reading 🚀 Mystery Shopping vs. District Managers

🚀 5 Reasons to Deploy Retail Execution Software

Asking a retail execution software vendor like Bindy whether you need this type of software may feel like asking a shoe salesperson whether you really need shoes. And yet the answer may surprise you. The business case for software automation hinges on your activity and the exposure, liability and costs that inconsistent or substandard execution may have … Continue reading 🚀 5 Reasons to Deploy Retail Execution Software

5 Benefits of Videos for Brand Standards

If a photo is worth a thousand words, can a video be priceless? Beyond the memes and cat videos, even beyond the helpful “do it yourself” home repair videos found on YouTube, videos deliver serious value to consumers and businesses. This is hardly news. Videos are one of the most consumed forms of media already. … Continue reading 5 Benefits of Videos for Brand Standards

🚀 10 Ways to Improve Site Audits

A retail audit helps retail and hospitality brands execute brand standards, programs, and procedures in areas such as operations, merchandising, loss prevention, health and safety and security across all sites, on time and in full. The audit is sometimes called an assessment or simply a visit. Below, 10 tips to improve site audits across your … Continue reading 🚀 10 Ways to Improve Site Audits

🚀 Don’t Sweat the Score, Seize the Opportunity

Assigning point values to inspection items is a common practice in retail and hospitality. The idea is to obtain an overall score for the store and an indication of the store's compliance with a program or sets of standards. Scoring a store may however trigger unexpected reactions from the franchisee or store manager. Most operators … Continue reading 🚀 Don’t Sweat the Score, Seize the Opportunity

6 Ways to Save Time During Site Visits and Inspections

It’s no secret that site visits are incredibly important to your retail operations. Store audits and inspections enable you to evaluate programs and initiatives, ensure compliance, and even connect with teams on the ground.  However, they can also take time. Between audit preparations, travel time, inspecting stores, and following up, site visits can take anywhere … Continue reading 6 Ways to Save Time During Site Visits and Inspections

6 Store Inspection Mistakes District Managers Make When Auditing Retail Stores

Having high standards and a strong plan of action is great, but even the best strategies will fall flat if they aren’t carried out properly.  As Larry Bossidy, former AlliedSignal CEO wrote in the bestselling book, Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done, “Strategies most often fail because they aren’t well executed.” This lesson rings … Continue reading 6 Store Inspection Mistakes District Managers Make When Auditing Retail Stores

4 Types of Inspections that Protect Store Operations

Conducting store inspections (also called retail audits, store visits, or store walks) should be on every retailer’s agenda to protect store operations. Why? Store inspections promote higher overall compliance with brand standards, shrink the gap between stores and head office, and improve customer experience by ensuring merchandising, service, and safety standards are executed consistently. So … Continue reading 4 Types of Inspections that Protect Store Operations

District Managers or Checklists?

You need to check brand standards across your retail or hospitality business, for all franchisees and locations. How do you do that? Do you rely on district managers, their experience and personal touch or do you deploy checklists for all to fill-out? Checklists largely consist of yes/no answers to standard questions. When a district manager … Continue reading District Managers or Checklists?

Misconceptions about Brand Standards

Let's be completely frank. Are your franchisees, and sites fully in line with brand standards? A survey by the In-Store Implementation Network sought to quantify a facet of this issue, specifically merchandising, and asked retail professionals how they measure performance of in-store merchandising. Twenty-eight percent of those surveyed responded that they "make the assumption that … Continue reading Misconceptions about Brand Standards

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6 Reasons to Measure Brand Standards

Brand standards span broad areas of a retail or hospitality network, including branding, customer service, product assortment, preferred vendors, merchandising, cleanliness, human resources, security, loss prevention and fire prevention. They govern how the business should be presented, how specific objectives should be completed and how programs should be implemented. Most customer-facing franchise-based groups, especially in … Continue reading 6 Reasons to Measure Brand Standards

The Cost of Merchandising Non-Compliance

It is often said that success in retail boils down to execution. How well do retailers execute today and what is the cost of merchandising execution non-compliance? We had the opportunity to discuss the current state of in-store execution with James Tenser, Director at the In-Store Implementation Network. Below are some of the key findings … Continue reading The Cost of Merchandising Non-Compliance

It is Time to Abandon Excel for Brand Standards

When we went paper less, we all assumed we'd magically become more efficient. Whiz-bang, look at us saving data! However, you can be just as inefficient with technology as you can without. Capturing data electronically does not, in and of itself, make it efficient. To make matters worse, multi-unit operators now collect more data about … Continue reading It is Time to Abandon Excel for Brand Standards

Why do Quick Service Restaurants Need Retail Audits?

A retail audit system helps multi-unit retailers achieve store-level compliance with brand standards such as operations, service and merchandising standards. How can retail audits help Quick Service Restaurants (QSRs) and why do QSRs need retail audits? Here are 10 reasons why the QSR industry needs retail audits. Health and safety When preparing and serving food, … Continue reading Why do Quick Service Restaurants Need Retail Audits?

How Much do Retail Audits Cost?

There are now mature, highly efficient, largely automated systems for conducting retail audits. Some organizations devise their own system, one or more "checklists", usually with Excel and email. Is this approach practical and cost-effective? In this post, we compare how much retail audits cost, with and without retail audit software. Let's get started. Excel and … Continue reading How Much do Retail Audits Cost?