Retail Application Areas

Merchandise Management	Inventory Management
Vendor Analysis	Loss Prevention
Marketing & Sales Analysis (Market Basket)	Employee Performance Management
Customer Analysis & Relationship Marketing	Ecommerce Analysis
Category Management	Financial Analysis

Merchandise Management
MicroStrategy facilitates effective merchandising, enabling retailers to provide the right products to the right stores at the right time. Analytics and flexible reporting empower retailers to compare product performance and evaluate promotion effectiveness across individual items, categories, geography and vendors.
MicroStrategy Reports Sell-Through Reallocations Inventory Turns Weeks of Supply Hot Item Report Seasonal Buying Lineal Feet In Stock % Mark Down % Department Contribution	Customer Snapshots: Ace Hardware and Hallmark Cards More than 6,400 users at Ace Hardware rely on MicroStrategy every day for merchandise analysis reporting. MicroStrategy's enterprise-wide deployment at Ace delivers insight on the effectiveness of marketing initiatives, pricing, product management, inventory and loyalty programs. "We are always looking for new ways to enhance operational efficiencies, and MicroStrategy provides us with the technology to do just that," said Ace Hardware's Technology Business Manager. Hallmark Cards has reduced product development and merchandising time with MicroStrategy, enabling better evaluation of promotions, reducing in-store testing time, and improving inventory and planning for individual stores. Hallmark's MicroStrategy solution tracks sales and predicts trends to drive profitable inventory, display and marketing decisions. The Web-based platform opens up Hallmark's ever growing point-of-sale (POS) data warehouse to business analysts across the country.
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Vendor Analysis
MicroStrategy enables retailers to evaluate supply chain activities, logistics operations and vendor performance across a wide range of metrics. ROLAP architecture provides transparency to all relevant data, and robust security protects sensitive information. Powerful analytics isolate bottlenecks requiring immediate attention, and automatically notify appropriate management of potential pitfalls and emergency situations.
MicroStrategy Reports Vendor Efficiency Vendor AP/AR Vendor Performance     Scorecards Vendor Rationalization Shipper Checks and     Balances Track Vendors and     Orders Stock Analysis Shipping Costs Reallocation/Direct     Store Delivery	Customer Snapshots: Frontline, Hudson's Bay Company & Payless ShoeSource MicroStrategy provides Frontline with in-depth analysis of sales and supply data for the 150 publications circulated to 55,000 retailers in the UK, which stock magazines managed by Frontline. "Our primary objective is to improve the efficiency and focus and our distribution across the UK," said . "For the first time we will have a real understanding of where our products sell, enabling better strategic planning and more efficient distribution management." - Geoff Love, Marketing Services Manager MicroStrategy users at Hudson's Bay Company include store managers, company executives, financial and marketing analysts, and outside vendor personnel. "MicroStrategy's zero-footprint web interface enables increased information sharing with our vendors, allowing us to realize efficiency and productivity gains that will help us more proactively serve our customers." - Gary Davenport, HBC's Vice President of Information Services Payless ShoeSource uses MicroStrategy to ensure inventory is available to meet planned (and unplanned) business events. Analysts run reports that depict inventory and shipment information, allowing Payless ShoeSource to better meet anticipated customer demand. Similar reports are frequently used to make intelligent inventory replenishment decisions when sales demand cannot be covered by available inventory.
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Marketing and Sales Analysis (Market Basket)
MicroStrategy provides clear visibility into store operations by comparing category, shift, pay rate, grade or other management variable. ROLAP architecture delivers data transparency, as well as insight for more efficient sales management, marketing promotions, operations and budgeting.
MicroStrategy Reports Sales & Margin Front Store Sales Sales / Square Foot Comp Store Sales Competitor Sales Return on Assets - ROA Inventory Turnover Register Usage Analysis	Customer Snapshot: Lowe's Companies and The Wet Seal Lowe's Companies is the world's second largest home improvement retailer and the 14th largest retailer in the U.S. Approximately 1,400 Lowe's employees use MicroStrategy to perform ad-hoc queries or run reports against an 8-terabyte data warehouse. Lowe's is realizing significant benefits - including high returns on investment - through improved merchandising decisions, more timely responses to information requests, cost reductions and enhanced employee productivity. Using MicroStrategy, The Wet Seal analyzes extensive transactional data to glean insight on the sales trends of its products by specific regions, demographics and stores. Users create personalized reports for managers in 600 stores. "MicroStrategy is providing the complete solution for Wet Seal's exacting needs," . "MicroStrategy offers exceptional user-friendly reporting features, superior scalability for large databases, outstanding Web deployability, and powerful analytics for the most granular-level data. MicroStrategy is a top-of-the-line system for bottom-line results." - Michael Relich, CIO, The Wet Seal
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Customer Analysis and Relationship Marketing
Retailers gain strategic insight into customer behavior and buying patterns with MicroStrategy, which analyzes customer data at both the granular and aggregate levels to make customer segmentation possible. With market basket analysis functionality, store level managers, marketers, and executives can quickly understand what product pairings, promotions, customers and vendors are most profitable.
MicroStrategy Reports Profitability Analysis Customer Segmentation Share-of-Wallet Revenue Contribution Attrition Risk Analysis Post-Campaign Analysis Customer Loyalty Core Items Items and Price Per Basket Demographic Baskets Brand Switching Shopper Penetration	Customer Snapshots: METRO Group and Ace Hardware The fifth-largest global retailer, METRO Group, has deployed MicroStrategy enterprise-wide. Approximately 1,500 users track sales trends and perform ad-hoc analysis to understand the drivers behind product performance. Users also run reports to provide suppliers with scorecards on product planning, forecasting and replenishment. "MicroStrategy meets the METRO Group's demanding requirements for a highly flexible, stable and scalable business intelligence platform. The MicroStrategy-based system enables our employees to track the performance of the entire company, optimize product assortment and make decisions that increase revenue and profitability." - Silvester Macho, Division Manager, METRO Group Information Technology Ace Hardware uses MicroStrategy enterprise-wide for retail analyses. Additionally, MicroStrategy powers the Ace Hardware loyalty program, known as the Helpful Hardware Club, which allows Ace to manage its larger customer base and customize promotions by demographic, buying patterns, season, and geography.
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Category Management
MicroStrategy makes effective category management possible by providing analytics across a wide range of marketing, planning, operations and distributor relationship variables. Additionally, MicroStrategy aligns vendors with retailer objectives by allowing suppliers to participate directly in the analysis of consumer, product and functional data.
MicroStrategy Reports Scorecards Pricing Modules Profitability Analysis Assortment Optimization Category Scorecards Market Comparison Role Analysis SKU Rationalization Item Definitions Share of Shelf Category Contribution Season Changeover	Customer Snapshots: Dick's Sporting Goods, Value City Department Stores and Raley's MicroStrategy replaced Cognos at Dick's Sporting Goods, allowing store managers, merchandising analysts, and senior managers to perform sophisticated category management, sales and inventory analysis. The MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform allows employees to more effectively track product sales, product mix and inventory levels. Value City Department Stores, DSW and Filene's Basement employees, merchandising analysts and senior management will use MicroStrategy software to analyze customer data and product inventories. Ken DeWitt, Sr. Vice President and CIO, stated that, "End users will be able to perform sales, category and inventory management analyses in order to more effectively track promotions, product mix and inventory levels." Raley's employees perform category management analysis, track shipping, examine sales trends, streamline budgeting and eliminate inventory inefficiencies with MicroStrategy. The solution has led to improved gross margins of nearly 15 percent. "Our category managers and category analysts have an easy-to-use, Web-based interface that helps them to better market, merchandise and price our products at any time of the day. MicroStrategy is helping us to perform our jobs more nimbly and efficiently." - CIO of Raley's Supermarkets & Drug Center
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Inventory Management
MicroStrategy assures a dynamic inventory that helps retailers avoid product losses to changing economic, technology, or consumer conditions. Retailers run MicroStrategy reports to rapidly determine what products are hot, where they are needed, and when they can be supplied, and also to determine effective strategies to deal with "at risk" inventory, such as discounting or promotion.
MicroStrategy Reports Inventory Turns Inventory Breakage,   Spoilage, Obsolescence At Risk Inventory Inventory Procurement Stock Levels Fill Rates Stock Outs Handling Costs Carry Costs Inventory Leakage/Waste Order, Ship & Arrival Dates	Customer Snapshots: National Retailer A major retailer uses MicroStrategy to avoid write-offs by combing its inventory for goods it can sell before their value is depleted severely. Inventory found to be "at risk" is then moved at a discount, leading to increased cash flow and marginal sales increases. National Boutique Retailer MicroStrategy is helping a leading national boutique retailer find and stop inventory leakage throughout its inventory processes - from ordering, to picking, to shipping, to arrival. The retailer uses MicroStrategy to capture data at more stages of the process, information such as order dates, ship dates, arrival dates, and quantities present at each point, and to run BI reports across complex metrics that have helped the retailer eliminate charges for inventory it has never received.
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Loss Prevention
MicroStrategy incorporates loss prevention and fraud detection solutions that enable management to uncover internal fraud, identify criminals for prosecution, and deter fraudulent activity, actions that ultimately increase margins and reduce expenses.
MicroStrategy Reports Shrink Analysis Vendor Rationalization Natural Losses Return Rates Cancels and Mid-voids Markdowns Backorders Hot Stores, Staff, Customers Distribution Shrink Refund Fraud Fraudulent Credit Card     Activity	Customer Snapshot: CSK Auto CSK Auto Corporation, parent of the largest specialty retailer of automotive parts and accessories in the Western United States, uses MicroStrategy for enterprise reporting and analysis. Approximately 50 CSK Auto employees run loss prevention and vendor performance reports at CSK. They are able to perform shrink analysis and track changes in inventory movement by region and product category. They also analyze product performance by vendor and store to enable more effective management of vendors.
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Employee Performance Management
MicroStrategy allows managers to evaluate employee performance across metrics such as sales, productivity, hours, budgets, expenses, and other human resources criteria. Intelligence from employee performance and labor scheduling reports help streamline staff usage and create efficiencies that boost bottom line performance.
MicroStrategy Reports Sales Performance by     Employee Store/Regional Performance Forecast staff Overtime Budget vs. Actuals Best / Worst Stores by     Performance Best Employees Fraudulent Employees Employee-Processed Sales     and Returns Event Shortages Sales per Labor Hour Labor Cost Analysis Call Center analysis	Customer Snapshot: Darden Restaurants MicroStrategy currently anchors 12 business intelligence applications across 17 business areas at Darden Restaurants, the largest casual dining restaurant company in the world. More than 250 financial and marketing analysts, operations and human resource professionals and executives use MicroStrategy to track, analyze and report on profitability and marketing promotions, guest satisfaction scores, employee retention, as well as perform market basket analyses, inventory and scenario planning. The human resources department at Darden will soon expand MicroStrategy's capabilities to provide analysis of employee turnover and to allow users to combine HR data with financial and other existing data. "Being able to make these kinds of informed business decisions helps us add to our bottom lin. We decided to expand our MicroStrategy deployment to include human resources because we wanted a single source of corporate data and reporting." - Heidi Metcalf, Senior Project Leader for Business Intelligence Systems, Darden Restaurants, Inc.
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Ecommerce Analysis
Web-based and call center commerce is a critical channel for many retailers, especially as broadband penetration rates continue to grow. MicroStrategy analyzes vast amounts of Web traffic and Web commerce data to enable logistics users to manage the Web channel effectively. Web analysis can also reveal strategic opportunities for new sales and marketing channels.
MicroStrategy Reports Advertising Metrics Sell Through Customer Subscription Entry/Exit Pages Inventory / Delivery Internet P/L Vendor Subscription Web Sales and Traffic Store Cannibalization     Analysis Call Center effectiveness Customer satisfaction	Customer Snapshot: The Men's Warehouse "MicroStrategy has done for Decision Support what Lotus did for spreadsheets: they put the power to control the application in the hands of the end user," said Kevin Richardson, Director of Information Technology at The Men's Warehouse.
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Financial Analysis
MicroStrategy enables retailers to take the financial pulse of their business whenever needed. Examination of financial performance metrics from across the enterprise arm financial managers with intelligence to make the most profitable business decisions possible. Financial insight from MicroStrategy ultimately improves gross margins and bottom line performance.
MicroStrategy Reports Working Capital/     Cash Management Accounts Payable/     Accounts Receivable Payroll Reporting Risk Management Insurance Tax Management Shareholder Metrics Expense Management Inventory Management/     Carrying Costs	Customer Snapshot: O'Reilly Automotive With MicroStrategy, O'Reilly Automotive has a consolidated, dynamic view for sales and financial analysis across its 1,011 stores. The company effectively monitors and manages inventory levels to improve product sales and company profitability. "The retail industry is very competitive, and understanding and acting on corporate data are invaluable to staying ahead of the competition. We chose MicroStrategy's industrial-strength business intelligence technology for its ability to consolidate and present valuable corporate performance data in an easy-to-understand format, over the Web. MicroStrategy will improve our ability to track sales, merchandising and inventory metrics. As a result, we'll be better able to identify revenue enhancement and cost reduction opportunities." - Greg Henslee, President, O'Reilly Automotive Inc.
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