Location: Forkhill, County Armagh
EDGEPoS Solutions: EDGEPoS ESELs, Appetite, EDGEPoS Self-Checkout, Loyalty, Scan, Pay, Go!
Results: Award Winning Success
Established in 1976 by Paul Mulkerns, the Mulkerns brand was one of the first stores to offer much needed convenience to the community; and has been supplying fresh foods and quality services for over 40 years.
Initially located at 1 Newtown Road, in the village of Newtowncloughoge, the business outgrew its premises and a new Supermarket, Filling Station and Post Office was constructed at its current location on the Forkhill Road in 1994.
Since relocation, the business has continued to expand and develop, and the store has grown into a complete shopping experience including a Deli, a Butchery, an extensive Off Sales department, in-store Florist by ‘O’Neill’s Flowers’ & in-store bakery by ‘The Corn Dolly’.
Mulkerns EUROSPAR is now a multi-award winning supermarket in its class and Henderson Technology couldn’t be prouder to have worked with this innovative and forward thinking store, having first installed EDGEPoS in 2012.
2020 has seen Mulkerns EUROSPAR shortlisted for many prestigious awards, including Best Community Engagement and Best Customer Service at Forecourt Trader Awards 2020/2021; and a whopping eight shortlists at Retail Industry Awards 2020/2021.
Lisa Mulkerns, Marketing and Social Media Manager, told us “We are delighted to have been shortlisted for so many awards at these events. All of the staff at Mulkerns EUROSPAR have worked incredibly hard over the COVID-19 pandemic, and deserve the recognition that these award shortlists bring to them.”
“We have used social media channels to engage with our shoppers like never before over the lockdown periods. Alongside this we constantly update our website and use our digital media screens instore to engage with shoppers. This can be anything from safety measures instore to deals and offers, and highlighting support of the local schools over the pandemic period. Other successful initiatives on social media have been our #ZeroWasteWednesday campaign, which ties in with our refill stations instore, and the #12GiveawaysOfChristmas, where we held a video draw every week online. Prizes included a TV, Deluxe Turkey & Ham Hamper and an Amazon Echo for the local community.” What a way to pick the spirits up in the community over this difficult period.
Technology was very prominent in two Awards shortlists – Best Customer Service at Forecourt Trader Awards and Best Use of Technology at Retail Industry Awards.
Proudly, Mulkerns EUROSPAR were also winners at Maxol Excellence Awards 2020 in three categories:
Excellence in Standards
Excellence in Community Engagement
Store of the Year
This store have certainly embraced retail technology instore. So why were Mulkerns shortlisted for these awards?
They added one Self-Checkout in 2019 to meet customer demands for a quicker shopping experience; and are part of the pilot of the upcoming Ubamarket Scan, Pay & Go! App.
To meet the demands of the pandemic, Mulkern’s introduced the Appetite Home Delivery, Click n Collect and Hot Food App in late 2020. Since they launched this service just weeks ago, they are now averaging over £5,000 per week of orders going through the App – and this is growing at a mammoth speed. Aaron McGuigan, Store Manager from 2019, said, “We have a home delivery service live instore which is very valuable to our elderly customers. We used Appetite initially to allow customers to pre order and pre pay for their Sunday carvery dinners, of which we would serve around 700 each Sunday.”
“Following the outbreak, this service became essential for the customer as well as our staff allowing for less queues and therefore less customers instore whilst still serving our community.”
Aaron concludes, “The decision was taken to extend the use of Appetite to the whole store. From this we can offer our customers a consistent service allowing customers to click and collect, picking a delivery slot or to pay instore with the groceries already picked by a member of our team. Our aim is to offer our customers a safe and convenient shopping trip, whether they leave the house or not.”
“Appetite has been a massive success instore, driven by our staff who update content regularly, maintaining live stock records. We have been able to personalise the app to offer app only deals for example on Cyber Monday as well as offering a Christmas Shop section on the app. We highlight the app on our social media channels and Vojo Digital Media signage throughout the store.”
Henderson Technology also installed EDGEPoS Electonic Shelf Edges label instore in the first week in January 2021. Aaron McGuigan told us, “The decision to switch to ESELs instore came as a way to proactively plan for the future of retail. Manually changing labels each promotion period is one of the most time consuming elements of our floor team’s week, so when the opportunity came to improve efficiencies throughout the store, it was a no brainer. We also had to plan for a potential eventuality where staff shortages could impact the quality and accuracy of our work.”
Aaron concludes, “I believe the ESELs have already vastly improved the customer shopping experience instore, as well as the customer having confidence in our pricing and accuracy.”
The Award Winning Deli onsite and Food to Go is an area where technology plays a large role in driving the business forward and increasing sales, whilst also ensuring margins and profit are maintained for this. They invested in Mettler Toledo Touch Scales in Mulkerns at a cost of over £15,000 in 2017. The Daily Deli Scales are integrated with EDGEPoS and give full visibility on reporting, margins, profit and stock. And a wholly developed feature by Henderson Technology, receipt resolution, has seen a decrease in fraud across the store and a decrease in transaction times.
They also use Gander onsite, an industry first mobile platform that displays ‘reduced to clear’ food products. Gander is unique for this industry as it displays reduced to clear food automatically and in real-time, with Henderson Technology’s award winning EDGEPoS System pushing the reduced food products to the mobile app, as they are stickered in-store. Similarly, when that item is sold it is automatically removed from the app, providing an instant feed of all reductions in-store at any time making it simple and effective for the shopper.
We would like to congratulate Mulkerns on their shortlists and can’t wait to announce winning achievements through Henderson Technology channels.
Henderson Technology works hard to provide our Retailers with the most innovative features and solutions. We are proud to be recognised by industry leading organisations for EDGEPoS EPOS Software.