Alpha centralises airport retail operations

Airport specialist turns to central SAP installation to reduce in-store burden

Airport retailer and caterer Alpha Retail is installing enterprise resource planning (ERP) software to consolidate and centralise key business functions.

The organisation will use SAP’s R/3 Retail software as the basis of its business change programme. It will integrate with electronic point of sale (Epos) and mobile terminals to handle discreet, store-based tasks governing cash and inventory management centrally.

The implementation is intended to give a business-wide, ‘bird’s eye’ view of store operations, says Alpha Retail group IT director Martin Cook. It will centralise control of supply chain functions, including replenishment, and minimise in-store administrative tasks.

‘We can drive more sales through our stores by freeing up staff,’ said Cook. ‘Cheaper stock purchasing will be possible from the centralised supply chain view by driving economies of scale with suppliers.’

Alpha Retail, the UK arm of international parent group Alpha Airports, will replace its ageing infrastructure and deploy the SAP software at its head office and stores, located in 12 UK airports, under the integrated retail information system (Iris) banner.

‘The strategy is to have SAP as our core ERP application to all the business, but we are working on the UK operations until March next year,’ said Cook.

Iris will include core R/3 Retail modules for warehouse management, forecasting and replenishment, finance and business intelligence. Chip and PIN-enabled Epos systems will handle cash management and automate inventory control.

The company is working with retail consultancy and SAP partner CiberNovasoft to install the ERP software. It is also using the consultant’s R/3-based process modelling tool, novaRetail, to speed up the traditional blueprinting phase of project Iris.