Today, more than ever, garden centre customers expect a connected retail experience whether in-store, through mobile devices or the web. Working in partnership, Davidson Richards and Garden Connect provide a range of innovative apps to allow garden centres to connect with their customers, provide a great shopping experience and increasing loyalty. Both companies specialise in serving garden retailers and by combining their expertise and the latest technology they deliver a proven best-of-breed approach.
The OpSuite Apps powered by Garden Connect include Loyalty, Scan & Go and Hospitality and are designed in line with the garden centre’s branding. The apps’ use real-time data for customers, products, pricing, promotions and loyalty already available in OpSuite, Davidson-Richards’ leading EPoS and retail management solution. Garden centres can transform how they interact with customers and reward loyalty through targeted activities. Campaign effectiveness is easily monitored, saving time, effort and costs compared to more traditional generic mass mailings.
Retailers such as Creative Gardens, Henry Street Garden Centre and Pennells have already benefitted from the OpSuite Loyalty App during lockdown and beyond. Two garden centres groups, Stewarts and Scotsdales, have taken a further step by introducing the OpSuite Scan & Go App powered by Garden Connect. Having already enjoyed a long working relationship with Davidson Richards for many years, they were keen to offer new shopping experiences to their customers.
Customers can download the Scotsdales or Stewarts App for free via Google Play Store or the Apple App store. When in-store, the customer creates a digital shopping cart in the app and, walking around the centre, scans products with the camera on their phone and add them to their trolley or basket. When ready, payment is simple; either by scanning the app’s ‘pay at till’ barcode at the tills and tendering by cash, card, or vouchers, just like any other transaction, or if desired, paying immediately via the card that is linked to their app.
The app helps to avoid queues at the tills, minimises contact with the products purchased and assists with social distancing measures in place. In addition, the customer’s receipts are stored in their app, for easy viewing or returns, saying goodbye to the lost receipt for ever.
Michael Saddler of Stewarts explains: “This demonstrates our pioneering approach for garden centres, in what we believe to be the first such launch of a Scan & Go App in the sector” adds Keith Bateman, Director of Davidson Richards. “After having successfully partnered with Garden Connect previously regarding many integrated webshops, it made perfect sense to work with them to develop the OpSuite Apps and bring them to market”.
Lauren Cambridge of Scotsdales explains: “We have already seen a huge increase in sign-ups and the popularity of our loyalty scheme and are excited by the possibilities of continued developments and how this will shape the future of shopping at Scotsdales Garden Centres. Since launching the OpSuite Scan & Go App, we are already planning a range of exclusive vouchers for loyalty members which will only be available via the app”.
Sjors Hemmen, Business Development for Garden Connect adds: “We’re very proud to be the first one to introduce this innovation to the garden industry and are pleased both Stewarts and Scotsdales embraced the idea when we first pitched it to them. In good partnership with Davidson- Richards, we can offer customers a professional customer journey which is currently only available with big, nationwide retailers. Our mission is to bring these innovations to the garden industry and launching two Scan & Go Apps is a good starting point. However, to us it’s only the beginning of the process since there’s more to come in 2021.”.
