A Major U.S. Convenience Store Chain Chooses Datalogic’s Magellan™ 1100i Presentation Scanner to Enable Participation in Unique Customer Applications
Overview
Convenience stores face many unique challenges at the point-of-sale (POS), such as verifying customer eligibility for age-restricted items or reading coupons from mobile devices. With these special needs in mind, convenience stores should be equipped with POS hardware that understands and eases daily challenges, and also prepares their stores for the future of retail.
The Challenge
One of North America’s largest convenience store chains began experiencing problems with its legacy POS equipment. The company’s existing laser-based scanners were creating major maintenance problems because the parts were either no longer accessible and if they were, the scanners became too costly to fix. In addition, the devices could not support reading two-dimensional (2D) symbologies, which was critical for their participation in new customer applications and data collection trends, such as mobile couponing.
The legacy equipment also caused issues in terms of cashier productivity. According to the Director of Systems Development and Maintenance, “We experienced difficulties in consistently reading items with small or highly truncated bar codes. This slowed down our front-end productivity because the codes took extra time to read.”
After considering these limitations, the IT executives decided to upgrade the existing laser-based hardware to advanced bar code readers with imaging technology. Upgrading to imaging devices would enable the stores to support 2D symbologies; however, they also had to consider new reader’s compatibility with their existing Verifone POS system.
The Solution
After several considerations, Datalogic’s Magellan™ 1100i on-counter presentation scanner with 2D decoding technology was determined to be the best scanner in terms of high-performance and satisfying the retailer’s other hardware requirements.
“We chose Datalogic as our sole vendor provider due to their long history and expertise in designing and manufacturing high-performance readers. The Magellan 1100i is equipped with every feature we could ask for and more,” the Director of Systems Development and Maintenance stated.
The most compelling feature for the retailer was the scanner’s simple, intuitive nature. With the Magellan 1100i scanner, employees can now easily read items in both a ‘sweeping’ or ‘presentation’ style, due to the scanner’s omnidirectional reading capabilities. This advanced, hands-free capability enables any cashier to quickly become efficient in scanning with little or no training.
The beauty of the Magellan 1100i scanner is that it can also be turned into an equally efficient handheld device. With built-in grip pads and an ergonomic design, the scanner can also be used for scanning large or bulky items, which eliminates the need for cashiers to pick up the heavy items that can cause injuries.
The ease of installation was another primary driver as the Magellan 1100i scanner synchronized perfectly with the Verifone Ruby terminals with “plug and play” compatibility.
The retailer also saw benefits in reduced overall error correction time due to the scanner’s precise imaging scan volume, which prevents accidental misreads of items caused by stray scan lines.
This was particularly important because counter space at the POS is generally crowded with many items that could be scanned by mistake.
Finally, the Magellan 1100i scanner is able to read both 1D and 2D symbologies. This was a critical requirement for the retailer because it enables the company to participate in new customer applications, such as mobile couponing.
What is mobile couponing? Technology that allows a retailer to create customer loyalty programs where opt-in subscribers are sent special offers via a 2D bar code on their mobile device. Datalogic’s exclusive Illumix™ intelligent illumination technology is especially helpful by enabling the Magellan 1100i scanner to read codes from a back-lit screen, such as a cell phone.
The retailer can also take advantage of unique applications from Datalogic, such as Driver License Parsing, with 2D reading technology. Here, the employee can scan the bar code on State issued driver licenses (or identification cards) and with the help of software, the data from the bar code will populate the employee’s computer screen, clearly indicating the customer’s eligibility.
The Results
Over 2,000 Magellan 1100i scanners were successfully installed at the major convenience store’s locations across North America. After installing the new scanner, the Magellan 1100i on-counter presentation scanner not only increased the productivity of cashiers at the check out, but reduced the time required for training new operators.
The enhanced reading capabilities will allow the retailer to take advantage of new bar code applications that are saving businesses time and valuable resources around the world.
Customer
Convenience Store Chain
Industry
Retail
Sub-Industry
Convenience Store
Application
Point-of-Sale (POS)
Country
United States
Canada
Datalogic Products
Magellan™ 1100i
