London Drugs
London Drugs Improves Corporate Reporting, Gains Insight Into Operations with SQL Server
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Company Overview
Founded in 1945, London Drugs is 100 per cent Canadian owned and is focused on local customers' satisfaction. Across Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, London Drugs' 63 stores employ more than 6,000 staff dedicated to providing customers with a superior shopping experience.
Business Challenge
As a large retail operation spread across three provinces, London Drugs requires in-depth reporting to be done from the store level to the boardroom at headquarters. In 2003, London Drugs recognized that its existing reporting solution and practices needed to be updated to meet the growing needs of the business, to provide employees with the ability to access the data they need when they need it and to gain a greater level of insight into the business. The company needed a new BI solution to complement its existing online analytical processing (OLAP) package and in-house point solutions.
“We’ve always had a few different approaches to reporting where different levels in the organization had different tools for reporting and where we didn’t have reports per se people would look it up,” says Scott Riddell, Manager, IT Solutions, London Drugs. “For example, if a store manager didn’t have a report for something they would view information by looking at screens related to operational data. So while the information they needed was all there, it was not easy to access or analyze which means they were spending time behind the computer instead of out on the floor with customers.”
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Solution
In looking for a new reporting solution, the London Drugs team did a comprehensive review of available business intelligence (BI) solutions, meeting with several BI different vendors.
“Going into the project we needed a solution that would fit with our business needs,” says Riddell. “We needed to work with a BI vendor who would be very savvy about our business and a solution that would extend beyond a pivot table we would have to customize. In making an investment in BI technology, the solution had to enable us to provide insight into our business that would make a difference in our day to day operations and not place a drain on valuable IT resources.”
As part of the review, London Drugs started looking at the BI capabilities of Microsoft SQL Server 2000, as they had used Analysis Services previously for an executive level digital dashboard application. During this review, they identified that Microsoft had a new offering which extended SQL Server’s existing BI capabilities, Reporting Services. After seeing a demonstration of SQL Server Reporting Services, London Drugs quickly realized that the solution would fit well into their existing IT environment and require minimal investment as they could leverage existing SQL Server investment.
By selecting SQL Server Reporting Services, London Drugs was able to aggregate data from multiple data sources which were designed in-house and from other vendors such as the point of sale and supply chain systems to provide users across the organization with highly specialized reports based on their unique business requirements. Furthermore, as London Drugs’ IT team had experience working with Microsoft-based solutions, they were able to leverage their internal skill set and easily create queries to enable data from other systems to be used for SQL Server Reporting Services. Currently, the organization has three individuals who are able to design reports.
“SQL Server Reporting Services has been extremely easy for our team to work with and we were able to create our reports within a day using existing queries,” says Riddell. “The development team is very comfortable querying data and we are confident that pretty much anybody on the team can create the reports required by our internal stakeholders. New reports can quickly be created with a minimum of fuss to meet future business needs. It is an extremely open and flexible system, it does most of what we want, so we have the confidence that it will meet our needs for years to come.”
To date, London Drugs has created approximately 25 reports, which are being used across the organization by 40 users, with plans to extend to up to 300 users. For example, a report has been designed for accounts payable, which automates the process of matching invoices to purchase orders. At the store-level, a report has been designed to filter through detail on promotions such as items required, signage, and merchandising required. Instead of printing out the entire report, managers are able to quickly access the information they need and identify any issues related to the required elements for the promotion.
One of London Drugs’ key requirements was the need to be able to deliver reports to users in a variety of formats. With SQL Server Reporting Services, London Drugs is taking advantage of the flexible report delivery options, which enables them to provide reports to end-users in the format that makes the most sense for them. Reports can be sent as an email attachment, viewed using a Web browser or even exported directly into Microsoft Excel.
“We are able to provide our store managers with reports on a daily basis via email so they can easily access them and make the necessary business decisions. This flexibility was key, as users aren’t going to take the time to review information if it doesn’t fit with their work habits. We’ve eliminated the need for users to search for information, perform ad hoc queries on systems, or ask IT to provide information, which is a real plus.”
Business Benefits
With the deployment of SQL Server Reporting Services, London Drugs has been able to significantly improve access to data across the organization and extend the use of BI across the organization. As a company in the highly competitive retail market, this business insight has a direct result on the bottom-line of the organization as it means improved customer service and greater productivity at all levels.
Reduced Total Cost of Ownership
London Drugs will be able to leverage their existing investment in SQL Server by implementing SQL Server Reporting Services, thereby reducing their total cost of ownership. Additionally, as SQL Server Reporting Services is leveraging the existing skill set of the London Drugs team, the time to develop new reports has been minimal, resulting in reduced software development costs when compared with other BI solutions.
“In assessing our options, we realized there would be a learning curve with most BI solutions as we would need to do a lot of the development ourselves,” says Riddell. “By selecting SQL Server Reporting Services, we were able to keep costs down and leverage our in-house expertise. We have a high level of flexibility and scalability with the Microsoft-based BI solution, and all at a fraction of the cost of investing in other BI solutions.”
Enhanced End-User Experience, Increased Productivity
SQL Server Reporting Services has made a major impact on the productivity of both IT and non-IT staff at London Drugs. Prior to the deployment, employees often spent time searching through various data sources and then analyzing the information. IT often needed to generate customized reports to meet specific requests. Now, employees are able to access the information they need, when they need it and set report parameters to meet their needs. Within the accounting department, the stock received report, which reconciles purchase orders with payables, eliminates the need for employees to manually match up documents, meaning they can focus on more strategic functions. Accounting personnel can quickly look for information they require or filter it in such a way that they are only looking at a specific region or product.
“Users can now access information in a consolidated and logical way that enables them to look at what is most important to them,” says Riddell. “The reality of any organization is that store managers aren’t data miners or analysts. They want operational numbers to run the business like what their sales and payroll are so they can make informed decisions.”
For the IT team, the reporting solution has reduced requests for very specific reports from various business units and has enabled them to be more proactive. “Instead of addressing individual requests, we are able to identify a business need and create a report to provide this information to users,” says Riddell.
“As we create new reports, we don’t have to make a big project of it,” says Riddell. “We can create the reports we need in a matter of hours which is a huge plus for SQL Server Reporting Services. This enables us to eliminate the bureaucracy of starting a new project and dedicating resources to it. Our team can work on other projects and stay focused eliminating the need to drain resources from other areas.”
Improved Customer Service
With the new reporting tool, personnel and management in London Drugs’ 63 stores now have an unprecedented level of insight into what is happening on a day-to-day basis. Also, the convenience and flexibility of having reports delivered to the manager’s inbox or accessed on an as needed basis means that they now have time to focus on activities that will have a positive impact on operations.
“Store managers now have the information they need delivered right to their inbox each day, meaning they make better informed business decisions,” says Riddell. “Instead of spending time searching for data they can quickly assess the situation and make decisions that will ensure the needs of our customers are met. Now, they have more time to spend out on the floor working with customers. At the end of the day, this really helps contribute to our bottom line.”
Looking Ahead
London Drugs is currently planning to extend the existing number of reports from 25 to approximately 60. As SQL Server Reporting Services is based on the Microsoft Windows® operating system platform, the company has a scalable platform for future growth and the ability to easily migrate to the next version of SQL Server.
“The value of SQL Server Reporting Services has been immense,” says Riddell. “It has provided us with the flexibility we need for future growth and by providing users with the power to access and analyze business critical data, we are able to be more competitive as an organization.”
Microsoft Windows Server System
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For more information about London Drugs products and services, call (604) 272-7400 or visit the Web site at: www.londondrugs.com
