System and method for retail store shelf stock monitoring, predicting, and reporting
First Claim
1. A system being operable of:
- (a) monitoring retail store front shelf stock capacity in real time, presenting shelf stock status by a plurality of symbols to visually enhance awareness of out-of-stock and low stock products at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(b) monitoring perishable product freshness on retail store front shelves in real time, presenting product freshness by a plurality of symbols to enhance awareness of out-of-date or near out-of-date product items at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(c) predicting future shelf stock capacity in real time, presenting future shelf stock status by a plurality of symbols to visually enhance awareness of out-of-stock and low stock shelf status at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(d) reporting retail store front shelf stock status based on analysis of historical shelf stock data recorded by the said system, visually presenting stock capacity and duration, out-of-stock alter levels, empty index, and other shelf performance indexes for given products at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels for given time periods; and
(e) issuing warning alerts for out-of-stock or near out-of-stock, and out-of-date or near out-of-date products to notify store managers or other relevant personnel for taking appropriate actions.
0 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A system for retail store shelf stock status monitoring, predicting, and reporting that is capable of monitoring retail store current shelf stock capacity and shelf product freshness at product level, category level, department level, store level, and other product hierarchy levels. It is also capable of intelligently predicting future shelf stock status according to predicted future store sales activities. It uses shelf stock empty index, out-of-stock alert, shelf stock freshness, shelf stock expiration alert, and other shelf stock performance measures to present current shelf status, future shelf status, and past shelf stock performances through interactive store maps and other visual presentation means to optimally deliver retail store shelf stock performance information in real time. The system empowers store clerks, store managers, chain store management, and corporation analysts to monitor, review, and analyze store shelf stock status in real time from anywhere at any time.
182 Citations
28 Claims
-
1. A system being operable of:
- (a) monitoring retail store front shelf stock capacity in real time, presenting shelf stock status by a plurality of symbols to visually enhance awareness of out-of-stock and low stock products at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(b) monitoring perishable product freshness on retail store front shelves in real time, presenting product freshness by a plurality of symbols to enhance awareness of out-of-date or near out-of-date product items at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(c) predicting future shelf stock capacity in real time, presenting future shelf stock status by a plurality of symbols to visually enhance awareness of out-of-stock and low stock shelf status at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
(d) reporting retail store front shelf stock status based on analysis of historical shelf stock data recorded by the said system, visually presenting stock capacity and duration, out-of-stock alter levels, empty index, and other shelf performance indexes for given products at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels for given time periods; and
(e) issuing warning alerts for out-of-stock or near out-of-stock, and out-of-date or near out-of-date products to notify store managers or other relevant personnel for taking appropriate actions. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 25)
- (a) monitoring retail store front shelf stock capacity in real time, presenting shelf stock status by a plurality of symbols to visually enhance awareness of out-of-stock and low stock products at product, category, department, and higher product hierarchy levels;
- 7. A store map being capable of visually presenting product locations and their shelf stock status by shapes, symbols, texts, and flashing color signs, and being interactive to provide users with additional information or navigate users to related pages.
- 10. A method for constructing product (represented by its universal package code, UPC) sales baselines and special day incremental sales impact factors from store historical sales data.
-
16. A method for estimating product (represented by its universal package code, UPC) future sales, comprising steps of:
- (a) calculating future base sales volume for a given future time in a future day according to the product sales baseline pattern which is prebuilt from store historical sales data; and
(b) calculating incremental sales volume if the future time is in a special day (e.g., major promotions, local events, extreme weather conditions, and major holidays) by applying an appropriate special day incremental sales impact factor to the estimated future base sales volume; and
(c) adding the estimated future base sales volume and the special day incremental sales volume to get the total sales volume for the given future time.
- (a) calculating future base sales volume for a given future time in a future day according to the product sales baseline pattern which is prebuilt from store historical sales data; and
- 17. A method for deriving product shelf stock empty index for measuring shelf stock status during a certain period of time, wherein the said empty index for a product (represented by its universal package code, UPC) is derived from its shelf stock alert levels and duration in the time period under consideration, while the said index for a higher product level (e.g., at store level) is derived from the shelf stock alert levels and the duration at each alert level of a lower level product (e.g., at UPC level).
- 21. A method for deriving product freshness score for measuring perishable product shelf stock freshness and assigning expiration alert level for issuing alerts for out-of-date or near out-of-date products, wherein the said expiration alert level for a product (UPC) is derived from the freshness score of individual product items of the UPC while the said expiration alert level for a higher level product (e.g., at store level) is derived from the shelf stock expiration alert levels of a lower level product (e.g., at UPC level).
- 26. The system according to claim 26, further being operable of simulating store sales data at higher product hierarchy levels including but not limited to category level, department level, and store level.
-
28. A method for simulating store product (represented by its universal package code, UPC) item sales, consisting of the following steps:
- (a) retrieving a sales baseline pattern for a given product (UPC) from database;
(b) retrieving special day incremental sales impact factor for the given product from database;
(c) calculating estimated base (unadjusted sales) sales volume in a given time period (time interval) at given time;
(d) calculating incremental sales volume by multiplying the estimated base sales volume with the special day increment sales impact factor;
(e) combining the estimated base sales volume and the incremental sales volume to get the adjusted total sales volume for the given time period;
(f) using a random number function to generate a series of random numbers;
(g) using the random numbers to generate a series of random sales volumes based on predefined criteria;
(h) adjusting the random sales volumes to make the total volume of the random sales volumes equals to the estimated total sales volume during the given time period;
(i) repeating the steps a to h for each product (UPC) to generate a complete dataset for all products;
(j) saving the simulated sales dataset to database; and
(k) repeating the steps of a to j for another given time to generate another new dataset.
- (a) retrieving a sales baseline pattern for a given product (UPC) from database;
Specification