Abstract
The retail business structure has rapidly changed over the past years. The changes are particularly evident in developing economies where traditional retail store formats are replaced by chain stores, franchises, hypermarkets, warehouse stores, and category merchandisers. Modem retail stores and wholesale outlets are logistic enterprises that constantly receive, shelve, and sell merchandise according to closely monitored consumer demand. The task is data dependent and only enterprises that can manage large amounts of information in a distributed multi-store environment are likely succeed in this increasingly competitive environment. In this research, retail products are classified into category hierarchies using A.C. Nelsen category management concept. EXPRESS is used to developed data models for products, categories, and a chain of stores while allowing for ISO integrated product data management. By applying EXPRESS to the task of managing product and market information, retail data is integrated and immediately accessible to other members of the distribution channel. Point of Sales (POS) systems at the store level provide the streams of data for chain-wide sales analysis and merchandise planning. This data is linked to a central database for dynamic retail data management using the EXPRESS models. The data models provide a means for automated shelf layout, continuous sales analysis, and real-time logistics at the store level and at the chain management level. The distributed multi-store data are structured and stored in an object oriented database. Data are classified into two types. Dynamic data include stream-type data from POS and product shipments. Static data include physical dimensions of stores, shelf layouts, and vendor references. The ObjectStore object oriented database links to remote stores via the World Wide Web. Thus, the Common Gateway Interface(CGI) is the tool used to store and medium used to link the retail headquarters with the distributed retail chain. The central object-oriented database formulated based on the proposed data model, provides a means to manage large amounts of rapidly changing information. Stores that implement retail information systems of this nature can easily expand to suitable and profitable economies of scale without loss of information and control.