Sunglass Menagerie has proudly served the New Jersey beach community for the past 38 years offering a variety of sunglass options for every type of beach bum. Sunglass Menagerie was originated in the late 70s before big brand sunglasses began to take off. Being one of the first sunglass stores in the country, Sunglass Menagerie’s goal is to have a pair of sunglasses for every face that enters the store. Over the past 30 years, Sunglass Menagerie has expanded to open 6 stores along the Jersey shore, and plans to open 5 more stores this upcoming season. With Sunglass Menagerie’s success and recent expansion, they sought a point of sale system that would work seamlessly across all locations. Star Micronics’ mPOP™ with Vend POS for retail was the perfect solution.
Sunglass Menagerie was experiencing huge success over the past few years, and needed a point of sale system to keep up with the high volume of transactions during their busy season. Prior to the install of the mPOP with Vend, Sunglass Menagerie used an analog cash register that they referred to as ‘a cigar box with a calculator’. When they decided to upgrade their technology, customers immediately noticed. Being based in beach town locations, Sunglass Menagerie typically employs high school or college students that are looking to make some extra cash over summer break. Their old cash register was very difficult for employees to set up and operate. “Employees could never be sure if the machine would even start up or work properly for the day,” said Colton Karch, Store Leader of Sunglass Menagerie.
The ‘out of the box’ solution offered by Star and Bend was simple to set up, only taking about 30 minutes. “A temp employee was able to get the first mPOP set up and running within an hour,” recalls Karch. Sunglass Menagerie never experienced a single technology issue with the hardware, and the Vend software offered a user-friendly solution for employees. The Vend POS solution allowed employees to run real-time reports, see their daily sales numbers, and complete seamless customer transactions, all to improve the overall customer experience.
The Vend and Star Micronics mPOS system brought many benefits to Sunglass Menagerie. One of the largest was inventory control. For the first time, Sunglass Menagerie has the ability to gain instant access to inventory reports to ensure that they never run out of popular items. Management can now check-in remotely and know exactly what they have available in each store, resulting in less lost customers.
The mPOP was also able to provide a smoother workflow for employees and management. Employees no longer have to worry about the system shutting down, and management is no longer receiving phone calls on how to change the receipt paper or that the machine ran out of ink.
“It’s comforting to know that we are no longer losing sales due to the system being down. Employees understand and enjoy using the new system. Knowing exactly what we have in stock and being able to see their sales numbers makes the employees more excited to set new goals and sell more sunglasses.”
– Colton Karch, Store Leader, Sunglass Menagerie
Download the full success story:Â Sunglass Menagerie Case Study
