2010-06-10Intelligent Software: A Vision for Retail-1
Throughout the past year, Peter Mitelman, President of GSI, has consistently laid out a vision for GSI’s software offerings to incorporate greater intelligence. Noting that the first SMART modules were introduced almost 15 years ago, Mitelman said, “ I want my software to be SMARTER! I want it to think for you …like you! I want it to make your decisions and your lives easier. In so doing, I want to give you the competitive edge …that little extra!”
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2010-06-08Running Room Converts to Retail-1 SaaS
“The GSI SaaS model is fantastic! It has integrity and totally makes sense. Let’s face it, no small or middle tier retailer has a true IT environment. GSI’s SaaS model is the best strategy for a retailer. All necessary infrastructure is in place. You are assured of uptime as well as the most current, newest, and hottest retail software. It’s a win-win strategy.”
Michael O’Dell, Vice President, Running Room Canada Inc.
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2010-06-01Stuart Weitzman Powers Expansion with Retail-1 SaaS
“When choosing a retail software solution, listen to your gut. From the beginning, we had a good feeling about the company. To us this was almost more important than the software itself. My advice to other retailers is to make sure you know what you want and need before looking and try to fulfill as many of the needs, even if they are not quite 100%, in lieu of holding out for the ultimate solution that offers it all. It doesn’t exist.”
Franco Niro, President, Stuart Weitzman Canada
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2010-05-18Partners for Life
“Our two companies have formed an incredibly strong bond over the years; the quality of systems and support offered by GSI has allowed us to focus on the business in lieu of our systems that support it. Our senior management team is always asking “where are the opportunities for improvement”, and that’s exactly what I am looking for.”
Ted Greenberg, President, ESCO Ltd.
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2009-12-20Strategic Alliance Offers U.S. Retailers A Full-Featured SaaS Solution
A strategic alliance has been formed to end the IT headaches for mid-to-larger U.S. retailers by offering a robust enterprise retail management solution in the increasingly popular “software as a service (SaaS)” business model. Gemmar Systems International (GSI) announces availability of Retail-1 SaaS and a strategic alliance with J.D. Associates to market its “software as a service” solution in the U.S.
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2009-12-19Praise for GSI and Retail-1
Jim Dion, noted retail consultant, has high praise for GSI’s Retail-1 as “one of the best integrated software systems” in the marketplace. In his overview of the NRF Convention and Show in New York January 10 -14, Jim strongly recommends attendees to visit the J.D. Associates booth (1374) where GSI is a featured partner to learn more about Retail-1.
View Jim’s comments by clicking here:
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2009-11-15Season's Greetings
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2009-10-29Retail-1 Powers Danish Retailer's Expansion Plans
Danish retailer Bestseller with its top fashion forward banners is expanding its global footprint with an aggressive new store program in North America. Bestseller Canada chose GSI’s Retail-1 Suite to power the retail technology supporting this program beginning with the Jack & Jones banner. “Retail-1 gives us the tight controls at both the head office and store level so we can pursue our expansion program with confidence” said Benoit Bouchard, Retail Operations Director of Bestseller Canada. (Complete article)
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2009-10-09Mission Snowsports Goes Thin Client with Retail-1
Point-of-Sale now runs from a head office server at Mission Snowsports Ltd. to reduce overall system support costs and increase control. This specialty retailer chose a thin client real-time network architecture concentrating all applications and data at the head office server level. “Our decision was taken with two factors in mind. First was the level of confidence in our network security and availability. Our service level agreement calls for a commitment of availability in excess of 99%. Second, was to focus our techno-savvy associates on using technology to support of store sales. Our thin client implementation eliminates the possibility of installing personal applications or engaging in personal internet surfing”, said Matt Singer. (Complete article)
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2009-06-15Webinar: Targeted Business Intelligence with Retail-1® Red Line
Strong Business Intelligence is a must to compete in today's retail environment; Red Line is the first of many true Business Intelligence applications to be offered within the Retail-1® suite. "Red Line is going to change the way we look at our business...What would take buyers hours to analyze is now done in seconds,” according to Jason Coorsch, Logistics Director, StylExchange. Join our webinar on Tuesday, June 23 as we unveil the power of Red Line and the impact on your retail operation. (Complete article)
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2009-02-04Positive Results in Challenging Times
GSI customers have been enjoying positive results in challenging economic times. Examples include improved inventory turns, reduction of inventories by 30% to 40% while maintaining sales, even cases of increasing comp store sales with less inventory. “Positive results don’t happen by accident, they happen because of planning and effective execution of those plans” according to Jacques Azoulay, Senior Retail Consultant to GSI.
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2008-11-05Webinar Highlights Keys to Weather Retail Downturn
GSI Customers are invited to attend a Retail -1® Capsule Webinar hosted by Jacques Azoulay on Tuesday, November 11, from 1:30 pm to 2:00 pm EST. The purpose? To highlight 5 key areas where our applications can significantly impact your bottom line: 1. Inventory Performance, 2. Markdowns, 3. GMROI, 4. Traffic, and 5. UPT's. Methods to optimize profitability have been successfully applied with many of our customers. All have achieved positive results. Join Jacques in this enlightening webinar and learn more about the benefits derived by our customers on Retail-1 Version 11. To register, mailto:sales@gsi.ca and provide your name, telephone number and any additional attendees e-mail. (Complete article)
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2008-07-222008 User Conference - "Thriving in Today's Retail World"
“Thriving in Today’s Retail World” was the theme for the 2008 GSI User Conference this past June in Montreal. Today’s economic environment presents serious challenges for all forms of retailing. “This year’s conference focused on the hard questions that retailers must answer in order to go beyond simply ensuring survival of their business.”, said Peter Mitelman, GSI President. During the conference, employees presented an engraved silver platter to Peter Mitelman to commemorate the Silver Anniversary of the firm.
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2008-07-2110 Strategies to Recession Proof Your Business
GSI was honored to have the keynote address for GSI's User Conference 2008 delivered by Jim Dion, a widely known retail consultant and frequent speaker at NRF. Jim examined current trends in both Canada and the U.S. and recommended 10 ways specialty retailers can recession-proof their business and challenged attendees to begin by acting on at least three suggestions. Read more and download a copy of Jim's presentation here.
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2008-07-21Celebrating Our Silver Anniversary
This year GSI celebrates its Silver Anniversary. Beginning in 1983, the firm has evolved from its original software offering for retail inventory management to a full suite of software and services for all aspects of retail management. “Our 25th anniversary is a major milestone for our firm and for the industry. We have uncovered the magic formula for survival and prosperity…the product must work and the customer must be happy”, said Peter Mitelman, GSI President.
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2008-07-21Introducing « Simon »
How much more money would you make with a retail consultant pointing out opportunities and trends on a weekly basis. GSI’s “Simon” unlocks the richness of Retail-1’s data and transforms it into actionable information. Business rules and performance targets, the software scans your retail data to identify merchandise, stores, and suppliers deserving your attention and summarizing its results in a easy-to-follow format.
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2008-07-21Retail-1 Red Line - Optimizes Sales and Preserves Profitability
The issue for any markdown decision becomes how much, when, and at what cost to the bottom line. Retail-1Red Line provides the business intelligence to identify opportunities to stimulate sales and achieve optimized performance. Retail-1 Red Line helps our retailers identify and prioritize markdowns with GMROI simulations and help them quantify "best case WHAT-IF scenarios" by taking advantage of their existing sell-through information and peak sales cycle.
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2008-07-21Retail-1 Store Watch
Retail-1 Store Watch provides a consolidated graphical interface including sales, units per transaction, staff to sales productivity, and performance to plan. Installed at POS with immediate access in time to take corrective action. When coupled with Retail-1 Traffic, views expand to store traffic hour-by-hour and conversion rates. At Head Office, users have an aggregate view across any grouping of stores in the chain. Color coded to quickly identify key conditions. Best of all....you can access Store Watch through your Blackberry!
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2008-07-21Labor Scheduling and Traffic: Software that makes money!
“The key to controlling cost and increasing profitability is more effective labor utilization. It’s simple but effective. We match labor utilization to sales curves,” according to Jacques Azoulay, GSI’s senior retail consultant. GSI’s Retail-1 Traffic provides a real-time view of store traffic. GSI’s new Retail-1 Scheduler provides the graphic interface to easily schedule your labor resources. (Complete article)
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2008-07-21Major Upgrade to Family Forum
“The first thing you will notice about Family Forum is a new look. However, the real changes provide significantly improved capabilities for our customers,” as Tina Faruolo, Director of Operations, unveiled the new Family Forum at the 2008 User Conference.
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2008-07-20“The Reporter” - Flexible Custom Reporting
“The Reporter” is GSI’s newest reporting toolset for Retail-1reporting…It’s a marriage made in technology heaven! Retail-1’s information rich database combined with flexibility of MS Excel for analysis and reporting. Our customers have gained increasing skills in the use of Excel reporting and often used exports from Retail-1 to populate their custom designed Excel reports.
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2008-06-20Your Worst Nightmare! A GSI User Tells His Story!
Your worst nightmare can happen and it did to Nero Bianco. An overnight fire left them with nothing…. except a 5 day old backup that was taken, thankfully, offsite. Their experience demonstrated the value of a long-term customer relationship with GSI. In 24 hours, a new server was installed with the backup and all the stores polled to provide an up-to-date picture of the business. Click on the “full story” and see a compelling testimonial from this GSI customer. (Complete article)
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2008-02-09Thriving in Today's Retail World – 2008 User Conference
“Thriving in Today’s Retail World” is the theme for the 2008 GSI User Conference. Mark your calendar for June 18, 19, and 20 to attend this key event in Montreal. Today’s economic environment is presenting serious challenges for all forms of retailing. “This year’s conference will focus on the hard questions that retailers must answer in order to go beyond simply ensuring survival of their business. We will use the information and business intelligence built into Retail-1 as the key element in showing our customers how to thrive in today’s retail world”, said Peter Mitelman, GSI President.
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2008-02-09NO MORE I.T. ISSUES!
Due to the complexity in today’s IT world, GSI felt it necessary for the first time to assume the responsibility to insure that its customers had optimal infrastructure and support for their IT environment. In announcing a new business unit named ASCII, GSI President Peter Mitelman noted, “it has become apparent over the past few years that IT is the critical component for the well being of any software environment. It is our decision to take that responsibility to insure that our product works to its optimum capabilities for our customers”.
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2008-01-30Tina Faruolo Appointed Director of Operations
GSI proudly announces the appointment of Tina Faruolo as Director of Operations. In her new role at GSI, Ms. Faruolo will be responsible for all operations including project management and customer support. “I am thrilled and consider it a feather in our cap to be able to have Tina come back to us after a nine year absence. She was obviously able to see the strength and position of our company in the market place and felt she could contribute significantly to our success. She is welcomed back by all of us with open arms”, said Peter Mitelman, GSI President. Welcome back Tina!!!!
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2007-12-16Your Worst Nightmare!
It’s never going to happen to me !!! ….well it can and it happened to Nero Bianco. An overnight fire left them with nothing….except for a 5 day old backup that was taken, thankfully, offsite. Disaster recovery must be a key component of all of our plans to safeguard our businesses, GSI included. In the event of a major disaster within our building, GSI can be fully functional within hours. “We have made this investment to protect not only ourselves but our customers as well”, said Peter Mitelman, President of GSI.
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2007-11-01La Vie en Rose First Retailer with EMV Solution for Canada
La Vie en Rose, a Montreal-based apparel chain, became the first retailer to fully implement an EMV compliant integrated credit card solution in Canada. EMV uses smart card technology embedded in credit cards and customer pin numbers at point-of-sale to reduce credit-card fraud. La Vie en Rose becomes the first retail chain in North America to achieve full compliance with the EMV standards.
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2007-09-05GSI Introduces Retail-1 DataMiner™
GSI unveiled two new products at the 2007 GSI User Conference. Retail-1 Merchant DataMiner™ and Retail-1CRM DataMiner™ are both planned for release in late 2007. These products represent the GSI’s commitment to exploit the robust data available in GSI’s Retail-1 data mart with application solutions that are immediately usable by retailers, according to Ian Holland, GSI’s Vice President of Development. The DataMiner™ applications are designed to work with a data mart generated from Versions 10 and 11 of Retail-1 Suite.
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2007-09-05Smooth V 11 Roll-out for Christmas Retailer
Bronner's Christmas Wonderland, touted as the World's Largest Christmas Store, smoothly converted to GSI's Version 11 Retail-1 system this past summer in anticipation of its high volume Fall season. "The conversion from Version 9.2 to Version 11 was incredibly smooth", according to Linda McInerney, CFO of Bronner's.
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2007-08-30Menswear Chain Fuels Growth and Profits with Retail-1
Ernest, a 40 year old menswear chain, fuels growth and profitability with GSI’s Retail-1 suite. “GSI provides much better management reporting, faster answers to identifying problems, better reaction for our buyers, and most importantly improved inventory turns, GMROI, and better profits at the end of the season”, said Benoit Bouchard, Vice President of Operations for Ernest.
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2007-07-19Tommy Hilfiger Turns to GSI for Money Card Solution
Tommy Hilfiger Canada turned to GSI for an effective gift card program after less than a year using a specialized third-party company. Implementing GSI’s GemX Money Card offering had immediate benefits for this trend-setting retailer. “Its ease of use, and its full integration with the Retail-1 suite, made the Gem-X card a true "gift" for our staff, and allowed us to offer much better service to our clientele”, according to Luc Trépanier, Vice-President, Information Systems for Tommy Hilfiger Canada Inc.
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2007-07-10Liz Claiborne Canada Benefits from GSI Money Card
Liz Claiborne Canada reaps benefits from GSI's GemX Money Card. Following a record-breaking six-week implementation project across four banners, “we noticed a significant increase in sales of Money Cards versus the traditional paper Gift Certificates”, according to Tony DeLuca, Director of Information Systems and Technology at Liz Claiborne Canada. Liz Claiborne Canada operates over 100 stores in Canada under the Liz Claiborne, Mexx, Sigrid Olsen and Yzza banners.
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2007-06-10Recognition from Province of Ontario
Running Room Canada, Inc. was recently recognized by the Province of Ontario for is gift card program. The Hon. Gerry Phillips, Minister of Government Services, recognized the Running Room as an outstanding example of a company providing a Gift Card program that best exemplified the new legislation related to Gift Cards in the Province of Ontario. The Running Room program uses GSI’s GemX Money Card software.
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2006-02-03Auld Phillips Celebrates 10 Years on Retail-1
Auld Phillips Ltd. operates over 50 ladies apparel stores under four banners in Western Canada. This year, GSI celebrates the 10th anniversary of Auld Phillips as a Retail-1 customer. "We choose them because of the 'system' and their people," according to Jim Gilbert, President. Since then, " there has been absolutely no advantage to make any changes from GSI."
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