Seasonal Retail Puts Temporary Checkout Systems to Work

Like clockwork, the season of temporary retail, in the form of pop-up stores, is here.

Spirit Halloween is opening more than 1,550 seasonal stores across North America this year.  Other retailers are doing the same thing on a smaller scale. Hallmark plans a limited-time holiday pop-up at Disney Springs. Kinokuniya opened a downtown San Francisco pop-up Sept. 18 that will operate through late December, while Uncommon Goods is opening holiday shops at Macy’s and the Grand Central Holiday Fair.

There’s a commonality here, as each location needs payment terminals configured, merchandise entered into inventory systems, employee permissions activated and transaction records preserved, even though most of those locations will disappear.

Opening the doors is only part of the job. A temporary location has to become visible to the retailer’s existing commerce systems quickly enough to justify a selling season measured in weeks or months.

Prices and promotions have to reach the POS. Inventory sent to the store has to remain visible elsewhere. Payment acceptance has to match what customers use at permanent locations. A purchase may need to appear in an existing customer account or loyalty program. Returns can arrive after the temporary store has closed.

Inventory Has to Know the Pop-Up Exists

Inventory provides one of the clearest examples of the infrastructure required to add a temporary store.

A retailer can send merchandise to a pop-up in a matter of days. If moving those products into the new location removes them from the retailer’s digital view of inventory, however, the store has created a hole in an operation customers expect to work across channels.

PYMNTS Intelligence reported that 73% of retail shoppers want digitally updated inventory visibility. Seasonal locations inherit those expectations without getting the long technology deployment of a permanent store.

PYMNTS Intelligence’s June Global Digital Shopping Index found 60% of consumers want mobile product locators for in-store shopping. Merchants are responding: 26% plan to add or improve online inventory verification over the next three years, while 25% plan improvements to buy-online-pick-up-in-store through kiosks and another 25% through service desks.

Those capabilities require a new store to connect with more than a POS system.

If a shopper checks whether an item is available before making a trip, the retailer needs an accurate count at the temporary location. If the item sells, the inventory record has to change. If merchandise remaining after the store closes moves to another location or fulfillment center, the retailer has to retain visibility as the goods move again.

A seasonal store therefore tests whether inventory infrastructure can accommodate a new node quickly rather than whether a retailer can install another cash register.

Checkout Has to Arrive Ready to Work

Payments face a similar, and compressed, timeline. Terminals need merchant and location configurations. Devices have to connect securely to processors and retailer systems. Contactless cards and digital wallets have to be accepted if the retailer supports them elsewhere.  PYMNTS coverage of storefront technology investment found retailers connecting stores with real-time inventory, loyalty programs, mobile payments and fulfillment operations.

Returns make that requirement concrete.

A gift purchased from a December pop-up may be returned in January. By then, the storefront could be empty and its employees gone. The retailer still needs the original transaction, product, payment method and refund rules if the customer brings the merchandise to a permanent store or handles the return through another channel.

Centralized transaction records allow the purchase to outlive the location where it occurred. Centralized inventory can do the same for unsold merchandise, while centrally managed permissions allow access for seasonal employees to be withdrawn without changing the systems used by the rest of the business.