To meet the ever-growing demand for ecommerce solutions, STORIS is introducing Buying Group Interface, along with a new API website integration solution and a host of timely features to its own eSTORIS ecommerce platform.
Ecommerce growth exploded over the last 18 months. A recent report from Newsweek noted that ecommerce sales grew 32.4% from 2019 to 2020, with total sales reaching $791.7 billion online. As such, STORIS’ ecommerce team has been hard at work supporting its retailers selling furniture, bedding, and appliances in scaling their ecommerce operations.
“Regardless of the strategy our retailers have for their website, we want all of our partners to be able to maximize their growth potential,” said Pete Dressler, ecommerce product manager for STORIS.
In support of this, STORIS is introducing a Buying Group Interface. The solution's first integrations are with BrandSource’s AVB Marketing Platform and Nationwide Marketing Groups’s website partners, Site on Time and Retailer Web Services. The Buying Group Interface is a plug-and-play solution for these website platforms. Web services are a valuable part of Buying Group memberships. This integration enables mutual partners to take advantage of these web services while utilizing STORIS’ industry-leading retail technology.
The Buying Group Interface packages fundamental APIs needed to connect STORIS’ retail software to these website solutions and share key data that enhances the customers’ shopping experience. The APIs have been pre-configured for these web partners, making it easy for retailers to build seamless multi-channel experiences. By providing the fundamental connection points, STORIS aims to make website integration accessible to partners of all sizes.
With the Buying Group Interface, retailers can seamlessly manage inventory across channels in real-time to accurately reflect updates to product details, price and availability. Retailers can also push association pricing into their STORIS inventory management solution. Further in-store Quotes created by retail sales associates can be sent to the retailer’s website for completion at home, while final Sales Orders will submit back to STORIS for order management.
“The Buying Group Interface streamlines processes for our mutual partners and provides a single source of key data for our retailer websites and showrooms,” explained Steve Mahler, pirector of POS initiatives for Nationwide Marketing Group. “Nationwide will support our members in configuring this interface. To support this integration, it is critical that our members stay ahead of the ever-increasing consumer demand for real-time and up-to-date inventory availability. With this information transparency, customers can confidently purchase online or visit a location to purchase.”
“We have seen a huge spike in ecommerce business that accelerated even faster during the early months of the pandemic and has brought many new customers to our dealers,” explained Chad Evans, VP of Merchandising for AVB, Inc. “In this new world we live in, our members are gaining new business by treating their websites as their flagship stores. It is very important for dealers to have their systems fully integrated so consumers can see, via our members’ websites, which items are in-stock and are ready to ship or pick up. Through our partnership with STORIS we have created a strong solution that accomplishes this and so much more.”
In May of this year, STORIS announced its full website integration solution with over 50 API touchpoints, eBridge Commerce. Retailers that launch with the Buying Group Interface can easily upgrade to eBridge Commerce as their ecommerce needs scale.
For more information, visit info.storis.com/ecommerce-demo-request
About STORIS: Founded in 1989, STORIS continues to be the leading provider of Retail Software Solutions and Services to the home furnishings industry. Over 450 clients utilize STORIS’ Unified Commerce Solution, which includes point of sale, eCommerce, mobile POS, CXM, inventory management, merchandising, business intelligence, kiosk, supply chain management, accounting and more.
