RFID in fashion retail: the essentials

Summary

Responding to today’s fashion retail pressures

Fashion retailers need to serve customers across physical and digital channels while managing leaner store teams and increasingly considered consumer spending. The opportunity is to focus colleagues on the work that creates the most value for shoppers.

RFID supports more efficient store operations and helps ensure that the right product, size and colour are available when a customer is ready to buy.

Inventory accuracy is the business-case foundation

Traditional stock audits provide a snapshot, but stock changes constantly through deliveries, sales, returns, transfers and loss. That means accuracy can deteriorate soon after an audit.

Regular RFID counts restore reliable item-level inventory data. This in turn improves product availability, supports sales and creates a dependable basis for further operational and digital services.

RFID enriches the existing technology stack

RFID is not there to replace systems such as ERP, order management or warehouse management. It provides those systems with more accurate, reliable data so they can work as intended and deliver more value.

Connected data across the technology stack reduces silos and allows retailers to use the systems they have already invested in more effectively.

Make omnichannel promises with confidence

Retailers can offer omnichannel services without RFID, but faster services such as ship-from-store, same-day collection and short availability windows require confidence in what is actually in each store.

Accurate visibility makes it possible to reduce safety-stock thresholds, broaden the online assortment, find products quickly and avoid unnecessary split shipments. It can also help returns move back into the selling estate sooner.