Extra tags: Artificial Intelligence
As a market leader in retail technology, TD Tawandang ("TD") is teaming up with Google Cloud to assist traditional mom-and-pop stores in modernising their operations, facing down competitive threats, and increasing profits.
Historically, shohuays, or mom-and-pop stores in Thailand, have provided residents with low-cost access to food and other necessities. Convenience store chains that are rapidly developing and can take advantage of economies of scale to provide lower prices have mostly eclipsed them. 61% of local micro, small, and medium-sized firms (MSMEs) have seen a loss in income due to the pandemic, including these micro-retailers.
TD provides a profit-sharing partnership model, revamps the aesthetic of mom-and-pop shops, and gives them access to its unified TD Retail Platform in an effort to protect their businesses, increase their competitiveness, and keep them afloat. The platform is based entirely on Google Cloud, which provides the platform's secure and scalable infrastructure as well as cutting-edge analytics, AI, and ML tools. After being updated, each shop keeps its previous name while still bearing the "Tookdee" branding.
TD manages stock replenishment and financial accounting through the platform's POS software, which is integrated with a comprehensive retail distribution network. As a result of the smart POS, store owners no longer have to close their businesses to visit wholesalers and manually record sales transactions. Instead, they can devote their time to tasks such as receiving goods, printing out price tags and promotional messages from the POS, restocking shelves, and cultivating relationships with customers.
Stores run by mothers and fathers who know their customers by name and have been there for years are the lifeblood of every town and province, but many of them have been struggling financially as of late. Others who lost their jobs during the pandemic are moving back to their hometowns and opening modest stores to make ends meet. TD was founded to help store owners like Tientham Setthasit succeed when the economy improves, he said.
More than 4,000 micro-retailers have been using our integrated platform, which was built with the help of Google Cloud's cutting-edge technology, to increase their daily earnings by an average of 85% without giving up control of their businesses or profits. Setthasit continued, "We will continue partnering with Google Cloud to expand reliably, enhance the platform, and bring more value-added services as more than a hundred micro-retailers per week join the Tookdee network."
Saving Resources, Anticipating Supply Shortages and Recouping Lost Profits
Small businesses have a hard time keeping up with demand and keeping their inventory stocked. When perishable goods spoil before they can be sold or when in-demand products are not restocked quickly enough, businesses see their profit margins diminish.
TD and store owners can keep tabs on sales and get a clear picture of their finances and stock levels thanks to Google Cloud's Dataplex, which acts as a bridge between point-of-sale (POS) software and a centralised, cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. To assist its retail distribution teams in anticipating demand and scheduling deliveries for just-in-time stock replenishments, TD used Google Cloud's predictive modelling, Vertex AI, business intelligence, and data visualisation technologies. TD equips shop owners with mobile devices that alert them via push notifications when restocking is complete.
In addition, many mom-and-pop shops are situated in remote places with spotty access to the web. With Google Cloud's expertise in areas like as lightweight application development, serverless computing, and low-latency data storage and retrieval, TD can provide its retail customers with a consistent and dependable experience across all of its cloud-based software. These include services like communications on mobile devices and point-of-sale software used at checkout counters. With these features, programmes can function without an internet connection, causing fewer problems for the store's daily operations, and any newly created data is synced across computers as soon as the connection is restored.
Though our programmes for small shops are intuitive to use on the surface, they actually run on a complex infrastructure. According to TD Tawandang's Chief Technology Officer, Ruud Akarapanitsakul, "all of these generate terabytes of data every day, which must be correctly managed and processed for the TD Retail Platform to benefit store owners as intended." "With Google Kubernetes Engine and Anthos Service Mesh, our team can quickly and safely get enormous datasets for analysis, and our engineers can roll out updates to existing features on a consistent basis without disrupting service. We can handle 30,000 stores and many more devices with this scalable architecture because everything is designed to work together.
Micro-Sellers and Shoppers Can Expect Future Improvements
TD has increased its rate of innovation now that its solid architecture is established. New self-service kiosks further transform mom-and-pop stores into "virtual hypermarts" by allowing customers to browse TD's broader catalogue of fast-moving consumer products, pre-order things that are not part of the in-store inventory, and pay in advance and then pick them up at the store. TD will be releasing a LINE mini app to inform users when their orders have arrived. The Tookdee membership account, the earn-and-burn rewards scheme, and the personalised product recommendations and incentives all enable micro-retailers to interact with and keep their customers.
"By incorporating mini-app data into our platform, we are able to derive granular insights into consumer purchasing behaviour in each province to provide initial assortment recommendations and boost sales more rapidly when a store joins our network, to identify new items that each store should carry on a regular basis, to promote local brands' signature snacks, to incentivize suppliers to run discounts due to economies of scale, and to inform decisions to establish new distribution cents."
TD is investigating data collecting from sensors that monitor the temperature and humidity outside each store or monitor foot traffic to different sections of the retail space as part of the next phase of its partnership with Google Cloud. Product displays and store layouts can be improved to grab customers' attention and expose them to more items, and the TD Retail Platform might use these to adapt to weather patterns and consumers' seasonal needs.
According to April Srivikorn, Google Cloud's country manager in Thailand, "TD is not just enabling mom-and-pop stores to safeguard and build their livelihoods; it is also opening additional business options for independent, domestic packaged food brands and job chances in grassroots communities." "With Thailand defining this year's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation agenda and leading debates on MSME recovery around the region, TD can be a fantastic illustration of how cloud, analytics, and AI technology can be utilised to benefit groups with unrealized economic potential. We are excited to help bring TD's retail operations and innovations to new regions in Southeast Asia and to be a part of the company's commitment to inclusive growth in Thailand.
