Over forty retailers have already engaged with SkillNet for a variety needs, be it implementing, enhancing or maintaining their retail systems. Every retailer has unique needs, and not every retailer can fit into a category. Specialty retail, for example, is called that for a reason. The merchandise, processes and information do not fit any pre-defined category, and by extension, best-of-breed systems usually fall short of meeting their needs.

SkillNet has worked with several kinds of retailers, such as pet-food, home-goods, and furniture retailers. Whether it was to enable customers to buy merchandise otherwise marked for rental, or extending features of the labor management system to include laws of different states, or integrate financials across stores, SkillNet has always aimed to make a confluent goal of business and technology.

Especially for retailers that do not fit into categories and therefore cannot benefit from established best practices, SkillNet proposes using StoreHub™, our flagship SOA-based integration framework. StoreHub™ follows a three-step approach to extend functionality provided by best-of-breed systems and enable customer-centricity: First, SkillNet's veteran retail consultants evaluate a retailer's business and system requirements; second, SkillNet determines the set of processes that need to be customized and automated, using pre-fabricated templates as a guideline; and third, identify application vendor partners, extend functionality and use pre-built connectors to integrate the disparate applications and point solutions. Once StoreHub™ connects all applications and processes together, data can flow freely, delivering critical information to stores. The best practices and pre-fabricated software components further shorten roll-out cycles and reduce costs.

For more on StoreHub, visit www.SkillNetinc.com/StoreHub