Technology - March 2005
-- Home Accents Today, 4/19/2005 1:28:00 PM
Welcome to the Technology section of Home Accents Today! Each month we will bring you news on the ever-changing innovations in technology and/or the Internet in our industry. You can always access this page from our homepage by clicking on the current cover. All the latest headlines also will be listed in the table of contents of each new issue of the magazine.
Home Decor Products launches KnobsandThings.com
Home Decor Products Inc. has launched KnobsandThings.com, an online retail site offering decorative hardware for the home that covers a broad range of price and style. This new Web site represents the parent company's fourth offering in the online home improvement retail space.
"KnobsandThings.com is an excellent demonstration of our ability to leverage existing platforms, skills and vendor relationships to capitalize on niche commerce opportunities," said Michael Golden, president of Home Decor Products. "In addition to our two core offerings, HomeClick.com and AbsoluteHome.com, this new Web site marks our second successful launch of a micro-focused, vertically integrated e-commerce business, which is a model that possesses tremendous potential."
KnobsandThings.com offers all types of decorative hardware, from vintage style to contemporary stainless steel, with prices ranging from budget to luxury. Unlike many competitors, KnobsandThings.com is an authorized dealer for all brands it sells.
"We chose this product category because homeowners are increasingly realizing that decorative hardware products increase the value of their homes with the least amount of investment, whether part of upgrading an existing room or undertaking major renovation," added Golden. "By offering reliable customer service, great selection and the best pricing, we intend to become the largest online retail site for this product category."
Additional features that distinguish KnobsandThings.com are its product-sampling policy that permits customers to test up to three items at home and return the unwanted ones for credit, and its price-matching policy and low-price guarantee. Under that policy, if a customer finds a lower price from any established retailer, KnobsandThings.com will match that price upon confirmation. The "Low Price Guarantee" assures customers that they will receive the lowest price for their purchase up to 30 days after the purchase date.
Meyda Lighting upgrades Web site
Meyda Lighting has upgraded its Web site -- www.meyda.com -- enabling viewers to find nearly any type of decorative lighting by color, description, style and/or model number..
Using its innovative power search tool, viewers are able to select the lamp or fixture of their choice by choosing the item by color, design, description or model number. Products are grouped by novelty lighting and accessories; ceiling fixtures; fireplace screens; landscape lighting, floor lamps, furniture, outdoor lighting, table lamps, wall sconces, stained glass windows, or by themed catalogs.
Online catalogs are Stained Glass Lighting, The Metro Line, Comfort Lighting Collection, Gifts and Home Accents, Art Glass Windows and Fireplace Screens, Old Forge Collection, and The Craftsman Signature Series.
The Web site includes images, dimensions and specifications on all the products.
Meyda Lighting dealers can click-on a secured section that enables them to see sell-through sales and marketing programs, including the 2005 Tiffany Tab Program, the 2005 Tiffany Tree Display Program, the Custom Lighting Tab Program and Discounted Merchandise.
The site also offers care instructions for Meyda Lighting products, recent ads and publicity.
Research And Markets: Retailers must integrate in-store, catalog and Internet shopping experiences
Research and Markets has added "Online Consumer Selling: A Multi-Channel Perspective" to its offering.
Researching product information online, then purchasing offline has become common buying behaviour for many shoppers. As consumers become comfortable mixing in-store, catalog and Internet shopping experiences, retailers must seamlessly integrate those channels -- or risk losing wallet share to more responsive competitors.
The Online Consumer Selling report explores the many ways that the Internet is changing the shopping experience -- on- and offline.
The Internet is empowering consumers, giving them the ability to compare old products, find new products, communicate with other shoppers and even find lower-cost products, all without walking into a single store.
In this fast-paced, compare-by-click shopping world retailers must learn new rules for engaging customers.
To acquire new customers and retain and deepen relationships with existing ones, retailers have to meet consumers wherever, whenever and however they want to shop. This requires a level of organizational and technological integration that recent research indicates many retailers have yet to achieve.
Key questions in this Emarketer "Online Consumer Selling" report addresses:
-- What are "The New Rules for Engaging Customers"?
-- What is the role of the Internet in multi-channel shopping?
-- How do retailers perceive the importance of integrated sales channels?
-- Why do consumers prefer to shop across retail channels?
-- How many consumers cross-channel shop?
-- How are retailers integrating catalogs with Web sites?
ARTS announces new item and price schemas
The Association for Retail Technology Standards has released new IXRetail XML schemas to enable retailers to use common methods and maintain consistent and accurate data for all systems that create, manage or consume item and price data within the retail enterprise.
The new Item Maintenance schema, the 10th standard XML schema developed by ARTS, is intended to communicate Item data from a central repository to stores ensuring synchronization of item data, a significant challenge for all retailers.
"ARTS IXRetail was founded to develop XML schemas to integrate applications within the retail enterprise," said Richard Mader, executive director of ARTS. "When retailers and their software vendors asked ARTS to develop an Item and revised Price schema to complement POSlog, we proceeded carefully to avoid conflict or duplication with other standard groups working in the business to business space."
ARTS and the Uniform Code Council have worked together to ensure the Item schema incorporates the EAN. UCC's basic identification numbers, the GTIN (Global Trade Item Number) and the GLN (Global Location Number). Use of the GTIN and GLN enables the retailer's internal systems to communicate effectively with their trading partners.
"Through our cooperation a retailer can use the ARTS Item schema for internal operations and generate records which can be used for data synchronization," said Al Garton of the UCC. "This is a practical example of how standards groups can work together to enable a single implementation to serve multiple functions."
The Item Maintenance schema can be used to create, update, or delete item information held within store systems such as point of sale, inventory management, layaway management or returns processing.
The Association for Retail Technology Standards is an international membership organization dedicated to reducing the costs of technology through standards. Since 1993, ARTS has been delivering application standards exclusively to the retail industry.
Elegant Linens debuts new Web site designed exclusively for interior designers and innkeepers
Elegant Linens of Park City has introduced a Web site, www.elegant-linens.com , with an extensive selection of luxury bedding. The site was created exclusively for interior designers and Innkeepers and offers merchandise from six major manufactures including the finest of Italian linens, Belgian linens, and domestic textiles. The linens come in a wide array of styles; jacquard, embroidered, floral, quilted, pure Belgian linen, matelasse, with coordinating sheets sets.
The bedding ranges from 310 thread count to 1050 thread count. These manufacturers are Peacock Alley (USA), Signoria (San Casciano, Italy), Dea (Pistoria, Italy), Eastern Accents (USA), and Libeco-Lagae (Belgium).
Elegant Linens offers an industry discount to those designers and innkeepers who register at www.elegant-linens.com. The prices displayed on the Web site are retail prices, which are very competitive. The industry discount is applied at checkout. This pricing offers great value to the designer's client and to the designer.
Elegant-linens.com also offers a Touch and Feel program that allows customers to sample our bedding with no risk. You may purchase a sham or a pillow case as a sample with no shipping costs. You may purchase up to four designs. This merchandise can be returned for a full refund if returned in the original packaging within 30 days. Interior designers can present this luxury bedding to their clients for quality and color scheme. Innkeepers can match the bedding to existing décor.
Green Industry Yellow Pages scores exclusive rights to e-catalog technology
Green Industry Yellow Pages, the green industry's leading online directory, announces that it has purchased exclusive rights to e-catalog technology from a local search software and service provider, the Innovectra Corporation. The patent-pending technology is expected to simplify catalog distribution for green industry vendors.
GIYP's latest service, the e-catalog, replicates current price catalogs onto a CD and Web site. The interactive catalog offers online update capability, enabling vendors to easily add or remove products from the catalog as well as modify prices after the catalog has been distributed.
"The digital catalog offers a more efficient way for vendors to showcase their products to potential buyers" said Steve Cissel, GIYP CEO and founder, explaining that the catalog can be sent in the form of a CD or delivered right to a customer's e-mail address.
For buyers, reviewing new products via the e-catalog will likely be more convenient. "Buyers don't have to physically flip through pages of the book to find products," said Cissel. Instead, they can locate items using the keyword search function and hypertext links, or go through it page by page.
GIYP.com hosts more than 150,000 green goods businesses in the U.S. and Canada and a plant database of more than 38,000 plants and flowers with photos and cultural information provided on Virtual Plant Tags.
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