The Elevator Pitch … RICS Software is a POS, inventory management and integrated payments platform specialized for footwear and apparel retailers. With its nearly four decades-long history, RICS serves small, medium, large and enterprise retailers with a platform that offers mobile and traditional point-of-sale; inventory management and reporting; and connectivity between retailers and brands through product catalogs, electronic ordering and inventory availability. RICS helps retailers improve profitability, save time, increase cash-flow and reduce costs. 

The Pandemic Impact … “For many run specialty retailers the pandemic magnified the need to reevaluate their digital strategy to include a higher priority for e-commerce and contactless checkout,” points out Keith Keokuk, business development manager, and in many cases retailers found that they first needed to upgrade their retail technology systems to integrated, connected and mobile systems as a foundational first-step.

What’s Next … The need for connected systems will continue to drive usage for the RICS integrated ecosystem, including product catalogs, electronic ordering and inventory availability, among others,” Keokuk says 

Advice to Retailers … “Always to focus on strategy, process, people and then technology,” Keokuk says. “You’ve got to make sure you’re fitting technology into your strategy and processes. Adding new or more technology to broken processes or strategies rarely works.”

The Future … At a high level, the major themes and trends RICS plans to deliver are more connectivity, greater flexibility, out-of-the-box integrations and less training required to get the most out of its technology.

RICS CASE HISTORY
Palmetto Running Company Made the Switch to RICS

Christian Fyfe, co-Owner, CFO and PLM for Palmetto Running Company, with two stores in the Lowcountry of South Carolina, has run his business with RICS since 2017. He knew of RICS from hearing retailer and vendor praises, but ultimately made the change due to the functionality and support team benefits.

“We switched from QuickBooks POS to RICS for various reasons, including better reporting capabilities, brand/product connections, e-commerce connections, QuickBooks data transfer link and a better POS/back-office interface,” Fyfe says. “The reports I’m able to run in RICS are by far my favorite feature.”

In January RICS introduced RICS>Pay, a credit card processing solution built directly into the RICS POS. Palmetto Running Company and all RICS retailers using RICS>Pay are saving time and costs.

“Since the day we switched, our checkout times are dramatically faster, we’ve had less card read errors and we’re saving on processing fees and getting our deposits faster,” says Fyfe.

“RICS has certainly enabled me to work and buy more efficiently and smarter,” He adds. “Numbers don’t lie.”