Vend helped the Brisbane Lions with a point of sale and retail management system that’s robust, reliable, and scalable.
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Omnichannel
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AU
Australia
The Brisbane Lions are a professional Australian Rules Football Club that joined the national competition in 1997 based out of Queensland, Australia. With both men and womens teams, the club plays a total of 32 rounds of home & away games each year.
In the retail space, the Brisbane Lions sell a variety of products to their fans. The team has a retail store in QLD and also holds pop-ups and sales events during game days. They have an online store running on BigCommerce which integrates with Vend.
lions.com.au/At a Glance
Vend helped the Brisbane Lions with a point of sale and retail management system that’s robust, reliable, and scalable.
With Vend, The Brisbane Lions can now:
The Challenge
After having issues with their previous system, the Brisbane Lions wanted to explore other options.
The Brisbane Lions came to Vend in 2020, after using another point of sale system, but decided to switch due to reliability issues, lack of adequate reporting and the inability to seamlessly integrate with the team’s ecommerce platform, BigCommerce.
“Vend's native integration with BigCommerce — was a big point for us," says Ben Kerswill, General Manager, Consumer Business.
Prior to Vend, they used paper vouchers which made it difficult to verify usage and redemptions. “We had paper vouchers originally, and when people redeemed them, we would just take a photo of the voucher with our mobile but we couldn't really validate the vouchers. So there wasn’t anything stopping customers from double-dipping online and in-store,” says Ben.
According to Ben, not only are they now able to effectively track voucher usage and redemptions, but they can also send customers vouchers via email, which can either be scanned in-store or redeemed online.
“Vend's native integration with BigCommerce — was a big point for us”
Ben Kerswill, General Manager, Consumer Business
The Solution
The team at the Brisbane Lions were pleased with how smooth it was to switch to Vend, and get the rest of their team up and running.
The Brisbane Lions had a dedicated migration partner that assisted them with the setup and training of Vend. “Our migration partner built a great relationship and we felt like we could ask him basic questions, without feeling like we were asking dumb questions. We weren’t expecting that level of customer support. With most SaaS products, you just get your log in details, and you’re on your own. So having a Vend launch and training specialist was really cool.”
Alongside their migration partner, the Lions felt confident in how the system was set up for ease of use. The Lions often have casual staff members running the stalls, so ease of use was a major factor when selecting the right software for them. Using Vend was an effortless experience for the team’s staff — even those who didn’t work at the stores full time.
“It was such an easy transition. It was also so easy to teach the staff how to use Vend. It was definitely a massive improvement, especially for our casuals.”
Anthony Croker, Licensing and Merchandising Manager
Brisbane Lions brings their solution together with the best in retail
The Results
The Brisbane Lions’ stores sell a wide range of items, so inventory management and stock analysis are key. It is important for them to do in-depth reporting of stock movement in different outlets around the ground, to ensure stock is kept in the right place. The team is looking forward to having a better handle on their data.
Fortunately, Vend has all the functionalities the Brisbane Lions need to make smarter decisions around stock orders and merchandising. “We don’t like carrying a huge amount of stock on the books, and Vend helps us be more efficient in this area.”
“With Vend’s stock analysis, we have the ability to split the outlet data and tell a better story, from a reporting standpoint,” says Anthony. “We can get some true metrics on what’s selling on the ground and what’s not. We can also segment that based on each individual game and location rather than having a mishmash of products, pricing, and locations.”
The team at the Lions are looking forward to their future using Vend, having greater insight into their sales and processes. “That’s one thing I’m looking forward to doing with Vend, we’ll be able to maximise customer spend and ensure that we’re selling the right things at the right locations”
“With Vend’s stock analysis, we have the ability to split the outlet data and tell a better story, from a reporting standpoint.”
Anthony Croker, Licensing and Merchandising Manager
