by Brianna Crandall — September 22, 2014—The Professional Retail Store Maintenance Association (PRSM), the authority on retail, multi-site facilities management, recently released its annual review of the state of retail facilities management and key trends being met by some of the industry’s leading retailers.
The report provides insight into how the retail industry is using technology to gain efficiencies in store operations, using data to better manage assets from HVAC (heating/ventilation/air-conditioning) to roofing, deploying cutting-edge sustainable business practices and technologies, and recruiting and managing talent to build the team of the future.
“The retail industry has undergone a tremendous amount of change, and if predictions are accurate, there’s much more in store in the coming five years. However, even if some experts are correct and stores continue to morph into experiential destinations, our goals will remain the same — to enhance the customer experience with every tool and technology at our disposal,” said Kirk Beaudoin, RFMP, president, 2014-15 PRSM Association Board of Directors and facilities manager at adidas America, Inc.
Included in this year’s report are Brixmor, Dollar Tree, Gap, Nike, Staples Canada and Walgreens, with support from Divisions Maintenance Group and ServiceChannel. Trending are:
- Making retail sustainable: Sustainability comes full circle as Staples Canada reduces and recycles its own waste, and has turned the store into a community-wide resource. From batteries to ink and cell phones, if it is an office product a Staples store probably recycles it in Canada.
- Energy Consumption x Zero = Zero: Walgreens brings it all together inside the industry’s first Net-Zero store. Wind, solar panels and geothermal produce all the energy a store requires to operate.
- Technology apps increase efficiency: Brixmor retail properties dot the landscape across the United States, providing shopping space for a wide variety of brands. Leveraging an iPad mobile application from Divisions Maintenance Group, Brixmor property managers integrated activities and “raised the bar” in efficiency.
- Building the team of the future: If the future really is here, it is partly because FM professionals created it. Dollar Tree and Gap are blending people, process and technology in response to today’s challenges, while building the team of tomorrow.
- Data mining/Data management: When Nike needed information, ServiceChannel brought data. Mix in a bona fide business analyst, and the results surprised the entire organization and even the most seasoned FM professionals.
The Report was released at the PRSM Association Mid-Year Conference in September and will be a topic of discussion at the 2014 Canadian Conference, in October. Download the PRSM Association 2015 Trends Report and view this brief Inside PRSM video for additional background on the report’s relevance to many segments of the retail industry.
