Session 1

Supermarket is one of the most successful businesses in the world. It provides wide ranges of goods, from food to home appliances, where people can get a widest selection of international grocery items. ParknShop is a very good example in the category as it is the leading supermarket chain in Hong Kong with over 230 stores in Hong Kong, Macau and Mainland China.
The followings are some examples of information systems used by Parknshop to support their business.

Internet shopping

http://www1.parknshop.com/WebShop/Home.do (The web site for internet shopping)

Internet shopping offers customers to purchase products or services over the internet 24 hours a day. It is very convenient for customers to shop online since almost everyone can access to the internet both at work and at home. This service is also helpful for people with disability or who cannot visit the retail stores during business hours. Customers can browse an online catalog for the items they need and purchase the items simply by clicking on the catalog. The orders will be delivered to their home by the agreed time period.

Customers can be paid by the following methods
Cash On Delivery
American Express Card
Visa Card
Master Card

Extra information:
There is another web page called Fishipedia, which is basically a database for the fishes they sell:
www.parknshop.com/fishipedia
This is a tool to help shoppers to ensure they are purchasing the correct fish that they are looking for. It also provides information of the origin of the fishes and the best way of cooking. This is quite interesting!
The database contains information such as product names, scientific names, any other common names found in the market and photos. Some of them even include nutritional information and cooking suggestions.

Barcode system

Regardless of the types of the business or industry, barcode system can provide an application that fits the business needs, including Point of Sales, inventory control, warehouse management and security.

For point of sales, barcodes are on every item and barcode scanners (an electronic device) are installed at cashier counters to obtain the information from the barcodes.
It provides a quicker and easier way for cashiers to get the bills to the customers. Capturing data by barcode scanner is not only faster than typing on the machine, the possibility of typing mistakes can also be reduced. (Information shows that Keyboard data entry creates an average one error in 300 keystrokes, Bar code data entry has an error rate of about 1 in 3 million.) Hence, supermarkets can provide a better service by reducing the queuing time of customers and minimizing complains for wrong pricing.

Barcode can also bring convenience to warehouse management. Barcode scanner can record inventory transactions remotely, and work with inventory data collected away from their desk using a data collection device.

Moreover, PARKnSHOP has pioneered a new barcode tracing system that will further enhance the safety, quality and freshness of all Mainland China vegetables on sale.

These traceability barcode labels are pasted on each basket of vegetables.

They contain information such as the supplier’s names, type of products, manufacturing dates, and other relevant production data. The data are used to check quality of the products at every stage of the supply chain and if problems are detected, the system can easily trace back the origin and recall back the product.
This gives customers unparalleled confidence in the traceability, safety, quality and freshness of the food they buy.
Web page for reference
http://www1.parknshop.com/WebShop/images/fc/enu/totally-traceable.html