Technology in Support of the Personal Connection (Market Express — Part 2)

SSCS software turbocharged the long-standing success of Market Express, while allowing staff to connect even more closely with their customers.

Note: This is Part 2 of a two-part shop profile. To access Part 1, please click here.

For the first few decades of Market Express’s considerable growth, Price, Utah’s leading independent convenience chain manually tracked sales, inventory, and other relevant information. It wasn’t an operational outlier; in the latter days of the 20^th Century, many c-stores had yet to commit fully to technology and did perfectly fine.

But growth and volume have a way of changing the status quo, putting pressure on the people managing the store. More time is needed to monitor the additional influx of sales, deliveries, and other daily work transactions, which also leads to more opportunity for clerical error, and an erosion of profitability.

These facts, rapid changes in the industry, and the prospect of increased competition in town, all contributed to Market Express owners Angelo and Dino Kiahtipes realizing it was time to computerize. The opportunity to do so presented itself, when the brothers built their second site from scratch.

As noted in Part 1, the Kiahtipes’s performed due diligence, and elected to go with the SSCS back office system as their technology of choice. Sheila Keele, a family friend and employee of the Kiahtipes’s, came to SSCS Headquarters in Salinas, California to learn the new system. Charged with getting Market Express’s back office processes digitized, Sheila learned the ins and outs of the Computerized Daily Book and brought both Market Express sites online.

Current manager, Nick Kiahtipes was about four years old when his father and uncle opened their second store and about eleven when they adopted SSCS. “Growing up in these stores, I remember having to tag every candy bar and soda bottle with the price gun; my sisters and I would race to see who could do it the fastest,” Nick recalls.

Eventually Nick left for college, and when he graduated in 2021, he returned to his home town with a broadened business perspective, ready to a take on a larger role in the stores he grew up in. He found himself viewing the business with a fresh set of eyes.

“My dad and uncle were forward-thinking in that they understood computerization was the way to compete, succeed, and expand,” Nick explains, “but when I came back I could see we weren’t using it to its full potential, and it also happened that SSCS’s capabilities had steadily grown since we first took it on. There’s a lot of features to explore in the Computerized Daily Book, and I began to see how we could use it more completely to improve business.”

Computerization also would ensure Market Express employees would get more opportunities to take the personal approach on which the store’s reputation was built.

“The Kaihtipes family understood that the time saved from computerization could free staff up to keep connecting with their customers,” adds the SSCS Sales Rep handling the Market Express account. “Being able to take a personal approach was especially important for Market Express, because their small-town reputation for customer service is maybe their biggest market advantage.”

 

If you ask Nick, himself, about the benefits of SSCS software, it all starts with the ability to capture every possible detail about the transactions passing through the store. “The more data you get into the system, the easier it is to manage for profit,” he says. “All that time saved, all those mistakes avoided, not to mention reducing the time it takes to reconcile errors. That’s very valuable.”

Nick has helped make sure as much information as possible gets into the computer. All store deliveries are either scanned with SSCS’s handheld software or imported into the system, revolutionizing the ease of creation of printed shelf labels, among other benefits.

“Our stores feature a wide range of offerings, including a deli/grill that prepares cold food for each of our stores and hot food at our Sinclair store,” Nick says. “Utilizing SSCS’s invoicing and inventory abilities allows us to track margins however we need.”

SSCS’s handheld software, EDI deliveries, and manual item adjustments allow Market Express to manage a range of products from a range of vendors. In Nick’s words: “I can bring in a new, local vendor and, within minutes, I have their items scanning at the register, improving the customer experience while minimizing the cashier’s frustration with new product.”

To cut through the flow of information to highlight specific areas of concern, Nick and his team use the large array of reports that SSCS provides, many of which are customizable. “You can really get to the bottom of occurrences that look like they may be issues and fix them fast.”

SSCS congratulates Market Express as an example of a progressive multi-site operator that remains independent and family-owned. The operation serves as a good example that the entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in the U.S.

“In our local market an independent c-store has to run at maximum efficiency to compete with big franchises,” Nick concludes. “You absolutely have to control your expenses to make it happen, and SSCS software has given us the ability to do that and much more.”