DURITZA GOES HIGH-TECH AT POS

DENISE ZIMMERMAN

WASHINGTON, Pa. -- Duritza Enterprises here boosted checklane productivity by 20% and trimmed training time by 25% to 30% with an open-architecture front-end system that features a powerful scanner and a new, intuitive cashier interface.

Bob Duritza Jr., general manager, credits checkstand efficiency gains to the scanner's ability to read a product's bar code on the first pass from any direction. Training time was reduced with the introduction of a user-friendly cashier interface, with functions that resemble a familiar automated teller machine, he added.

The cashier interface combines a keyboard with a 10-inch liquid crystal display monitor. Unlike a conventional cash register, the device features only eight keys whose functions change according to the adjacent LCD readout.

"The keys change description, depending upon what part of the order you're in," said Duritza. Because the system operates on principles similar to that of an ATM, new cashiers essentially train themselves. "Everything is right on the screen; the monitor displays prompts as you go along."

Duritza Enterprises' eight-lane Shop N Sav store here is the first U.S. supermarket installation of the unit.

The company invested about $7,500 per lane to install the point-of-sale system in late June. The setup cost about 25% more than an upgraded, but less feature-rich system, he noted.

"This costs more, but we figured just in training alone, let alone productivity, it was worth it," Duritza said, adding that a three-year warranty eliminates service expenses a while.

The cashier interface is called Dynakey and was developed as a peripheral to the NCR 7450 point-of-sale system from AT&T Global Solutions, Dayton, Ohio. Other components of Shop N Sav's new front-end system that enhance productivity are a thermal printer and an omnidirectional scanner.

Duritza said checklanes are moving faster partly due to the printer, which generates receipts more quickly and can fill out shoppers' personal checks, but mostly because the new scanner reads bar codes from any direction.

Duritza said the POS system's open architecture will accommodate a host of software options not possible with a proprietary system.

"We hope to tie it in with other backroom software products like direct store delivery, labor scheduling and cashier monitoring," Duritza said.

Other initiatives the system would support are an electronic marketing program and alternate payment options like credit and debit, if the company decides to go that route.

Eventually, Duritza said, he'd like to link the point-of-sale system directly to an off-site remote personal computer so company principles can have access to the data base and stay close to decision-making while traveling.

For now, however, the company will monitor cashier training and productivity, Duritza said. Once operational kinks are worked out, Duritza Enterprises may expand the front-end system when it relocates this eight-lane store to a larger, 18-lane site next year.