Douglas Macmillan Hospice

How the Dougie Mac retail operation has become

the largest income generator for the hospice

21 stores across North Staffordshire, England

Retail generating over £3m

For almost 50 years, Douglas Macmillan Hospice – more affectionately known as Dougie Mac, has been providing care for adults and their families
in North Staffordshire fighting terminal illnesses. Costing over £12m a year to run, the large hospice employs over 250 staff and over one thousand volunteers, relying upon fundraising and its retail arm to generate income, as Liz Clarke, Head of Retail at Douglas Macmillan Hospice explains, “We generate £3.75m across the retail function, the retail team is now the largest income generator for the hospice.”

An impressive feat for the hospice which runs 21 charity shops across the county, including specialised shops for fashion, homeware and children’s items. “Because the care we deliver is in North Staffordshire, it’s important that we have a shop on every high street, in every community, so that people can come and support their local hospice” says Clarke.

Dougie Mac is one of the largest hospices in the country and the retail side of the business is continuing to grow, which was one of the main reasons for choosing Cybertill’s CharityStore platform almost five years ago, as Clarke explains, “we put the software in across all our stores when we made that decision to move to EPoS and we chose Cybertill – it’s been a fantastic choice and we’ve not looked back. We’ve formed a great partnership with Cybertill, and we have a really good relationship that is continuing to grow.”

“It’s important that we have a system that’s reliable and can do a transaction quickly, last year we sold over 1.2 million items, which is over half a million customer transactions. By using Cybertill we can keep on top of it.”
Liz Clarke, Head of Retail, Douglas Macmillan Hospice

Implementing EPoS across the retail estate provided many advantages to the charity, reducing time consuming manual processes and paperwork, which proved to be instantly. Reducing the paper trail was important to Dougie Mac, not only from a sustainability aspect, but it eliminated the transaction dockets that were sent into the finance team from the old till system, creating a full audit trail on transactions. Being able to see and analyse the data is another huge benefit
Dougie Mac have seen using Cybertill, as Clarke continues, “the data collected through the system and how we’ve been able to use that data to grow our business has been incredible. The growth since inception of Cybertill to now is phenomenal. To grow from £2m gross turnover, to this year projected £3.75m is great.”

 

“Overall our experience with Cybertill is really great. We’ve formed some great partnerships with the team, which is something that will continue to grow”

Liz Clarke, Head of Retail, Douglas Macmillan Hospice 

Love your supporters

Investing in EPoS was a huge step for Dougie Mac and for Liz Clarke, but more than that - using the whole system is paramount to the success Dougie Mac has seen, including the Loyalty and Gift Card modules.

“We love the fact that we can have a loyalty card – the Dougie Mac supporter card, we use that for Gift Aid, and now we can take loyalty to a whole new level.”

As part of the retail operation strategy, the charity will be using the Loyalty module and Supporter Cards, designed by Cybertill, across all commercial functions of the business, from retail, to lottery and fundraising, enabling the charity to identify loyal customers and supporters, while rewarding them for their support.

Supporters and Donors who agree to Gift Aid donations receive a Dougie Mac supporter card with their unique Gift Aid number on, meaning, each time they donate, their card is scanned, and a label can quickly be generated for the items donated. “We like the fact that we have single recognition barcode, so we can get transactions moving quickly through the till, and in the back [of the shop] where we move stock quickly. It helps the team as they can generate that barcode and the items go straight out onto the shop floor” explains Clarke.

Growing Gift Aid

“What we really love is that our Gift Aid is improving all the time, we’ve grown 10% in the last year which is fantastic, we’re using CharityStore to its truest potential.”

Gift Aid is a key factor for the retail operation, as it increases the re-sale value of donated goods by 25% through claiming Gift Aid on donated goods and cash donations, and Dougie Mac, not wanting to rest on their laurels are still wanting to improve.

“There’s still more Gift Aid to get, we’re moving to Electronic Donor Sign-up with Cybertill, which is really important, we’re always working with Cybertill to make sure that we’re getting the most out of the product that we’ve invested in and raising as much money as we can for the charity” continues Clarke.

Seamless roll-out

As part of the on-boarding process, Dougie Mac involved the retail and fundraising teams, ensuring all parties where aware of the capabilities of Cybertill’s CharityStore platform.

Clarke explains how at the time of implementation, she was Head of Fundraising at the hospice, “I worked closely with the head of retail at the time and because I understood what the capabilities of the Cybertill system were, I could see where we could be doing event sign-ups
and having retail and fundraising working together.” Across the retail team there are over 600 volunteers, giving their time to working in the shops,
so for Dougie Mac, it was important that the on-boarding process went as seamless as possible, “because we’re working with volunteers who come in for a short period of time, it was really important that the roll-out went as well as it could. I believe working with Cybertill and working with the team, we did that well, we didn’t have any functionality problems from the hardware and software that Cybertill was providing - it was great support” continues Clarke.

One-stop shop for the future

It’s an exciting time for charity retail and Dougie Mac, there are many tech developments and innovations that the industry can tap into, which ties into Clarke’s outlook, “times are changing and it’s important that a customer can come into a store and do a one stop shop.”

Currently the charity is developing the ‘Dougie Bank’, which is a collection tin designed to be purchased in store, so supporters can collect money in their homes and bring it back to the charity. “By doing this it means we’re no longer going to have different pieces of paper for separate transactions and receipts, we’ve got a till
system here that can do that.”

In addition to the Dougie Bank, the charity is also looking to improve the Gift Aid process, as Clarke explains, “we’ve done a lot of work to improve our Gift Aid but it’s so important that we now take that step to Electronic Donor Sign-up with Cybertill. We want to be scanning the barcode on the supporter loyalty cards and getting that customer straight into the system and printing off labels straight away. I believe it will speed up the process and improve our Gift Aid conversion, which is important and will ensure more sign-ups.” When asked about the future of the charity and Cybertill, Clarke concluded, “what’s in store for us in the future with Cybertill is we want to strengthen that partnership we’ve created. I think it’s important that we understand how Cybertill as a supplier want us to use the product but equally Cybertill are listening to what it is customers need.” The partnership with Dougie Mac and our other charity customers is what gives Cybertill the
drive for continuous improvement and ensure that more money can be made for such worthy causes.

Cybertill’s CharityStore platform includes:

Cybertill’s CharityStore cloud-based retail management and EPoS software can help provide a seamless customer experience both in-store and online. Our innovative cloud-based platform helps charity retailers make more profits, automate manual process, increase Gift Aid capture and fully integrate their entire retail operation easily.

1. Outstanding POS software with real-time, secure stock, sales, and customer data visibility.

2. Cloud-based, modular complete retail management platform with enterprise merchandising and warehousing options.

3. Enhanced supporter and donor experience with touch screen mobile POS and e-receipt options.

4. Advanced real-time reporting including accounting, budgeting and forecasting.

5. Marketplace modules for multi-channel online selling.

6. Seamless integration into existing ERP, accounting, Ecommerce systems, and more.

7. Gift Aid module that automates the whole process and is proven to increase capture by at least 20 - 40%.

8. Increase loyalty with integrated, customisable schemes and donor cards.
9. Lottery integration that prints tickets direct from the till, right down to the last minute.

To arrange a free, no obligation demonstration, fill in the form below or ring our friendly sales agents on 0800 030 4459