With soft consumer spending, retailers are investing in process improvements and technology to more effectively control their spending and protect their profits. They are under constant pricing pressure from incurring costs associated with operating distributed store locations, warehouses, etc. Here is where company like Coupa comes in. Coupa provides a cloud solution that combines e-procurement and expense management into one platform which offers several advantages to retailers to adopt smarter spending practices:

• Enables companies to save money because they have greater visibility into the expense pool
• Can drill down and audit problem areas of spending, curb "maverick" spending
• Because it's cloud based, all this data is accessible in real-time and provides the ability to track spending behaviors, see trends both internally and against how other companies are doing/spending and set benchmarks, and then adjust practices moving forward.

Coupa just announced a significant uptick in the number of retail and franchise businesses selecting Coupa to more effectively manage and control their indirect spending. Here’s the complete news release:

Retailers Flock to Coupa Cloud Spend Management to Cut Costs

The Container Store, Michaels and Others Protect their Bottom Line from Slowed Consumer Spending

SAN MATEO, Calif. – August 3, 2010 – Coupa Software, the leading provider of disruptive and innovative cloud spend management (CSM) solutions for squeezing savings from business operations, today announced a significant uptick in the number of retail and franchise businesses selecting Coupa to more effectively manage and control their indirect spending.

Express, Inc., The Limited, Michaels, The Container Store, Dollar General, and a prominent specialty retailer of stylish home furnishings and high quality cookware are among the retailers leveraging Coupa’s platform for their e-procurement needs.

With soft consumer spending renewing worries about a fragile economic recovery, retailers and franchise businesses are investing in process improvements and technology innovations to more effectively control their spending and protect their profits. Coupa Cloud Spend Management offers several advantages to retailers eager to adopt smarter spending practices, including:

• Centralized control over procurement processes and greater visibility into spending at the store level, without having to deploy IT resources or professional buyers in each location.
• Broad adoption with an easy-to-use solution that requires minimal change management and training to learn or adopt, perfect for workforces characterized by non-office personnel, or that have high turnover or seasonal fluctuations in their employee base.
• Ability to segregate content and streamline store-level purchasing through content groups. For example, with Coupa, retailers can segregate catalog items, how to buy policies, contracts, punchout sites and more by region, store layout, or other logical grouping to standardize ordering processes in each location.
• Full budgeting support, including budget remaining checks before requisitions are approved, and roll-up reporting for store-level, and regional (or district) spending relative to budget.
• Universal access via any web browser. As the only true multi-tenant cloud company in the e-procurement category, the software can be accessed from the Amazon cloud via any web browser.  There is no hardware to buy, or software to install.
• Fast time to value. Everything you need to get started is included in a single subscription price and standard implementations are free, perfect for organizations designed to be self-sufficient at the store level, without expensive IT overhead.

“Coupa’s traction in our industry does not surprise me at all,” said Scott Jones, Purchasing Agent and Coupa Project Manager at The Container Store. “The dynamics of the retail business model demand efficient and cost-effective operations. Coupa’s cloud-based e-procurement solution fits that need perfectly. We’ve been very successful with the software.”

The Container Store, a Coupa customer since 2008, eliminated stockpiling and supply over-ordering at the store level by integrating Coupa with its warehouse management and supplier systems. By managing its requisition and purchase order processes through Coupa, The Container Store can accurately charge supply costs to individual stores based on supply usage, instead of more arbitrary measures like cost allocation based on percent of sales volume. The company reduced the number of SKUs managed in-house by 60%, and now processes 50% fewer purchase orders per week. Time savings generated by improved processes allowed the company to act on the spend intelligence gathered to negotiate new contracts for greater pricing discounts.

“Brick and mortar retailers have certain advantages over their online counterparts, but they are also under constant pricing pressure from pure online competitors who do not incur the same costs associated with operating distributed store locations,” said Rob Bernshteyn, CEO of Coupa Software. “It’s absolutely critical that retailers keep a watchful eye over every dollar of spend. And industry leaders are doing so with Coupa.”

About Coupa Software
Coupa is the leading provider of disruptive and innovative cloud spend management (CSM) solutions that help companies control their indirect spending and generate savings that go direct to the bottom line. Coupa combines the best e-procurement and expense management capabilities in a single solution that is easier to use, faster to configure and deploy, and more cost-effective than anything available today. With deep domain knowledge in e-procurement and expense management, a best-in-class cloud computing platform, a fast-growing community of customers, and industry-first innovations like real-time benchmarking, intelligent expense report auditing, and crowd sourcing great deals on the Web, Coupa is leading the way in helping companies spend smarter and save more. For more information please visit, http://www.coupa.com or call 650.931.3200.