Client: Capital Chemist Charnwood, ACT
Spokesperson: Samantha Kourtis, Managing Partner & Pharmacist
Solution Delivered By: Future Shop

The Challenge

Operating a busy pharmacy with long trading hours, Capital Chemist Charnwood struggled with inefficiencies related to traditional shelf labelling. With frequent retail price changes and a constant flow of stock, the manual process for updating tags was both time-consuming and unreliable.

Their key challenges included:

• Delays in price updates – tags were often printed late or not put out at all
• Label errors – smudging, misalignment, and lost or damaged paper tags
• Operational bottlenecks – changes in wholesale prices weren’t consistently reflected on shelves
• Customer dissatisfaction – missing or incorrect prices led to confusion and lost sales
• Limited visibility of stock status – staff lacked a simple way to verify stock levels or identify discrepancies
• High staffing costs – with extended hours and public holiday trading, price changes were labour-intensive

Although they had considered ESLs two years earlier, the initial cost and lack of integration made the investment difficult to justify.

The Solution

Future Shop’s fully integrated Electronic Shelf Labels (ESLs), working seamlessly with PosWorks, provided Capital Chemist Charnwood with the modern retail solution they needed.

The ESL implementation enabled:

• Instantaneous price changes, including remote updates and after-hours pricing
• Visual cues for promotional pricing, catalogue items, and pharmacist recommendations
• Automatic stock status alerts – tags update to show “Out of Stock” or “On Order”
• Complete integration with pharmacy systems, improving accuracy and eliminating duplicate data entry
• Improved team efficiency, reducing reliance on manual labour and boosting customer-facing engagement

The Results

1. Immediate Return on Investment

After just the first round of automated retail price changes, Samantha noted:

“I actually messaged my business partners and said, ROI achieved. If we get nothing else out of this, that single experience was a game changer.”

2. Increased Gross Profit and Price Confidence

Empowering the stock controller to respond quickly to wholesale price changes has:

• Increased pricing accuracy
• Prevented margin erosion
• Boosted gross profit

Customers also trust the digital tags more than paper, in Samantha’s words: “It automatically gives confidence… ‘It has to be right, it’s digital.'”

3. Enhanced Stock Visibility

Thanks to real-time tag updates:

• Staff can now immediately spot when an item is out of stock or on order
• Shelf label status helps verify stock on hand without unnecessary searching
• Label messaging saves time and prevents stock-related miscommunication

4. Reduced Staff Workload and Increased Sales

With staff no longer bogged down by paper labels, they now spend more time assisting customers, leading to:

• Greater basket sizes
• More meaningful customer engagement
• Improved in-store experience

5. Promotional Flexibility & Better Visual Merchandising

Tags display red headers for promotions, “Pharmacist Recommends” badges, and other visual cues, replacing flimsy paper signage with professional, branded communication.

6. Future-Proof Functionality

With seven-day trading and late hours, the ability to change prices dynamically — even for after-hours or public holiday trading — adds another level of operational control.

Client Testimonial

“This system is absolutely a game changer — it’s transformed how we do business.”

“I’m not at all missing floppy bits of fluro paper.”

“We can very easily now consider changing pricing for after hours or public holidays. Loving the functionality of the tags.”

Click here to watch the full testimonial.

Conclusion

By adopting Future Shop’s ESL system, Capital Chemist Charnwood has turned a once-cumbersome pricing process into a seamless, profitable operation. What began as a search for efficiency has become a transformative retail strategy, resulting in:

• Measurable time savings
• Higher profitability
• Stronger staff productivity
• Better customer trust and satisfaction