Charlotte Russe Achieves Speed to Value with New JDA Point of Sale System Accelerating Checkout and Improving Customer Service

Business Wire, Nov 2, 2006

Fast-Growing Fashion Retailer to Support Growth Plans and More Efficiently Manage Workforce with Implementation of New JDA Portfolio Store Systems

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. -- JDA Software Group, Inc. (Nasdaq:JDAS) today announced that Charlotte Russe Holding, Inc., a mall-based specialty apparel and accessories retailer, is implementing several JDA Portfolio[R] solutions to improve in-store execution and service to its customer base of young women in their teens and twenties. Based on the successful pilot of Portfolio POS[TM] (PPOS) software at its first five stores, Charlotte Russe is accelerating its rollout into additional locations including its flagship store. Since the rollout began, the retailer has reported a faster check-out process that its store associates mastered with limited training.

To support its chain-wide rollout of PPOS, Charlotte Russe signed a significant hardware and hardware services agreement with JDA in third quarter 2006 that included the purchase of IBM SurePOS 742 cash registers, Symbol Scanners and Symbol Signature Capture Devices.

"Thanks to a reduced number of keystrokes to ring up a sale in PPOS, we're moving our customers through the check out lines much faster," said Ed Wong, EVP chief supply chain officer at Charlotte Russe. "Another benefit that we experienced is that our store associates quickly became fully self-sufficient with PPOS due to its intuitive interface. We opened at 10 a.m. and by noon they were processing transactions and taking care of our customers, with no help from our trainers. That was a pretty fast learning curve!" added Wong.

"We are thrilled to hear of the real results that Charlotte Russe is experiencing with PPOS," said Thomas Dziersk, senior vice president of the Americas. "Because the retail industry faces higher turnover rates than most other industries plus relies on seasonal workers, the less training that must be done on a POS system the better. As proven by Charlotte Russe, our PPOS application is easy for store associates to master plus offers proven stability and broad, world-class functionality for more personalized and expanded customer service."

The fast results that Charlotte Russe experienced with PPOS are in line with what the retailer had achieved with its earlier JDA implementations. According to Wong, the retailer licensed several JDA store applications in first quarter 2006 to build upon its positive JDA relationship and to take advantage of integration between Portfolio Merchandise Management[TM] (PMM) host system and the Portfolio Store Systems. In addition to PPOS, the retailer added Portfolio Back of Store[TM] (PBOS), Portfolio CRM[TM] and Portfolio Workforce Management[TM] (PWM) to become a JDA shop from host-to-POS. Charlotte Russe will deploy these applications on Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft Windows Embedded for Point of Service.

"By implementing JDA's store applications, we can fully integrate our PMM and Arthur[R] Planning applications to sharpen our back-of-store processes, improve store-planning capabilities and expedite workflow for inventory management," said Wong. "In addition, JDA solutions will support our aggressive plans to open 40 new stores in fiscal 2006, which is up from our original plan of 35 stores, and at least 50 new stores in fiscal 2007. With these enhanced, streamlined processes our store associates will have more time on the floor servicing our customers."

Other benefits that Wong expects to realize is to establish activity-level labor demands by task and to better forecast staffing with PWM, JDA's workforce management solution. Charlotte Russe is counting on achieving benefits that other PWM users have experienced and that is "obtaining scheduling savings while avoiding lost sales during peak selling hours by ensuring the optimal number of associates on hand," said Wong.

Charlotte Russe will work with JDA's consulting services team for these additional implementations.

"JDA looks forward to helping Charlotte Russe continue to realize new efficiencies, cost savings and sales growth as they implement additional JDA applications to better manage their workforce and store-inventory while more precisely marketing to the right customers to boost customer loyalty," said JDA's Dziersk.

About JDA Software Group, Inc.

JDA[R] Software Group, Inc. is the global leader in helping more than 5,500 retail, manufacturing and wholesale-distribution customers in 60 countries realize real demand chain results. By capitalizing on its industry position and financial strength, JDA commits significant resources to advancing the JDA Portfolio suite of vertically-focused supply and demand chain solutions. JDA Portfolio software enables high-performance business process optimization and execution to achieve a connected view of the customer from raw materials flowing into production to end-consumer products at the shelf. With offices in major cities around the world, JDA employs the industry's most experienced supply and demand chain experts to develop, deliver and support its solutions. For more information, visit www.jda.com, email info@jda.com or call 1-800-479-7382.