At Hibbett Sports, the system being used to locate the basketball shoes was time consuming. When a customer asked an employee to try on a pair of shoes, the employee had to go to the stockroom and search through literally hundreds of pairs of shoes for the correct model, size and color. Finding the brand of shoe, like Nike, was easy due to the distinctive box. The shoe size was also was not much of a problem because it was clearly marked in a large font on the bottom left hand corner of the box. The real difficulty was in finding the right model and color within the brand. With Nikes, many of the model names are similar. All the basketball shoes for example have the word "Air" in the name. This adds to the problem. However, the most difficult variable to distinguish is the color. In most cases the shoe model will come in various colors. In the case of the Nikes, the color of the shoe is written in a small font that is quite difficult to see. Because of the many attributes associated with the shoes, and the large quantity of shoes which are stocked and sold each month, the system is ineffective in helping the employee find and restock shoes properly.
