Regional specialty chain Mast General Store manages omnichannel taxes
Mast General Store is using technology to stay on top of complex tax regulations associated with store-based fulfillment of online orders.
The North Carolina-based retailer, which sells general goods and outdoor apparel and operates 11 stores across the Southeast, began fulfilling orders from its brick-and-mortar stores using the Celerant Stratus e-commerce solution during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As a result, Mast General Store expedited its fulfillment process from a previous average of three to five days to same-day shipping for most orders. However, the retailer found itself dealing with economic nexus laws, which impose tax collection obligations on businesses based on a certain level of economic activity within a state.
Because each state defines economic nexus thresholds differently, Mast General Store has to be able to keep track of when it triggers new tax obligations by reaching a certain amount of sales and/or number of sales transactions in another state.
The retailer, which operates stores in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia and ships orders to 14 states, deployed the Avalara Ava Tax and Avalara Returns solutions to meet economic nexus requirements in 14 states and file tax returns for 11 states.
All of Mast General Store's website sales are processed through AvaTax, so even if it's selling into a state where it currently doesn't meet the economic nexus threshold, the retailer can forecast upcoming obligations as sales increase and potentially trigger nexus in other states.
In addition, the retailer leverages AvaTax to handle events like sales tax holidays and sudden tax changes, because the solution is updated at regular intervals to reflect changing rates and rules in the 13,000-plus U.S. sales and use tax jurisdictions.
"We've kept our eye on nexus obligations for a while, and as our website sales started to pick up using Celerant, we reached out to Avalara to make sure taxes didn't stand in the way of our growth," said David Cliett, VP of operations at Mast General Store. "Our accounting department was very pleased because working with Avalara, we're able to devote more time to other important finance tasks, and we're able to avoid having to face the learning curve it takes to learn to file across more states."
"As retailers like Mast General Store expand their online presence and grow across channels, we want to make sure complex tax rates and rules don't stop them from reaching customers in new locations," said Liz Armbruester, EVP, Customer and Compliance Operations at Avalara. "With Avalara, Mast General Store is realizing worry-free and reliable tax calculation and filing as it expands to reach new customers. Thanks to Avalara's partnership with Celerant, Mast General Store has been able to scale their operations and automate their tax compliance requirements through an easy-to-use integration."
"Having worked with Mast General Store for over 15 years, we've had the opportunity to help their business evolve, as we've significantly evolved as a company as well," said Zeke Hamdani, director of web services at Celerant."Oftentimes, retailers evaluate the 'best-in-breed' versus the 'all-in-one' approach. Mast is the perfect example of how leveraging a single retail technology partner — across all channels — can streamline your business."
Mast General Stores stock over 400 brand names in categories ranging from hard-to-find home goods, the latest outdoor gear, fashion apparel, footwear, toys from yesteryear and local & regional favorites. Each location has an extensive knife shop and more than 500 varieties of old-fashioned candy by the pound.
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