Case Study: 860‑store Retail Department Store achieves resilient, higher‑bandwidth omnichannel retailing with Hughes Network Systems Managed SD‑WAN

Powering the Retail Environment of the Future

Retail Department Store, a national retailer with 860 locations and 98,000 employees, needed to modernize in-store digital experiences — supporting in-store marketing, smartphone-enabled strategies, app resiliency for a revamped mobile rewards program, in-store pickup and greater bandwidth — while reducing the cost and complexity of its legacy MPLS and managing multiple NAP/ISP providers. Hughes Network Systems was engaged to address these challenges.

Hughes Network Systems deployed an 860‑branch Hughes Managed SD‑WAN (HughesON) solution using the HR Branch Gateway for secure SD‑WAN and dual‑broadband across 46 NAPs in 47 states (mix: ~46.5% LTE, 38% cable, 9.5% fiber). The deployment delivered higher application performance, stability and real‑time bandwidth adaptability (improving QoS), simplified multi‑data‑center connectivity, and enabled digital signage, video‑on‑demand training, cloud inventory and omnichannel ordering with in‑store pickup — while a cost‑neutral switch from T1‑MPLS provided significantly more enterprise bandwidth.