What is an outlet?
An outlet is one physical place where a product is sold or served to consumers, such as a bar, restaurant, cafe, hotel or shop, counted once however many ways it can be reached. Sales teams call the same place an account, a door, a venue, a POC or a store, and each word quietly changes what gets counted.
Open venues, floors.
The trusted intelligence layer for teams selling to Hospitality & Retail
Eight words for one place
| Word | Who says it | What it really counts |
|---|---|---|
| Outlet | FMCG and beverage sales, market researchers | Physical places that sell or serve, customer or not |
| Venue | Hospitality, events, Dashmote | A physical on-premise place |
| Account | US sales teams, CRM users, distributors | A customer relationship: one site, or a whole group under one contract |
| Door | US retail and consumer goods | Physical stores that carry a product, used in distribution claims |
| POC (point of consumption) | Brewers and beverage companies in many markets; one brewer keys every outlet in its CRM on a POC code | On-premise places where the drink is consumed |
| Store, location, site, unit | Retail chains, pub groups (site), restaurant chains (location, unit) | One branch of a group |
| Customer | Bottlers and distributors | Whoever is invoiced: one bar, or a wholesaler that serves hundreds |
| Storefront | Delivery apps and eCommerce teams | One outlet's page on one app; one outlet can have several |
The Insee definition of a sales outlet is a useful neutral anchor: a physical place where goods are sold. Everything else in the table is a business view laid on top of it.
Who means what by outlet by role
| Role | Usual word | What they count |
|---|---|---|
| eCommerce manager | Store or storefront | Listings on each delivery app |
| Field sales rep | Outlet or account | Places in the territory, and which of them buy |
| Category manager | Door or store | Places where sell-out is measured |
| Distributor | Customer or delivery point | Ship-to addresses on the invoice |
| POS-system vendor | Site or location | Places running a licence |
| Market researcher | Outlet | Places in a universe or panel |
Who means what by outlet by region
| Region | Usual words | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| UK and Ireland | Outlet, site, account | Pub groups count sites; reps count accounts |
| US and Canada | Account, door, location, unit | "Outlet" also means an outlet store to most shoppers |
| Continental Europe | Outlet, point de vente (FR), horeca outlet (NL) | Lists often mix outlets and companies |
| Latin America | PDV, POC, cliente; canal tradicional (tienditas, abarrotes in Mexico) vs canal moderno | A cliente can be a wholesaler serving many outlets |
| Asia Pacific | Outlet, store; kirana (India), sari-sari (Philippines), warung (Indonesia) for traditional shops | Traditional trade outlets are often unlisted anywhere online |
Common confusions
- Account is not outlet. A group account can cover hundreds of sites; one site can hold two accounts (the bar and the hotel restaurant above it).
- Storefront is not outlet. A restaurant on three delivery apps is one outlet and three storefronts. A virtual brand is a storefront with no outlet of its own, and one ghost kitchen can sit behind many storefronts.
- Door counts double when a list counts a shop-in-shop, or a hotel with two bars, twice. Decide whether one address is one outlet before you compare numbers.
- Customer is not outlet. A bottler's customers are the outlets and wholesalers it invoices; its outlet universe is every outlet, customer or not.
- Called on or not. One brewer's CRM marks each outlet as called on by field sales, by inside sales, or not called on: the account list and the universe in one field.
- Closed outlets linger. Customer lists keep places that stopped trading; a universe should not.
How Dashmote counts it
A venue is one physical place, counted once, with its channel, menu, ownership and delivery presence on the same record. Each listing of that venue on a delivery app is a storefront, linked back to the venue where the two can be paired. That is why we never add venues and storefronts together: one restaurant on three apps is 1 venue and 3 storefronts.
Accounts, customers and doors are your words for the part of the market you sell to. We match your account list to venues (CRM account matching), so your customers and the whole market sit on the same key, and the gap between them is the white space.
Worked example illustrative
One street, made-up numbers.
- There are 10 physical places: 6 restaurants, 2 bars, 1 hotel with a bar and a restaurant, 1 shop. That is 10 outlets (the hotel is one).
- The 6 restaurants are on 2 delivery apps each, and one of them also runs 2 virtual brands on both apps: 12 + 4 = 16 storefronts.
- A bottler's customer list shows 4 customers: 3 venues it delivers to directly and 1 wholesaler that serves the rest.
Asked "how many outlets are on this street?", the honest answers are 10, 16 and 4. Only the first is a count of outlets.
Frequently asked questions
What does number of doors mean?
Doors is the number of physical stores or outlets that carry a product. "In 5 doors" means five locations stock it, whatever the number of companies behind them.
What does storefront mean on a delivery app?
A storefront is one outlet's page on one delivery app, with its menu, prices and opening hours. One restaurant listed on three apps has three storefronts and is still one outlet.