The Candid Voice in Retail Technology: Objective Insights, Pragmatic Advice

Practical Retail Uses For The Internet of Things

For retailers, the Internet of Things (“IoT”) remains an innovation that keeps waiting to take off.Every year since 2015, RSR has benchmarked retailers’ attitudes about the business value of Internet of Things (IoT) technologies.

But even after 5 years, one out of every two retailers admits they simply have no idea how IoT will impact their own operations in the next three years. There’s a fundamental disconnect between how the retail industry sees the opportunities vs. how the technology world sees them.

But it’s not hopeless; Over-performing “Retail Winners” see opportunities to use IoT technologies to track customer flow nearby and in stores in order to improve time to service, improve operational efficiencies, and importantly to help their companies improve how they manage their inventories.

Read the report to learn our current findings!

The Retail Supply Chain: Designing New Ways To Satisfy Demand

The supply chain remains the "next big thing" in retail. Challenges in supply chain execution are driving retailers to find new and better supply chain strategies to support fulfillment-from-anywhere.

This report examines the challenges, opportunities, internal inhibitors, and technology enablers affecting the supply chain (pre-COVID-19). It also takes a hard look at retailers' current – and planned – investments.

The Real Role Of Robotic Automation In Retail

There is no shortage of media hype over the promise that robotic automation can bring to all kinds of business applications in the future. But what does this really mean for retail? Specifically, how do retailers perceive the improvements robotic  automation will make to their supply chains – and are they acting on these options now ? If so, in what capacity – and if not, why not?

We also want to dive heavily into retailers’ viewpoints on what these technologies mean for stores, themselves. Robotics are steadily finding their way into real-world use cases in stores right now – what does the next phase of this evolution look like?

To answer these questions, RSR will survey retailers to gain an understanding of their current perception and activity surrounding automated systems. We will also uncover their views for the future.

The resulting report will examine the challenges, opportunities, internal inhibitors, and technology enablers affecting the implementation of robotic automation in the retail industry. As this is the first study of its kind, RSR will pay especially close attention to gross margin trends to gain insight into those practices making the most difference to retailer performance.

The Store: Meet BOPIS & BORIS: The Profitability Twins

As online retailers offer faster and faster shipping, who knew Buy Online/Pickup In Store would become so popular? But it is – and retailers are embracing it as a means to leverage one of the few things they have that Amazon doesn’t – STORES – and compete in a most immediate way.

At the same time, legions of consumers are normalizing shopping behaviors that not too long ago would have caused retailers to “fire” them as shoppers: buying troves of products online, only to use their own living rooms as the point of decision and returning the majority of items to their nearest store. Again, while many still perceive returning to a store easier than boxing up and shipping goods back to the online source, this trend capitalizes on the shopper’s immediacy.

While both trends get shoppers into the store (a good thing, indeed) both also create VAST logistical complexity for retailers.

Here’s the thing: they’d better get used to it, because BORIS & BOPIS are a shining opportunity for profitability in the Amazon-dominated world.

What are the best steps retailers see to get there? And what are the biggest challenges they perceive coming at them from shoppers?

At the same time, we will survey shoppers to see what they think matters most, and how retailers are meeting their needs.

This will be the first time we’ve ever conducted a study like this, and we are extremely excited about it.

The Case For An AI-enabled Supply Chain

Tariffs. Virus outbreaks. On top of it all? A customer who has not only grown more determined their every demand be met, but who is increasingly intolerant the moment it is not. Today’s supply chain is no longer a challenge – it’s a high-stakes, high-wire balancing act, with peril constantly being introduced from previously unseen angles.

How is a retailer expected to navigate this new reality? The promise of a supply chain made smarter by Artificial Intelligence tools looks to help identify problems – and opportunities – as (if not before) they arise. However, amidst all the hype, how are retailers really moving AI-enabled capabilities from the fringe into their operational and strategic horizons? What are the pain points business leaders currently have? What are the areas AI can really help, and what are the foundational technologies needed to help them get there?

To answer these questions, we need your help. This survey should only take about 10 minutes to complete, and we greatly look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Brian Kilcourse and Steve Rowen, report authors

The New Retail Model: Becoming Agile And Efficient

Retailers recognize the disruptive competitors they face. Whether it be Amazon, fast fashion, Aldi or consignment retailers, competition is fierce and fast-paced. In addition, there are significant factors outside their organizations that continue to change more quickly, impacting strategic initiatives. How do retailers best prepare their companies for the new and unexpected? One way to face these challenges is to enhance organization agility by improving access to data/insight to evaluate and respond more effectively while eliminating time-consuming administrative tasks.

Existing in-house systems may prove inadequate for the planning and tracking of these new business models. In fact, they may not foster the inter-department collaboration that drive and determine success. Finance teams also need the systems, processes, and resources to quickly execute on decisions. Yet replacing core financial and planning systems may not be a top priority on the growing list of Retail technology projects.

The purpose of this research was to determine the value retailers place on new financial planning and analytic systems, and the opportunities associated with organizational agility and insights in near-real-time.

The Need For Location Analytics in The Age of Covid And Beyond

The entire consumer value chain has been upended by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Until a vaccine is discovered, or an efficient cure is out in the field, we can expect to see outbreaks across the world.

RSR believes that location analytics can be used to help understand how to adjust supply chains based on demand patterns, impact on local customers and employees, and finally evaluate the success of various initiatives across all these dimensions.

Lessons learned during the pandemic will no doubt help inform value chain activities in the future.

Getting Past The Hype – What Can AI Analytics Really Accomplish For Retailers?

In RSR’s 2019 study on the state of Innovation in Retail, we stated:

Retailers strongly agree that information is strategic to their businesses, even more than the value of experimenting with new concepts in the shopping experience. Information leads to insights, and insights lead to innovations.

This finding was reflective of indications that we found in earlier studies that retailers want to use information and analytics for more than record keeping. Next-generation analytics, made possible by new non-transactional data often gathered outside the “four walls” of the enterprise and data analysis engines like artificial intelligence, are becoming important as retailers extrapolate patterns in data to help them sense changes in the operational environment and respond appropriately in time to directly affect outcomes. Data visualization techniques “democratize” complex analyses, and operational processes can be infused with the results of insights derived from new data to automate certain decisions.All of these capabilities weren’t possible even ten years ago, and some of the technologies being used now weren’t generally available even in 2015, the last time that RSR studies BI & Analytics in Retail.

The Cloud In Retail: Promises Made - Promises Kept?

Retailers have pretty completely bought into the Cloud Computing paradigm. The development backlog has IT practitioners raising their hands for help, and the need to push the “go faster” button to satisfy ever-changing consumer wants and needs, while lowering operational costs has Line of Business executives juiced over the concept as well.

Last year, in RSR’s inaugural Cloud computing benchmark, we found this to be true, but also found some potentially troubling signs. On the one hand, retailers seemed to believe that the Cloud could solve operational, process and data cleanliness and integration problems: in other words, that it would be a panacea for all the ailments that have plagued them for years. There were also some indications that communication of changes could be better and that functionality is not always as robust as it was in legacy on-premise systems.

Our goal this year is to see if retailer attitudes have matured, and if the vendor community in general is keeping the Cloud’s promise of agility and flexibility.

Omnichannel: What Will Turn A Customer Away vs. What Will Keep Them Coming Back?

It is no secret that consumers are calling the shots in retail these days. But when they shop across all of the various touch points or channels a retailer might have (stores, desktop site, mobile site, mobile app, even social channels) – are they getting what they want?

We’ve been asking retailers to self-asses their efforts in omnichannel studies since 2008, and from their viewpoint, they’ve been doing an okay job. But now we want shoppers to weigh in, as well.

Are retailers holding up their end of the bargain? How converged is converged commerce these days? And when converged commerce breaks, how much do customers care – and what do they tend to do next?

Merchandising: Can Agility And Sustainability Work Together?

Until very recently, fast fashion was the darling of the retail industry, and was given credit for the demise of the moderate-priced department store. But in the past year, it has become apparent that the bloom is off the fast fashion rose. H&M was forced to deal with a billion dollar inventory problem at the end of 2018, and Forever 21 declared bankruptcy in late September 2019.

We know that the rapid turnover of fast fashion styles has created significant environmental impact. It has also become apparent that across other retail verticals and price points, sustainability is becoming a real issue.Most recently, luxury retailer Kerig vowed to become carbon neutral, following in the footsteps of Gucci, who announced similar efforts in 2015.

Then there’s the matter of food. The FDA has reported,”…In the United States, food waste is estimated at between 30-40 percent of the food supply. This estimate, based on estimates from USDA’s Economic Research Service of 31 percent food loss at the retail and consumer levels, corresponded to approximately 133 billion pounds and $161 billion worth of food in 2010. This amount of waste has far-reaching impacts on society:

Wholesome food that could have helped feed families in need is sent to landfills.

Land, water, labor, energy and other inputs are used in producing, processing, transporting, preparing, storing, and disposing of discarded food.”

This begs two questions: First: Do retailers recognize the extent of changing consumer opinions on environmental concerns? And second: How serious are consumers about sustainability vs. low-priced offerings? They may talk the talk, but do they actually walk the walk? We aim to find out.

TBD #2: Now Welcoming Your Ideas

If you have a particular topic you'd like to see us cover, please let us know!

Past topics have included:

• Location Analytics
• C-Suite Careabouts
• Store Health Check
• Home Delivery Options
• Retail Disruptors

Let us know! Contact Linda Wolfe!