Summary
- Client Details: A leading US-based retail industry with a dedicated workforce of 25,000 employees and a diverse product range.
- Challenges: The client, with its vast network of retail stores, faced challenges in managing promotional campaigns. With incentives from multiple brands, ensuring POS, shelf, and display compliance became a formidable task. The sheer scale of the operation, with thousands of stores, necessitated a massive investment of approximately 250,000-man hours each year. Besides, coordinating the unique requirements of each brand across various store combinations proved to be a complex act. Navigating this intricate web of demands required meticulous attention to detail and efficient resource allocation.
- Solutions: Our innovative predictive analytics solution that integrated with their campaign management system bridged the gap between predictive and actual sales across locations for each campaign. Within an impressive timeframe of 3-5 days from the promotion launch, our solution swiftly identified non-compliant stores and highlighted those likely to comply. AWS SageMaker, powered by Python helped the client to reduce excessive manpower and automate shelf and display monitoring required to ensure compliance.
Impact Delivered
All of the above initiatives resulted in:
- Reduction of 85% of manpower required to ensure compliance.
- Better measurement of promotion impact for each brand.
- Proper allocation of resources in critical business areas
About the Client
- We recently worked with a leading retail industry based in the USA that has millions of retail stores worldwide and a diverse product range. With a colossal workforce of 25,000 dedicated employees, this remarkable organization stands as a true embodiment of success and innovation. Their unwavering commitment to providing exceptional products and services has positioned them at the forefront of the retail landscape.
- Harnessing their extensive expertise and forward-thinking approach, our client continuously revolutionizes the retail experience, captivating customers nationwide. Their unparalleled passion for excellence has propelled them to new heights, redefining industry standards and leaving an indelible mark on the hearts and minds of consumers.
Challenges
- The client faced an array of challenges due to their extensive network of retail stores and the multitude of promotional campaigns they were running with various brands. The primary challenge lay in achieving and maintaining compliance across all stores for POS, shelf, and display requirements.
- Firstly, the sheer scale of the client’s operations posed a significant hurdle. With thousands of stores spread across different locations, ensuring consistent compliance became a daunting task. Coordinating efforts and maintaining uniform standards across such a vast network required extensive resources and meticulous planning. Secondly, the client had to contend with the intricacies of brand-specific promotion campaigns. Each brand had its unique set of guidelines and requirements, necessitating careful attention to detail. Ensuring that every store adhered to these specific guidelines added complexity and increased the chances of human error.
- Moreover, the allocation of resources was a major challenge. Employing 2,50,000 man hours annually to ensure compliance showcased the substantial manpower needed. This not only translated into high labor costs but also posed logistical challenges in managing such a large workforce efficiently. With different brands and stores having their distinct identities and layouts, ensuring uniform compliance and brand representation became an ongoing battle. Addressing these challenges required a comprehensive approach that could streamline compliance processes, optimize resource allocation, and enhance coordination between brands and stores while minimizing errors and reducing costs.
Solutions
- Our expert analytics team developed a state-of-the-art predictive analytics solution that seamlessly integrated with their campaign management system, revolutionizing their approach. Our solution’s primary goal was to bridge the gap between predictive and actual sales across multiple locations for each campaign. Within an impressive timeframe of 3-5 days from the launch of our promotion, our cutting-edge technology swiftly identified non-compliant stores and highlighted those likely to comply. By doing so, we significantly reduced the excessive manpower, empowering their team to focus on high-value tasks while ensuring compliance is effectively managed.
- Our client’s success story exemplified how our predictive analytics solution transformed their compliance management process. By adopting our innovative technology, they witnessed a significant reduction in manual efforts and resources required to track and manage compliance across their store network. Our solution excels at differentiating between various types of compliance, providing valuable insights into store performance. Within days of launching a promotion, they gained access to a comprehensive list of non-compliance stores, enabling them to take prompt corrective actions. Additionally, the solution highlighted stores likely to comply, optimizing their allocation of resources for maximum impact. The reduction in required manpower allowed the client to allocate their resources to other critical areas of their business activities.
- AWS SageMaker, powered by Python, revolutionized retail compliance by automating shelf and display monitoring for our esteemed client. Leveraging cutting-edge AI and computer vision, this dynamic duo unleashed unparalleled efficiency and accuracy in assessing compliance. Through SageMaker’s machine-learning capabilities, we trained a custom model that swiftly analyzed product placements, shelf organization, and promotional displays. Python’s versatility facilitated seamless integration, enabling rapid development and deployment of this innovative solution. By eliminating tedious manual inspections, our client witnessed a quantum leap in productivity and savings. Swift, precise, and visually captivating, this automated system unleashed a new era of compliance monitoring, empowering our retail partner to conquer the market with unrivaled shelf and display excellence.
