CASEY GOLDEN

In today’s retail landscape, merchandisers are overwhelmed with data but often lack actionable insights. They face the challenge of making quick decisions on product selection, inventory, and more, all while navigating fragmented data systems. Traditional BI tools, while useful, can complicate this process with complex dashboards that don’t cater to individual needs. The good news? AI-powered analytics are stepping in to bridge this gap. By integrating generative AI with BI platforms, merchandisers can easily access insights using natural language, simplifying decision-making. For instance, instead of sifting through multiple dashboards, they can simply ask an AI for sales data on specific products across regions. This integration not only streamlines workflows but enhances data-driven decision-making, ultimately improving product assortments and customer satisfaction. As we embrace AI, the future of merchandising is set to become even more intuitive and responsive, giving retailers a competitive edge. Conversations On Retail, Chain Store Age

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Ulta Beauty has some big plans for Holiday 2024... 🎄 What is the #1 retail beauty destination prioritizing through Q4? 🤔 🧴 Categories on the Rise - Ulta has invested in in-demand categories such as body care and wellness to ensure it remains the go-to destination for trending products. It's also positioned itself as a leader in the Gen Alpha skincare craze. 🤩 Bringing Joy to Stores - With cultural sentiment seeming to always be negative, Ulta has an initiative to bring more joy to stores, and the gifting season presents the perfect opportunity to communicate this to customers. 👂 Listening to Customers - With 44 million loyalty members, Ulta has an incredible opportunity to learn about trends and get feedback on initiatives. This enhances a sense of community and ensures that retailer continues to deliver what customers truly want. My bet is that Ulta Beauty will continue its beauty dominance through the holiday season and grow as a major retail beauty destination through 2025. #ultabeauty #beautyretail #giftingretail #beautygifts New Ground

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Key EMARKETER stat: US ecommerce resale volume will hit $80.60 billion this year, a growth of 3.4% YoY, per our December 2023 forecast. Beyond the chart: Ecommerce resale volume is returning to growth after a 6.9% dip YoY in 2022 and a 2.5% one in 2023, per eMarketer forecast. But it still hasn’t returned to its pandemic high of $85.87 billion in 2021. Growth in the number of online fashion buyers has slowed, leading platforms to search for strategies to boost order values by offering luxury goods and courting wealthy shoppers. #ecommerce #resale #retailsales

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As we look toward the retail holiday season and planning for the year ahead, MOHR Retail will be hosting a panel discussion that explores the landscape of retail store environments today, focusing on a range of topics, including the dynamic roles of store teams, the rise and fall of self-checkout systems, how stores are increasingly becoming fulfillment centers, and how successful retailers are addressing issues related to mental health, safety, and burnout amid preparations for the holiday season. Here’s a quick overview of some of these hot-button retail store trends and issues and what we’ll be focusing on during the webinar: ↪The Evolution of Store Roles With the surge of Buy Online, Pick Up In-Store (BOPIS) options and stores doubling as fulfillment centers, retail teams are adapting to new responsibilities. The traditional role of a store employee has shifted from managing in-store tasks to balancing online orders and managing stock all while building loyalty by ensuring a seamless customer experience, both online and offline. ↪The Rise and Fall of Self-Checkout Self-checkout was once hailed as a revolutionary step forward in retail efficiency, offering customers a quicker way to check out while reducing the need for staff. However, recent concerns over security, increased theft, and the impersonal nature of the experience have led some retailers to reconsider their reliance on self-checkout systems. ↪Doing More with Less As staffing challenges continue to rise, retailers are finding themselves needing to do more with fewer employees. Retailers need to rethink scheduling, training, and multi-role positions while looking for best practices that help streamline operations. If you’re interested in joining this panel discussion, reach out to me! We’re looking for your experiences, insights, ideas, and/or other lessons you might be able to share to add to a lively, thought-provoking discussion #LearnMOHR #RetailTrends #Retail

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Department stores will need to break away from old habits if they want to become a staple for younger generations – and stay relevant for decades more. I had the chance to share my perspective with CNBC recently on how department stores are leaning into new tactics like third-party marketplaces to stay relevant. Read the full article here: https://on.bcg.com/4chNiW4

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Kirsten Chang provides a nice summary of today’s retail/consumer sentiment - spending, saving, and more… Get the “Retail Detail” here: https://lnkd.in/g-uRQY9C It’s a fast read with great #data and ways to play with #ETFs. All 👀 on earnings! TMX Group VettaFi

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The fast moving consumer goods retail industry has reached its Rubicon, an inflection point demanding a decision. It is time for you, and your organizations, to make a deliberate choice to leap to the exponential path and leverage never-before-possible capabilities to create the future of retail, or remain on the linear path that you’ve lived. A path that leads to retail purgatory. “Hawkins delivers a compelling wake-up call, highlighting the urgent need for transformation in the face of the exponentially accelerating innovation in the industry.” - Tom Furphy, CEO Consumer Equity Partners Order now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Amplify Publishing, and wherever books are sold. https://lnkd.in/gp5qetYG Center for Advancing Retail & Technology (CART) #retail #innovation #transformation #disruption #grocery #supermarket #CPG #FMCG #technology #Bionic #BionicRetail #CEO #CIO #CMO #COO

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A new survey reveals the areas holiday shoppers plan to cut back this year https://lnkd.in/etx3J6zx Product categories respondents are most likely to cut spending on year-over-year include electronics (53%), health & beauty (45%), toys (44%), groceries (36%) and home goods (35%) #retail Chain Store Age

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Shein has been repeatedly rejected in its attempts to become a member of the National Retail Federation, the largest trade association in the industry. The NRF's acceptance could provide validation for Shein and help legitimize the company in the eyes of U.S. lawmakers. Shein is facing scrutiny over its supply chain, use of a tariff law loophole, and geopolitical concerns related to China. The NRF's approval could be a positive catalyst for Shein, although the organization has not completely shut the door on Shein's membership application. The NRF's board leadership team and executive committee play a significant role in membership discussions, with key industry insiders involved in the decision-making process. #shein #nrf #ipo

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This is a good article on retail media, but I would add two things for the C-Suite to consider. Structure follows strategy. I still see many CPG companies that have not wrestled to the ground how retail media fits into the structure of their financial budget structure (trade, brand) and their organizational structure (sales, marketing, centralized/decentralized). I was in a meeting recently with a company that had 5 stakeholders weighing in on retail media strategy and execution between consultants, agencies, and internal resources. This lack of clear structure is sometimes a symptom of the absence of a well thought out retail media strategy to begin with but we are also seeing structure get in the way of executing a well crafted strategy. Internal constraints, entrenched thinking, turf wars, and the preverbial fly ball that drops between well intentioning teammates can get in the way of optimized retail media performance. Not saying these are easy fixes but they are controllables. They are worth attending to in every CPG organization.

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Dollar General is enhancing its retail media program by teaming up with solutions provider Criteo. The commerce media platform will work with the retailer's Dollar General Media Network (DGMN) arm to support onsite sponsored ad offerings. Through this arrangement, brand partners can access inventory and campaign execution and utilize Criteo’s self-service demand-side platform. Among other capabilities, brands can leverage DGMN’s inventory within their private market through Criteo’s retailer monetization platform. In addition, the technology enables brands to reach Dollar General’s digital customers who often build lists online before making their weekly in-store purchases. Omnichannel insights will be available for marketers to see if sales are taking place online or in-store. | Progressive Grocer https://lnkd.in/gATgumgr #retail #retailmedia #grocery #shoppers #media #digital

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Here are five key shifts in #consumer behavior, and practical steps for #retailers to respond effectively, remain competitive, and drive long-term success courtesy of Eric Karofsky, CEO, VectorHX.

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Good article in WSJ’s CIO Journal today about Gen AI’s potential in retail. Many retailers are talking about AI and many solution providers are weaving AI into their capabilities; but there is also a resurgence of ‘vaporware’ connected to AI as the hype escalates. In reality - and the article does a good job of this - there are multiple areas where Gen AI can absolutely add value to retail activities. The areas I’m most focused on are hyper-personalization of marketing, business process automation, and data insights. The real magic happens when you combine these things. Together, these synergistic Gen AI capabilities are poised to transform and disrupt traditional retail marketing. But technology alone is an enabler. It must be combined with changing business processes to be transformative. And that’s what’s beginning to happen in historically mass-driven FMCG retail. Retailers using capabilities provided by a company like Birdzi, Inc. are upending traditional retail marketing, finding it is now more efficient, more cost effective, and more impactful to go to market on a true customer-specific basis. No more mass promotions, no more segment-based targeting. Gen AI capabilities, combined with big data, automate the process of developing, communicating, and delivering, hyper-personalized promotions and content to each individual customer. Understand the fundamental change that is happening here. For the first time, technology is enabling retailers to truly be customer-focused in how they go to market, rather than product driven. This was not possible before artificial intelligence. Marketing personalization was limited to simply filtering a finite number of mass promotions (ex. ad items) or coupons to surface those most relevant to the shopper. This was all current technology was capable of. Birdzi’s tech blows away those limitations, able to generate n number of customized promotions for each individual shopper, drawn from the 30,000 or 40,000 or 80,000 SKUs the retailers has on its shelves. And do this at scale. But most importantly - and most powerfully - Birdzi’s technology is disruptive: It changes shoppers’ expectations. Personalized Disruption article here: https://lnkd.in/gCPT8-sK #retail #FMCG #CPG #technology #AI #transformation #disruption #grocery #supermarket Center for Advancing Retail & Technology (CART) Birdzi, Inc. Shekar Raman #CEO #CMO #COO #CIO #retailinnovation #retailtech #genai Greg Fasullo Todd P. Michaud Pasquelo Tate https://lnkd.in/gaifbFkU

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Lots to think about as we look to retail trends for 2025. Retailers must continue to embrace both physical and online merchandising as crucial components to success, and brands must continue to set themselves apart on shelf. https://lnkd.in/gkpN43v3

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Retail sales rose significantly, showing strong increases both month-over-month and year-over-year, as consumers continued to spend and drive growth https://lnkd.in/ekHc4QcA Total retail sales (excluding automobiles and gasoline but including restaurants) rose 1.35% month-over-month in May and were up 3.03% year-over-year #retail Chain Store Age

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The size of a retailer does not guarantee sustained success or outperformance. With the advanced technology widely available now, size does not confine a retailer to low performance or value destruction. Generating positive and impactful value in the retail industry necessitates the implementation of courageous decisions and bold strategic moves, and the opportune moment to commence this endeavour is now. #andrewtanatomisingapore #theatomiway #atomi15 #Gifu #retail #innovation #Japan #Singapore

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