Featured Customer
We tried to build an internal solution using a standard database tool, but it simply did not work. Not only did we struggle with scalability issues, but we also needed to cleanse and load the data ourselves, and we discovered it certainly was not trivial. Going with Retail Solutions was the logical decision.
-Gary Hall,
Business Analyst,
Kimberly-Clark
Data Management
Retail Data Management
More and more retailers are sharing downstream data today, and more and more companies have realized the tremendous ROI promise embedded in this opportunity. Analysts have long touted Demand Signal Repositories (DSRs) as the core capability to start leveraging this data, and the foundation of Retail Execution Management, one of the main sources of competitive advantage for CPG companies.
However, companies have come to realize that while implementing a DSR is already a challenge, populating it and keeping it up-to-date while also ensuring data accuracy is even more difficult. Retailers indeed share data, but each of them shares a different data set at a different level of granularity in one of many different formats (EDI, XML, flat files, databases...) and makes it available in one of many distinct transmission mechanisms (FTP, SFTP, EDI, AS2, portals...) To further complicate things, these sharing initiatives constantly evolve as retailers change sharing practices or start making additional data elements available.
Retail Solutions customers leverage Retail Data Management, by Retail Solutions, to enable their customer teams to focus on the usage of, and value creation with, downstream data rather than on cleansing, harmonizing and loading the files sent daily by the retailers.
Retail Data Management, a complete offering in a Software-as-a-Service model, helps CPG companies collect, load, cleanse and harmonize downstream data supplied by retailers so that their teams can start working with reports, analyses and alerts based on Sunday's data as soon as they get to the office on Monday.
Every day, Retail Data Management loads data from over 30 leading global retailers, including 9 of the top 10 American food, drug and mass retailers, and makes this data available to over 300 companies across the Americas and Europe.
Retail Solutions customers concentrate on realizing the promise of Retail Execution Management rather than the menial, time- and resource-consuming tasks associated with data management.
- Data is available next day: Sunday data is loaded, cleansed, harmonized and available for reporting on Monday morning
- Data is readily usable: Retail Solutions will harmonize data across retailers, translate data into CPG company-specific hierarchies and calendars, and provide all necessary attributes and metrics to help category managers, sales people, replenishment specialists and other associates immediately leverage the data in their everyday roles
- Data is integrated into the most widely used downstream data reporting and business intelligence tools in the industry, provided by Retail Solutions and used by over 300 CPG companies across over 30 retailers
Retail Data Management, by Retail Solutions offers a full-service solution for downstream data management:
- Extensive data cleansing: Retail Solutions operates over 600 rules to ensure retailer data is complete, accurate and relevant
- Cross-retailer harmonization: Retail Solutions reconciles data across retailers to help customers analyze and take action both at the individual retailer level, across specific channels, and at the overall market level
- Historical record maintenance: Retail Solutions stores at least 104 weeks of history at the most granular level (store-item-day)
- Integrated to Retail Solutions leading reporting and business intelligence offerings, helping CPG companies take advantage of the data across all processes within the Retail Execution Management scope