Retail Reality Check

Shoppers don’t care what the system says. If they walk into a store for sneakers, paper towels, or a phone charger and the shelf is empty, that’s what they remember. And the impact is bigger than a single missed sale. Over time, it erodes trust and sends customers elsewhere.

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Walmart is the latest retailer to team up with OpenAI to let ChatGPT users directly shop and check out its products.

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Ulta Beauty is now live with UB Marketplace, a curated marketplace dedicated to beauty and wellness products, on its e-commerce site and app. The retailer initially announced its plans to open UB Marketplace in March 2025.

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The apparel giant is entering a multi-year partnership with Google Cloud to accelerate its digital-enabled technology strategy to reimagine retail across its portfolio of brands, including Old Navy, Gap, Banana Republic and Athleta.

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Williams-Sonoma is leveraging the Salesforce Agentforce 360 Platform to build and deploy agentic AI bots intended to bolster customer service and enhance shopper experiences. Each brand in the Williams-Sonoma, Inc. portfolio will seamlessly integrate AI agents with human experts across their websites.

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I just returned from SAP Connect 2025 in Las Vegas. This was essentially a new event as a unification of five prior events (CX, Spend, Success, Finance, and Supply Chain Connect) to showcase transformation across all lines of business, with a huge focus on business AI and role-based automation.

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A Pittsburgh-based regional food, fuel and pharmacy retailer has successfully replatformed its loyalty program for real-time personalization and future-proofed operations. The grocer has leveraged Eagle Eye AIR throughout this process.

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As turnaround efforts proceed to fix Nike’s digital sales and general revenue trajectory in 2025, the sportswear and apparel giant’s artificial intelligence strategy intersects with many parts of its business — including how Nike is using AI to improve customer service, represent its brand and optimize its products.

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Wayfair Inc. is reaching out to home design pros with a new tool integrated into its Wayfair Professional platform.

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The online giant is rolling out Amazon Quick Suite, a new agentic AI solution developed by its Amazon Web Services cloud computing subsidiary that it calls an "AI teammate" for professionals.

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Checkout.com has announced a new partnership with HelloFresh. The aim of the tie up is to help HelloFresh simplify and optimise its payments across all of its global markets.

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Circ reports a collaboration with H&M Group. For the first time, the retailer will incorporate Circ’s recycled fibers from polycotton textile waste into its product offerings.

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Aramark is rolling out Culinary Co-Pilot (CCP) — a proprietary, embedded AI-powered tool designed to streamline and enhance decision-making across culinary operations.

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Sainsbury’s Rugby supermarket has become the first complete trial store for the UK grocery giant’s Smartshop Pay on Handset technology.

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Raising Cane’s is inviting customers to step inside a haunted version of its restaurants in partnership with Emperia. It has created its first ever haunted restaurant Halloween virtual experience, an interactive, limited time digital adventure anchored around a collectible Cane’s glow in the dark cup.

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Finnish retailer to drive efficiency and growth with smarter product assortment decisions. Broman Group, a Finnish automotive spare part and accessories retailer, has chosen to expand their use of RELEX Solutions.

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The growing complexity of the DashMart micro fulfillment network made it essential to improve operations. DashMart’s Supply Chain planning function relied on manual processes that made it difficult to scale.

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Grubhub is powering robot delivery at more than 40 US campuses nationwide. And in partnership with Avride, it has now completed over 100,000 autonomous deliveries at The Ohio State University's Columbus campus.

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Refuel Operating Co. LLC is transitioning to the PAR Retail platform, bringing together real-time loyalty, guest engagement and actionable insights to better understand and serve customers.

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Sheetz Inc. is launching the next evolution of the Sheetz Rewards experience by transitioning its loyalty operations to Ignite Retail Technology.

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El Corte Inglés has joined Bolt Food’s on demand delivery platform.

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For Mondelez International—the $80 billion global maker of Oreo, Ritz and Chips Ahoy—the shift from Microsoft Azure to Amazon Web Services wasn’t just another IT project. It was a full-scale reinvention of how the company approaches cybersecurity in a hyper-connected world.

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Tesco has launched new accessibility modes to help visually impaired customers on its self-service checkouts in both UK and ROI Tesco stores.

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IGA USA Inc. has formed a distribution partnership with Bitcoin Depot to expand access to the company’s kiosks across the United States. IGA stores will be able to offer access to Bitcoin Depot’s in-store Bitcoin ATMs, where permitted.

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Tesco has launched new accessibility modes to help visually impaired customers on its self-service checkouts in both UK and ROI Tesco stores.

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SharkNinja is using Salesforce's Agentforce primarily for customer support. In doing so, it allows the retailer "to focus on high-value interactions that deepen consumer relationships," it said.

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Portugal’s NOS Cinemas is piloting a new store within a store concept, developed by Sensei, which works through its 5G and is being tested at its NorteShopping location.

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Clothing brand Tommy John is seeing benefits from AI-enabled product lifecycle management.

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Love’s Travel Stops is launching what it says is the first retail media network designed specifically for travel stops.

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Onyx CenterSource announced a significant expansion of its GroupPay platform across 700 Hyatt properties.

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Weis Markets is implementing the Cognira PromoAI solution to gain real-time insights that will help it evaluate performance and make better decisions in its promotional efforts. The retailer selected PromoAI for its AI functionality, intuitive workflows, and analytical capabilities that will streamline promotions in-store and across digital channels.

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Giant Food announced a strategic partnership with cash-back platform Upside last week, marking the first collaboration between the Washington D.C.-based technology company and an Ahold Delhaize USA banner. The partnership will offer Giant customers Upside’s personalized cash back rewards program across the retailer's 163 Mid-Atlantic locations.

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The Magnum Ice Cream Co. and NotCo AI, an AI platform for CPG innovation, have formed a partnership aimed at ramping up demand-driven innovation and growth in the U.S. ice cream category.

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Pingo Doce, which is part of is part of Jerónimo Martins, a food retailer with over 5,700 stores across Portugal, Poland, and Colombia, has teamed with SymphonyAI in a bid to monetise insights, drive precision execution, and give CPG partners a real-time edge.

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Better Health Market and Gelson’s have successfully adopted digital circular solution. Since adopting Swiftly’s Audience Optimizer solution, independent grocers Better Health Market and Gelson’s Markets have been able to extend their digital communication capabilities.

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Executives from Pandora, The Cotswold Company and Kingfisher shared where they are placing their strategic bets on artificial intelligence (AI) deployments to get the most bang for their investment buck at the FT Live Future of Retail event in London this week.

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East of England Co-op has become the first UK retailer to pilot full digital compliance across its estate when maintaining its Costa Coffee coffee to go machines, as it ramps up a commitment to reducing its use of paper.

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The central Texas regional affiliate of Goodwill Industries is streamlining product pricing, tagging and channel assignment with proprietary AI technology.

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OnePay reportedly plans to add cryptocurrency trading and custody services to its financial app. These new services from the FinTech company that is majority-owned by Walmart will be powered by Zerohash and will enable users to access bitcoin and ether later this year.

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Forget beautiful and eye-catching website design, A/B tests, and run-of-the-mill cart optimization. In the world of agentic shopping, it all takes a back seat. AI-powered shopping agents aren’t browsing your homepage or responding to on-brand banner ads. They’re scanning product feeds, parsing metadata, and completing purchases autonomously.

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Perfect Corp. has partnered with Erborian for the launch of the brand’s Find Your Match experience. The tie up highlights Erborian’s latest launch, a new CC Creme.

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Tesco has Whoosh, and now Morrisons has announced the launch of Morrisons Now, an on demand delivery service offering fresh food in as little as one hour.

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Rally House recognized the need to upgrade its point-of-sale (POS) system to keep pace with rapid expansion and evolving customer expectations. Its legacy POS system was proving inadequate, lacking the scalability and integration capabilities necessary to support the company's needs.

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Loblaw Advance is strengthening its partnership with STRATACACHE, expanding its in-store digital screen network across Loblaw Companies stores. STRATACACHE will invest in building and connecting digital screens to operate within the Loblaw Advance retail media network.

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Total Wine is adopting two public cloud platforms, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, in partnership with end-to-end hybrid cloud and AI solutions company Rackspace Technology.

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The discount retailer is deploying the Legion workforce management platform in an effort to better manage its labor budget while also increasing employee engagement across its North American fleet of stores and distribution centers.

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Google Cloud today announced the expansion of its long-standing partnership with Gordon Food Service – one of North America's largest privately held foodservice distributors – focused on a comprehensive AI strategy that includes broad adoption of Google Workspace and the deployment of Gemini Enterprise, its agentic platform designed to bring the full power of Google's AI to every employee.

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Select Dollar General customers are encountering stores with no visible employees. TikTok videos have surfaced showing locations in Banner Elk, N.C., and in Texas where shoppers are questioning the absence of staff.

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Danish home furnishing retailer to implement targeted supply chain solutions across 3,350 stores in 29 countries

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When the time came to search for a POS to replace its legacy system, its private equity firm, which also owns Beef 'O' Bradys and the Brass Tap, suggested Toast, uniting all three brands on one POS.

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Revolve Group has launched a Zelig AI powered ‘Build a Look’ fashion experience, allowing shoppers to create a digital closet and mix and match outfits virtually for the first time on the brand’s e-commerce site.

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The retail giant is deploying ambient sensors on pallets to gather supply chain data from its massive network, which will feed its AI systems. [Photo: Wiliot] Walmart will be putting millions of sensors on its pallets across its supply chain chain, in a move that technology partner Wiliot is calling “the first large-scale deployment of ambient Internet of Things (IoT)” sensors in the retail industry.

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Brazilian wholesale distributor of medical, hospital, and surgical materials will deploy RELEX forecasting and replenishment capabilities to improve agility, reduce errors, and improve customer service

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Roadrunner is taking another step in its transformation from turnaround story to technology-driven carrier, announcing the full rollout of its new enterprise-wide pick-up and delivery (P&D) software.

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Virgin Voyages and Google Cloud today announced a strategic partnership to embed generative AI across the cruise line's business, with more than 50 specialized AI agents on Gemini Enterprise now deployed company-wide. "Email Ellie," the first agent from this collaboration, has already driven significant business impact, contributing to a record-breaking sales month and validating the company's ambitious AI strategy.

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Walmart has introduced the first of 10 planned “Auto Care Centers (ACCs) of the Future” in Fayetteville, Ark., providing customers with a contactless self-service car care experience via the retailer’s mobile app.

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The Hilton Anatole hotel in Dallas, Texas has deployed digital wayfinding technology from Living Map.

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Modern point of sale solution to be deployed at 70-plus stores; the cloud-native order management system adds powerful omnichannel capabilities

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NCR Atleos and Moto are extending their partnership to deliver access to cash through the NCR Atleos Cashzone Network, which now includes more than 16,000 ATMs across the U.K.

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The Body Shop, which filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection and ceased operations in the U.S. in March 2024, is relaunching in the U.S. with a digital-first approach, offering customers access to its product portfolio through a dedicated online store and a digital storefront on Amazon.

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