The retail analytics playbook

Type: White Paper

As in football, a retail playbook is a collaborative effort from management (coaches) covering all disciplines – merchandising, store operations, finance, logistics, marketing and IT. IT plays a vital role, much like scouting in football, because the IT department owns all of the performance information. The challenge for IT is to present the information in the right context so that users can take action — otherwise, what is the point of having the information in the first place? Without having a playbook and an agile business intelligence infrastructure, it is doubtful that a retailer can successfully compete against those that do.

The mention of a retail playbook raises several questions: Who is the quarterback? Who calls the plays? Too often, retailers silo themselves into independent, insufficiently coordinated units such as Merchandise, Operations, Supply Chain, Planning, etc. The playbook offers the possibility of an integrated and powerful response under a team leader. In retail, the team leader can be the buyer, the category manager or the planner. In narrow-mix specialty store chains, it can be the COO. Most importantly, the team leader must be empowered to call for action across organizational lines. All specialists must then follow through with their own well-defined roles and responsibilities. Otherwise, a sequence of broken plays will surely ruin your season.