Including Uncrowd, Patchworks and Nedap: RTIH’s biggest retail technology articles on LinkedIn
We’re big fans of LinkedIn and are busy building an amazing community of retail tech enthusiasts on the social media platform. These are the articles that are currently on their radars, including Faire, PacSun, N Brown Group, Logiwa, Criteo, Astound Commerce, and the 2023 RTIH Innovation Awards.
Salesforce specialist Bill Donlan joins Astound Commerce as Global CEO
Astound Commerce has named Bill Donlan as its new Global CEO.
The ex-head of the Salesforce Practice at Capgemini and KPMG will take charge immediately at Astound, which provides digital experiences for global B2B and B2C brands in retail and other areas.
It is itself a Global Salesforce C360 platform specialist, so can tap into his prior knowledge of the ecosystem.
2023 RTIH Innovation Awards winners announced during glittering ceremony in central London
In November, we announced the winning submissions for the 2023 RTIH Innovation Awards, sponsored by PMC, FreedomPay, Worldpay from FIS, CADS, 3D Cloud by Marxent, Goodays, and Vista Technology Support.
Our winners were revealed during an event which took place at the Barbican Centre in central London and included a drinks reception in the stunning Conservatory, followed by a Christmas themed three course meal, and awards presentation in the Garden Room.
Scott Thompson, Founder and Editor, RTIH, says: “Since we launched the awards in 2019, they have gone from strength to strength and holding them at the Barbican Centre, a much loved, internationally acclaimed venue, is going to be a tough one to top.”
“Thanks to all those who entered the 2023 awards, many of whom were at our event last night. We received a record number of submissions this year and many fantastic examples of the continued resilience and dynamism of the retail space during hugely challenging times.”
“Congratulations to our 2023 winners and highly commended submissions.”
“To quote a member of our judging panel: “What a year, these awards are really going from strength to strength. There were many categories in there that were so difficult to call. Very worthy entries and winners.”
Further information on all our 2023 entries can be found here.
Faire's Charlotte Broadbent: can independent retailers drive a high street resurgence in 2024?
After a bruising year for retail, there are finally some reasons for optimism going into 2024, says Charlotte Broadbent, General Manager in the UK at Faire, an online wholesale marketplace.
Gresham House Ventures makes £1.75mn follow-on investment in retail technology firm Patchworks
Gresham House Ventures has made a follow-on investment of £1.75 million into Patchworks.
Taking the form of a convertible loan note, this is Gresham House Ventures’ fourth investment in Patchworks.
Forming part of a £2 million round, it brings the former’s total funding to £10.5 million since its first injection of capital in July 2021.
Patchworks offers software that connects key e-commerce systems including shopfront, ERP, CRM and warehouse management, enabling businesses to streamline the integration of their technology stack.
Retail veteran Clare Empson takes on Director of Supply Chain role at N Brown Group
Fashion and homeware digital retailer, N Brown Group, has announced the appointment of Clare Empson as Director of Supply Chain. She takes over from Phil Barnes, who confirmed last year that he will retire in the spring.
Empson will join the N Brown Executive Board, holding responsibility for Operations, Distribution, Workplace, Engineering and Facilities, Health and Safety, Supply Chain MI, Solutions and Logistics Transformation.
Her appointment is part of a Group wide transformation that aims to create a customer first experience with technology at its core. She will be responsible for ensuring shoppers are provided an outstanding customer service proposition through its supply chain operations.
Empson has a range of experience across the retail sector over the past 25 years, and in leading global retail operations.
She was most recently Director of Operations at Ted Baker, where she also held senior roles within its Retail and Transformation areas during her time there.
Uncrowd claims its pre-Xmas foresight about the best UK grocers is vindicated by official sales
Uncrowd has used its data technology to assess the experience of shopping in the leading eight UK grocery stores before Christmas 2023.
It correctly predicted Sainsbury’s would be the supermarket with the biggest revenue gain over Christmas – “nearly a week before Kantar’s official numbers were released,” said CEO and Founder, Richard Hammond.
But Morrisons was still rated its overall winner for its price, quality, speed, fresh and premium options.
Kantar Worldpanel recently revealed that British supermarket Sainsbury’s saw sales rise 9.3% in the four weeks from 1-24 December 2023 in the crucial pre-Christmas trading period, giving the grocer its highest UK market share (15.8%) since December 2020.
According to Uncrowd’s Christmas Grocery 2023 report entitled 'Sleighing It! UK Grocery at Christmas', Sainsbury’s was always likely to be the revenue winner during the present cost of living (COL) crisis because it was the standout in its ‘Stretching the Christmas Budget’ category.
This measures a family’s main shop on a tight budget, with preferences evident for fresh food, plenty of options on the shelves and budget choices, alongside family one-off necessities to mark the special occasion for this squeezed middle segment of the marketplace.
The discounters, Aldi and Lidl, did well in Kantar’s market segment focused exclusively on value. They also performed well in Uncrowd’s assessment of their specialist area.
PacSun kicks off deployment of Nedap iD Cloud Store RFID solution across its stores
Nedap has partnered with PacSun to implement RFID across the company’s fleet of stores.
Deployment of iD Cloud Store to all of PacSun’s stores is estimated to be completed in Q1 2024.
It says that it is tapping the solution to increase inventory accuracy, inform replenishment decisions, and improve both omnichannel and in-store experiences.
Shirley Gao, Chief Digital and Information Officer at PacSun, says: “Meeting our Gen Z customers in how they want to shop is crucial. PacSun shoppers are social media savvy and shop our exclusive merch drops with urgency.”
“We pay attention to our customers' desired preferences and listen to them every second of every day - including their expectations of a seamless shopping experience. To achieve this, PacSun is a digital disruptor and we actively invest in technologies that will help take our brand experience to the next level.”
“Partnering with Nedap is helping us unlock competitive advantages as we tap into data-rich fulfilment and operational cheat-codes to get the right product to the right stores for the right customers.”
Chris Patton departs Punchh for app platform Rovertown as Head of Integrations and Implementation
Rovertown reports that Chris Patton has joined the company as Head of Integrations and Implementation.
The aim of this new position is to streamline the process from when a retailer joins the app platform to launch.
Patton’s experience working with leading technology vendors allows Rovertown to more easily add new partners to the existing integrations in its Integration Store.
“This is a critical step as we continue investing in the future of our company,” says Mike Philip, CEO and Co-Founder at Rovertown.
“In this next stage of growth, it’s essential to quickly meet the technical requirements for vendor integrations and easily navigate the micro-steps involved in new app launches. Patton brings a wealth of experience and has already made a significant impact on our team.”
Macy’s veteran Melanie Zimmermann joins Criteo to lead the company’s global retail media practice
Criteo has announced the appointment of Melanie Zimmermann to lead its global retail media practice.
Zimmermann joins from Macy’s, where she built its Media Network, the company’s retail media network that reaches more than 46 million customers across Macy's and Bloomingdale's and is said to influence more than 440 million transactions online and in-store.
In her most recent role as VP, Head of Macy’s Media Network, she was responsible for developing and executing strategy and leading all retail media operations from media planning, sales, campaign management and analytics.
At Criteo, Zimmermann will report to Chief Revenue Officer Brian Gleason and her team will be in charge of driving the global vision and strategy of Criteo’s retail media practice and forging alignment across regions.
She will also play a pivotal role in retail media product strategy and prioritisation, closely connecting commercial needs and product development.
Disrupt Retail Innovation Lab fourth edition opens with focus on data, in-store ops and media
The Disrupt Retail Innovation Lab has issued its latest call for technology inviting start-ups to enter their ideas to get support from four retailers for pilots and proofs of concepts (PoCs) in the areas of data and customer insights, in-store operations, and retail media. Applications open on 8th January and close on 4th February.
'A game changer': Logiwa unveils new look Logiwa IO Fulfilment Management System
Logiwa has updated its Logiwa IO Fulfilment Management System (FMS) to cope with the high volume fulfilment needs of today’s modern digital marketplaces.
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