ROI and economic uncertainty top UK retailers’ digital transformation challenges, PMC
Return on investment (ROI) and economic uncertainty remain UK retailers’ top digital transformation barriers, according to research released by PMC and Retail Economics, with the trade-off between innovation investment and margin protection creating opposing pressure points for businesses.
Its survey of over 100 senior retailers and brand leaders showed that ROI and overall economic uncertainty were the most common transformation challenges for 35%.
“Despite a challenging economic reality, retailers can’t afford to take their foot off the innovation accelerator,” says Richard Lowe, CEO at PMC. “And that means cutting their digital transformation cloth a little differently. A back to basics approach - adopting simplified, product-led delivery models - will enable retailers to drive results from their tech stacks, without tying themselves in knots.”
Retail Economics' CEO, Richard Lim, says: “Retailers face a trade-off between the need to invest in innovation versus other, often competing, business needs around cost saving and margin protection.” And this, he adds, requires a focus on setting - or resetting - digital foundations as well as fixing and removing siloed legacy systems.
Infrastructure challenges are also creating roadblocks in retailers’ innovation strategies, with a third reporting ongoing issues with legacy systems and a further 24% citing internal silos among the problems preventing progress. Culture remains another key sticking point, with 24% of retailers saying they face an absence of leadership support to champion tech deployments, or that executive teams lack the strategic vision to back investment needed for digital transformation success.
“Getting the fundamentals right is mission critical,” Lowe says. “In our work with leading brands, we see that those retailers who embrace best-of-breed, modular approaches - underpinned by simple but unified data integrations - cut the cost of complexity while driving tangible performance.”
2026 RTIH Innovation Awards
Digital transformation will be a key focus area at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards.
The awards are now open for entries and celebrate global retail technology innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.
Our winners will be revealed at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony, taking place at The HAC in Central London on Wednesday, 4th November.
Check out our 2025 winners here.
Our 2025 hall of fame entrants were revealed during a sold out event which took place at The HAC on 16th October and consisted of a drinks reception, three course meal, and awards ceremony presided over by award winning comedian, actress and writer Tiff Stevenson.
In his welcome speech, Scott Thompson, Founder and Editor, RTIH, said: “This is the awards’ fifth year as a physical event. We started off with just 30 people at the South Place Hotel not far from here, then moved to London Bridge Hotel, then The Barbican, and last year RIBA’s HQ in the West End.”
“But I’m conscious of the fact that, to quote the legend that is Taylor Swift, You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby. So, this year we’ve moved to our biggest venue yet, and also pulled in our largest number of entries to date and broken attendance records.”
He added: “This year’s submissions have without doubt been our best yet. To quote one of the judges: The examples of innovative developments across both traditional and digital retail spaces were truly remarkable.”
Congratulations to our winners, and a big thank you to our sponsors, judging panel, the legend that is Tiff Stevenson, and all those who attended our 2025 gathering
