Retail Insight partners with Asda to tackle phantom inventory

Since 2009, we have been supporting supermarket chain Asda, to enhance their in-store operations. Our data-led solutions have delivered tangible and far-reaching benefits for the Asda estate. As a result, with a tighter grip on replenishment and availability, has come a greater focus on accurate inventory, in particular, phantom inventory.

Theft, short deliveries, and miss-scanned items at checkout are a few of the reasons why retailers struggle with inventory management. Indeed, recent research from ECR Retail Loss found that 60% of inventory records are incorrect. which leads to supply chain replenishment lags, lost sales, and, ultimately, disappointed customers.

As a result, we have worked closely with the Asda team to implement a solution that can tackle this challenge head-on. After a successful trial in February & March 2023, we are pleased to announce our partnership with Asda on the full store rollout of our InventoryInsight solution, in particular, the Phantom Inventory Optimisation Model.

“The decision to rollout InventoryInsight for our stores was a no-brainer given the strong results we saw in the trial period. We believe that adopting this methodology as part of our instore processes will ultimately lead to a better in-store experience for our shoppers,” said Neil Fairclough, Senior Director of Retail Transformation at Asda

Our innovative solution gives a clear view of inventory discrepancies in stores. It does this by processing data using our proprietary cognitive technology to create and train a data model for each item in all stores. We then provide targeted alerts to staff to allow them to action the highest priority items, increasing efficiency, productivity, and margin. In other words, InventoryInsight detects, alerts, and can correct instances of phantom inventory automatically.

“It’s been a pleasure working with Asda stakeholders on the Phantom Inventory trial and seeing their commitment to a better store operating process. Asda is at the forefront of technology solutions for in-store colleagues that ultimately lead to better instore availability and customer satisfaction,” said Kieran O’Brien, Client Director

We are excited to embark on this journey with Asda and are confident in being able to recover sales faster, increase in-store productivity, and, ultimately, reduce phantom inventory. 

If you would like to find out more about InventoryInsight and see how you can save over 50% of labor hours, you can visit our InventoryInsight product page