Retail’s Responsible Reset | Accenture

Retail’s
Responsible
Reset
The six imperatives for growth

Contents
Industry backdrop
01. Reset consumer offerings
02. Reset channels
03. Reset fulfillment
04. Reset sourcing
05. Reset talent
06. Reset data
Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved. 2
Next steps
Retail’s Responsible Reset
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Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved.
Industry backdrop
With the retail industry in perpetual flux, there’s
no rest for the weary. Traditional retailers are
vulnerable to disruptors from within and to a
barrage of external forces beyond their control.
The last thing they should do is hunker down
and wait for things to settle. Because they
never will.
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Retail’s Responsible Reset | Industry backdrop

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Traditional retailers are vulnerable to disruptors
from within the industry as well as a barrage of
external forces beyond their control, which are
creating massive demand volatility and uncertainty.
Retailers are scrambling to balance costs and
preserve margins while assessing how to respond
to a permanent state of unpredictability that
touches everything they do.
The challenge (and opportunity) for retailers is to
strengthen digital capabilities while fully harnessing
the physical model they’ve built over decades. This
is a profound transformation that requires a reset of
every aspect of the business—people, process and
technology. All while navigating environmental,
social, and governance (ESG) implications.
The retail industry
is in perpetual flux

Let retail’s responsible reset begin
It’s time for retailers to demonstrate the resilience and
creativity that have been hallmarks of the retail industry for
years. Challenges abound, but so do opportunities to
create a new future of retail growth.

Retail’s Responsible Reset | The six imperatives for growth
Reset consumer offerings
Connect offerings to a retailer’s purpose in
consumers’ lives in ways that are authentic
to the brand and create new revenue streams.
Reset channels
Take a portfolio approach across digital
and physical channels to balance engaging
consumers with the cost of operations.
Reset fulfillment
Activate local fulfillment and make it
profitable by using retailers’ assets and/or
those available through partnerships.
Reset sourcing
Improve resiliency by rethinking the supply
base—focusing on the geopolitical climate,
surety of supply, sustainability, and transparency.
Reset talent
Develop a compelling value proposition to retain
and attract talent while supporting a digitally savvy,
data fluent, and diverse workforce and culture.
Reset data
Become a truly data-driven retail organization
where employees are more than just data-
aware—they become data-dependent.
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01
Connect offerings to their
purpose in consumers’ lives
in ways that are authentic
to the brand and create
new revenue streams.

Purpose and value. A retailer’s brand purpose
and the value it has in enhancing consumers’ lives,
should be at the heart of the offering, whether it’s
a product or service. With consumers making
(sometimes paradoxical) choices and balancing
cost versus value, retailers need to be clear about
their differentiation and value.
Essentials for resetting
consumer offerings
Modern merchandising. Retail merchants need
to look beyond the placement of their own or third
party products. They should consider developing
assortment and private label strategies with a highly
local lens and price sensitivity, by combining their
deep category expertise with insights from AI and
machine learning.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 01. Reset Consumer Offerings

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New and relevant offerings. With shifting
consumer expectations and the blurring of physical
and digital channels, retailers need to consider
expanding their portfolio of offerings. There may be
opportunities to sell adjacent products or services,
create new revenue streams such as rental or repair,
or explore new channels such as the metaverse.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 01. Reset Consumer Offerings

02
Take a portfolio approach across
digital and physical channels to
balance engaging consumers
with the cost of operations.

Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved.
Essentials for
resetting channels
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Customer experience. Retailers need to aim
to provide hyper-personalized online and offline
customer experiences that make sense for the
brand, made possible by rich data analytics and
a strong cloud-based foundation.
Brand strategy. Retailers need to draw on creative
storytelling that puts the brand front-and-center
and is central to every touchpoint and experience
across every channel—from the flagship store to
the product page on a website or the metaverse.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 02. Reset Channels

Retail’s Responsible Reset | 02. Reset Channels
The value of the store. As well as the
number, role and format of stores across
the store network, retailers need to
consider the purpose, design and operating
model of individual stores to serve the
needs of their local communities.
Test, learn and scale. By trialing solutions
and strategies through experimentation—
whether a new store concept, emerging
market, bold brand extension or the
metaverse—retailers can make informed
decisions on the solutions to scale.

03
Activate local fulfillment and make
it profitable by using your assets
and/or those available through
partnerships.

Predictive analytics. Retailers need to be using
data and AI to predict how best to serve the most
profitable, highest-value customers—and keep them
coming back. And leverage analytics, such as demand
forecasting, order affinity and inventory placement,
to optimize operations.
Essentials for
resetting fulfillment
Agile network design. Retailers need an agile design
approach to reset their networks faster. This is about
specificity—network design based on shape-of-chain
analysis across the store estate, and making the right
decisions around product flows and operations.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 03. Reset Fulfillment

Home delivery. The last mile can make or
break customer relationships, and transparency
is key—retailers need to include real-time order
tracking and be open and honest when
problems arise. Last mile delivery must be
continually optimized to ensure profitability.
Strength in numbers. The new fulfillment
landscape allows retailers to work with partners,
including those in transportation and last mile
delivery. In making partnership decisions, retailers
need to pursue those that help lower the carbon
footprint of last-mile.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 03. Reset Fulfillment

04
Improve resiliency by rethinking
the supply base—focusing on the
geopolitical climate, surety of supply,
sustainability and transparency.

Scenario modelling. Retailers need to take a
predictive approach to managing sourcing risk from
external influences beyond their control. By defining
and running scenario simulations, decision-makers
can anticipate, assess and mitigate high-risk situations.
Essentials for
resetting sourcing
Surety of supply. Retailers need to reassess and
reprioritize the risks at each node of the supply network,
with visibility beyond Tier 1 and Tier 2 suppliers.
Rethinking the mix of nearshore and offshore suppliers
and exploring local sourcing models is also key.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 04. Reset Sourcing

Profitable sustainability. Contrary to popular belief,
sustainability can be achieved while reducing cost.
Retailers need to embed responsible ESG practices
in their sourcing decisions, such as transitioning to
sustainable materials and applying I&D practices.
Value from transparency. More and more,
consumers expect and value transparency around
retailers’ sourcing practices. Retailers need to
make sourcing “a glass pipeline,” creating a huge
opportunity to engage consumers with authentic
storytelling that aligns to their values.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 04. Reset Sourcing

05
Develop a compelling value
proposition to retain and
attract talent while supporting
a digitally savvy, data fluent and
diverse workforce and culture.

Workforce and culture. With a highly challenging
talent landscape, retailers need to foster a purposeful
and omni-connected culture to attract and retain
talent—where everyone feels they are seen and
heard, and have the chance to advance and thrive.
Essentials for
resetting talent
Beyond flexibility. While many frontline retail workers
may not have a choice in work location, retailers need
to explore other areas of flexibility—such as what work
they do, when and how—to provide more autonomy
in their employees’ experiences.
New roles and new skills. With new retail roles redefined
around digital technology, automation, seamless online
and offline shopping experiences, and data-driven
decision making—retailers need to ensure employees
have the right tools and skills to thrive.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 05. Reset Talent

06
Become a data-driven retail
organization where employees
move from being 'data-aware’
to becoming ‘data-dependent’.

Data dependent. To be data dependent, retailers need
the organizational muscle—systems, advanced digital
technologies, capabilities, workflows, governance and
more—to consistently act on data insights.
Essentials for
resetting data
Right data, right place. To act on data insights,
retailers need to enable data movement by creating
an architecture for data to move from application
to application quickly and seamlessly.
Power from cloud. Retailers need cloud technology
to manage data and maximize its strategic value.
Cloud platforms offer scale and agility, and access
to the most advanced analytics tools in the market.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | 06. Reset Data

New growth from insights. Retailers can
use rich data insights to create new revenue
streams, such as new categories or markets,
products, stores, or businesses. Media services
is a promising new business, for example.

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Intelligent insights. Given consumers’ price
sensitivity, it’s essential for retailers to prioritize the
necessary data to have an accurate picture of price
elasticity and how price hikes will impact consumer
purchasing and loyalty.
Data-driven operating model. Data value often
comes from employees who leverage data to
enhance their roles—but for this, retailers need to
ensure data transparency to foster trust in the data.
Activate ESG. In the near future, retailers will
need to include ESG data—such as water usage,
carbon footprint and fair labor practices—in
company reporting, so need to have the data
structures in place to do this.

Next Steps
Responsibly reset and get ready
for constant change
Retailers that boldly step into change—and execute
it confidently—will be in the best position to stand out.
For shareholders. For consumers. For employees.
For partners. For the planet. And for the future.
This is retail’s moment of truth. The focus?
Reset the business responsibly and maintain its
agility to continually reset to grow, in a changing
and challenging world.
Retail’s Responsible Reset | Next Steps

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Jill Standish
Global Retail Industry Lead
jill.standish@accenture.com
Contact us

Retail’s Responsible Reset | Accenture

Retail’s Responsible Reset | Accenture

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