Visibility is vital. The more information you have on a situation, the better you can understand it, the faster you can react to it, and the more likely it is that you can anticipate what comes next.
A lack of visibility carries real consequences for consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies. Unless CPGs have a clear view of the flow of goods from the supply chain to the shelf, it’s almost impossible to get to the truth about demand. The right insight can help CPGs stay on top of a situation no matter how fast it evolves.
It’s with that in mind that SKUtrak was first developed to offer our customers interactive visual analytics that can instantly answer questions using dashboards. This gives users a clear, current, and comprehensive view of sales and product movement.
Naturally, for SKUtrak to provide the most comprehensive view of the market, it also needs to provide data from as many retailers as possible. That is why we are excited to announce that users can now link their Waitrose data with their SKUtrak account.
All the power of Waitrose Connect, with none of the effort
The addition of Waitrose Connect data to SKUtrak makes it faster and easier to analyse Waitrose trading data than ever before.
Neil Tomkinson, Atheon's Commercial Director, comments, "From speaking to SKUtrak customers, I know that Waitrose is a deeply important account for many CPGs. I also understand that it's an account many brands struggle with in terms of visibility. This functionality has been at the top of many people's SKUtrak wish lists for some time now."
As is the case with all retailers supported by SKUtrak, data is imported straight from Waitrose Connect directly into your SKUtrak account. This high-quality, curated feed brings you all of the information that you’d normally find within Waitrose Connect, without you having to manually source and add it.
Incorporating Waitrose trading data into your workflows.
Leveraging the available data, we have developed a suite of dashboards. Critical reports include Sales, Range, and Waste reports, enabling you to easily and quickly summarise sales, identify waste trends, map product distribution, and assess overall performance.
With these reports, you can:
1. Improve the accuracy of sales reporting: Monitor performance, evaluate trends and make better predictions with granular data down to store-level.
2. Maximise returns on promotional activities: Carry out promotional reviews at speed, eliminate guesswork and get a handle on your performance.
3. Identify opportunities to grow your distribution: Gain a better understanding of trading patterns and discover areas with growth opportunities.
4. Cut back on waste: See which products are underperforming to support your SKU rationalisation decisions.
5. Measure the success of NPD: Monitor the introduction of new SKUs by assessing sales and return on sales against your plan.
6. Justify cost price increases (CPIs): Use historical data (up to two years worth) to predict the impact of price increases.
Real-time and direct access to daily curated data
Besides driving time savings and deeper insights, the added functionality available through DataShare also simplifies importing data from Waitrose Connect into other systems. Built on Snowflake, DataShare integrates with various other platforms and includes "out of the box" connectors for applications such as Excel, Power BI, and Tableau. It facilitates a seamless data flow from Waitrose, to SKUtrak, and then onto the application of your choice.
That integration isn’t just limited to Business Intelligence tools, either. With its programmatic interface, DataShare also makes it easy to bring your Waitrose Connect data into other tools too. As a result, no matter whether you’re managing a simple Excel tracker or a global ERP, finance, or planning system, you can provide that application with the high-quality data needed to maximise its effectiveness.
We’re excited about the impact this new integration between SKUtrak and Waitrose Connect will have on that situation and look forward to hearing how it performs within your organisation. You can learn more about the launch of Waitrose Connect for SKUtrak here, and add a Waitrose plan to your account just by getting in touch.
