Most retailers have the tools, platforms, and channels. The problem? They don’t talk to each other. Simply offering apps, delivery, and pickup options is no longer enough—the real challenge is connecting those systems seamlessly underneath the surface.

In an upcoming report, Jeremy Goldman (VP of Editorial and Insights) outlines this exact issue: the omnichannel execution gap. Ahead of the release, he sat down with Xavier Vaissiere (Global Insights & Analytics Director at CP Skin Health Group) and Erica Meagher (Head of E-commerce at Beiersdorf) to discuss why this operational gap is widening and how retailers can fix it.

INSIDE THE EPISODE:

- Why a massive percentage of retail dollars still sit within the physical store, and how leaders are connecting it to digital.

- How constantly adding new sales platforms without retiring old ones is creating a data nightmare—and what to do about it.

- The specific trap brands fall into when deploying AI without a clear roadmap, and how to use it effectively.

- Why closing the execution gap requires mastering four specific, unglamorous backend operations (from real-time inventory to returns).

Listen to the full discussion above to learn how to make your underlying systems work together.

The full report lands later this month.

Welcome to another addition of Rethink Roundup.

Your weekly brief to help retail leaders decode the biggest news in retail, AI, and commerce—and understand what those developments mean in practice.

In this week's episode, VP of Editorial & Insights Jeremy Goldman joins Zak Stambor (EMARKETER) and Richard Kestenbaum (Triangle Capital LLC) to highlight how retail giants are shifting from reaction to restructuring when facing market disruptions like tariffs and inflation.

These titans are completely changing how they manage inventory, set prices, and run seasonal campaigns to build a permanent competitive advantage.

INSIDE THIS WEEK'S EPISODE:

The Tariffs Front-Loading Surge:

Instead of waiting to see how trade policies play out, retailers are treating tariffs as a permanent, predictable business expense. They are aggressively front-loading their inventory, accepting high storage costs today to guarantee their shelves aren't empty tomorrow.

- U.S. ports are expected to handle a record 2.47 million import containers in July as retailers rush to get goods in before expected August tariff updates.

WALMART'S OFFENSIVE PRICE WAR:

The retail giant isn't just lowering prices to help shoppers fight inflation, it is using price cuts defensively and offensively. By slashing margins on highly visible everyday staples (like meat, produce, and soda), they are squeezing out smaller competitors who simply cannot afford to match those discounts.

THE JULY BACK-TO-SCHOOL SHIFT:

The traditional late-August rush is officially a thing of the past. Amazon Prime Day has permanently pushed the shopping calendar up into July, while shoppers are increasingly using AI discovery tools to map out what to buy weeks before they ever visit a physical store or checkout screen.

- 17% of shoppers had already finished most of their back-to-school buying by early July, per CivicScience.

Listen above for the full conversation on the trends making us rethink retail this week.

Instacart is shifting from a basic delivery app to a complete digital operating system that runs grocery stores from top to bottom.

Ryan Hamburger, Chief Commercial Officer at Instacart sat down with Yael Kochman, Chair of AiR, to break down how the platform is bundling hardware, software, and AI tools that help grocers manage everything from smart shopping carts to automated inventory tracking.

“Consumers know the shopping cart. You cannot make it a complicated experience. Otherwise they will abandon it.”

By solving real-world frustrations on the store floor and removing the inventory guesswork for retailers, Instacart is scaling AI to create a unified experience for everyone in the aisle.

INSIDE THE EPISODE:

- How smart carts bring your digital account, real-time store inventory, and loyalty rewards directly to the grocery aisle.

- Why tools only succeed if they fit a shopper's routine, making it effortless to budget in real time, find items on the shelf, and manage lists.

- How Instacart handles the technical headache for grocers trapped by ancient computer systems by wrapping software around existing infrastructure.

- How Instacart’s AI acts as a proactive meal planner for shoppers while tracking shelves and predicting inventory for retailers.

Listen above for the full discussion on how grocery AI delivers the most value when it connects the entire retail ecosystem while remaining simple for shoppers and practical for grocers.

Welcome to the Rethink Roundup.

Your weekly brief to help retail leaders decode the biggest news in retail, AI, and commerce—and understand what those developments mean in practice.

To kick us off, VP of Editorial & Insights Jeremy Goldman, CEO Marie Chevrier Schwartz, and Senior Retail Analyst Lavina Suthenthiran break down a massive structural shift: the transition from tech experimentation to real-world deployment, the growing value of digitally native leadership, and why smaller brands must abandon corporate copycat strategies to survive.

Inside This Week’s Episode:

AI: From Experimentation to Practical Deployment

- Retail AI has moved past superficial pilots into live, shopper-facing tools focused on solving real customer friction: buying certainty, listing friction, and automated cart building.

- While brands are rushing to adopt AI, few have restructured their operations around it. Adoption is currently outpacing true business transformation.

"More than 75% of companies are now using AI in their business functions, but only 21% actually redesigned their workflows around it, and only 16% have scaled it enterprise-wide." - Lavina Suthenthiran

Rise of the Digitally Native Leadership

- The traditional pipeline to top executive leadership is being disrupted.

- Boards are now selecting leaders based on digital ecosystem thinking, media literacy, and community building.

- Modern fields like retail media are so new that universities don't yet teach them. Retailers have to train their own future leaders internally.

“While merchandising and store operations experience still matters, you know, I would say that we have to be really focused on where commerce is headed.” - Marie Chevrier Schwartz

How Smaller Retailers Fight Back

- Walmart’s multi-billion-dollar acquisitions of Vizio and Vibe.co show how retail giants are linking TV viewing data directly to what customers buy.

- Smaller retailers must focus on hyper-specialized product categories, authentic storytelling from real experts, and building passion-driven communities.

"Whatever you see Amazon and Walmart doing, you don't try to do the same thing because you're not going to be successful. You have to find other ways to kind of compete in a David and Goliath-like manner." — Jeremy Goldman

Click play above for the full conversation on the trends shaping retail.

Retailers rarely manage to scale new storefront technology beyond a basic pilot phase.

Demo modes simulate perfect conditions, but they completely ignore the chaotic reality of a live store. This operational gap kills widespread rollouts.

Mark Propes, Chief Business Development Officer at Vusion, and Hitha Herzog, Chief Retail Analyst at H Squared Research, join Jeremy Goldman to pinpoint exactly why these retail trials hit a wall, and how brands can actually make in-store tech work.

“Are you really building something that's durable enough and rugged enough for what happens in the aisle?"

From fragile lab environments to a cracked data foundation, they break down the roadblocks stalling retail innovation.

INSIDE THE EPISODE:

- Why teams must build store tools for physical durability rather than treating them as fragile science experiments

- How central strategic alignment solves the 95% failure rate of AI pilots

- Why you must clean up baseline inventory metrics before touching advanced AI

- How to shift evaluation metrics away from abstract vendor marketing and toward real operational numbers

Stop blindly throwing disconnected tools at your tech stack. Listen to the full conversation above to see how teams turn experimental pilots into operational realities.

AI is becoming embedded in retail operations, shifting the conversation from experimentation to scalable, sustainable execution.

At Shoptalk Europe, Azita Martin (VP & GM of Retail, CPG & QSR AI at NVIDIA) joined Yael Kochman, Chair, AiR (AI in Retail) to explore what leadership looks like in this next phase. The discussion focuses on how leading organizations are approaching ownership, cost, and operational scale as AI moves into production.

Inside the episode:

- How retailers are adopting hybrid architectures that combine frontier models with smaller, task-specific systems

- How AI is being applied across physical store operations, fulfillment, and real-time inventory management

- Why cost discipline and infrastructure decisions will define the long-term viability of AI deployment

Listen to the full conversation to learn the practical steps for navigating the next phase of retail AI

Welcome to Media in Retail

Today, RETHINK Retail officially launched Media in Retail (MiR), a new community built for the people shaping the future of retail media.

To mark the launch, Community Chair Drew Cashmore joins Jeremy Goldman to discuss why the industry needs a dedicated space for connection, collaboration, and candid conversation.

WHY MIR EXISTS:

- Retail media has grown quickly, but there are still too few opportunities for authentic, honest conversations between the people building the industry.

- MiR brings together brands, retailers, agencies, and technology partners in a year-round community built around shared learning, fresh perspectives, and real-world experience.

- A Community, Not an Event

- MiR doesn’t begin and end with an event. It’s a year-round community designed to connect, learn, and grow alongside peers across the industry.

- The community is also meant to create pathways for emerging and aspiring retail media leaders, while opening the door to mentorship and shared learning across experience levels.

WHY IT MATTERS NOW:

- Retail media is becoming a core part of how retailers operate, engage customers, and drive growth.

- “Retail media started in its infancy as a profit center for retailers to offset some of their operating costs. And it is quickly moved into the total flywheel that generates value for retailers.”

- As the industry evolves, the decisions shaping its future shouldn’t happen in isolation. Progress depends on greater collaboration, stronger relationships, and a better understanding of the challenges and opportunities facing every part of the market.

What Success Looks Like

MIR IS BUILT TO:

- Helping buyers and sellers better understand each other’s priorities

- Creating opportunities for more productive conversations across the industry

- Supporting the next generation of retail media leaders

- Building stronger connections between the people shaping the future of the space

Listen to the launch episode to hear why MiR was created, what it hopes to achieve, and how you can be part of the conversation.

Welcome to Media in Retail

Today, RETHINK Retail officially launched Media in Retail (MiR), a new community built for the people shaping the future of retail media

To mark the launch, Community Chair Drew Cashmore joins Jeremy Goldman to discuss why the industry needs a dedicated space for connection, collaboration, and candid conversation.

Why MiR Exists

- Retail media has grown quickly, but there are still too few opportunities for authentic, honest conversations between the people building the industry.

- MiR brings together brands, retailers, agencies, and technology partners in a year-round community built around shared learning, fresh perspectives, and real-world experience.

- A Community, Not an Event

- MiR doesn't begin and end with an event. It's a year-round community designed to connect, learn, and grow alongside peers across the industry.

- The community is also meant to create pathways for emerging and aspiring retail media leaders, while opening the door to mentorship and shared learning across experience levels.

Why It Matters Now

- Retail media is becoming a core part of how retailers operate, engage customers, and drive growth.

- “Retail media started in its infancy as a profit center for retailers to offset some of their operating costs. And it is quickly moved into the total flywheel that generates value for retailers.”

- As the industry evolves, the decisions shaping its future shouldn't happen in isolation. Progress depends on greater collaboration, stronger relationships, and a better understanding of the challenges and opportunities facing every part of the market.

What Success Looks Like

MiR is built to:

- Helping buyers and sellers better understand each other's priorities

- Creating opportunities for more productive conversations across the industry

- Supporting the next generation of retail media leaders

- Building stronger connections between the people shaping the future of the space

Listen to the launch episode to hear why MiR was created, what it hopes to achieve, and how you can be part of the conversation.

Most grocers can launch same-day delivery. The real challenge is building a model that keeps customers happy while still protecting margins at scale.

In this RETHINK Retail Podcast episode recorded at Shoptalk Europe, Top Retail Expert Sharon Yourell sat down with Rohlik Group leaders to break down how they built a profitable in-house same-day delivery operation across five markets.

The conversation goes deep into the strategic side of eGrocery, including:

- Achieving fulfillment orchestration across 25k+ SKUs with near-perfect inventory accuracy and minimal substitutions

- The tradeoffs grocers face when customer relationships, transaction data, and margin ownership shift to third-party platforms

- Why owning the customer journey  and creating operational consistency are critical drivers of long-term eGrocery profitability

A must-listen for grocers focused on building more resilient in-house operations.

Listen above!

On this special crossover episode between RETHINK Retail and Retail Razor, guest host Ricardo Belmar — founder of the Retail Razor podcast network — sits down with Aidan Mittra, Co-founder of OrderGrid, to explore how retail innovation is reshaping grocery operations, tackling margin constraints, and leveraging data to unlock the massive opportunities presented by AI and retail media networks.

Key Takeaways

- Acute operational and resource pressures remain: Margin constraints, high staff turnover, and shifting customer expectations create an incredibly complex environment where grocers must operate leaner than ever.

- Clean data is required for emerging tech: Advanced solutions like AI-based pre-trip meal planning rely entirely on real-time, accurate inventory and product data foundations.

- Isolated point systems must be connected: Novel solutions like robots, sensors, and electronic shelf labels generate useful data, but they lack the operational connectivity needed to orchestrate real-time daily tasks for overwhelmed store associates.

- Stores are evolving into omnichannel hubs: Physical stores remain essential but are shifting to blend digital channels with experiential upgrades, such as utilizing smart carts, apps, and backroom fulfillment.

- In-store retail media opens incremental high-value revenue: Grocers possess an invaluable goldmine of first-party customer data that can be activated inside the store to build a meaningful new income stream with real bottom-line impact.

- Three factors separate future market leaders: Success hinges on structuring organizations around the customer rather than separate physical/e-commerce P&Ls, establishing strong data foundations today, and fiercely owning the customer relationship through loyalty.

This episode digs deep into how a clean data foundation and operational connectivity position grocery operators to lead an increasingly complex and fast-moving retail landscape.