Technology
You are fighting many fronts. On the left side, you have cyber attacks and InfoSec mandates. On the right, you have further demands from stores, warehouses, and your e-comm team. On the top, you are expected to stand up an AI, digital transformation, and automation organization to build rather than buy. And on the bottom, you are competing with the biggest tech players in the world for talent, who can afford double the amount you can for the same applicant.
To adopt AI and compete with Amazon, you know building from scratch is a bad idea. But there are very few good partners to chose from so what are you going to do? Every retail tech company is beating their chest, claiming to be the world’s AI expert. But they always seem to under-deliver. And their “AI”-experts have MBAs. ??
Focal is the exact opposite. We were founded out of Stanford’s AI Lab 7 years ago with the mission to HELP retailers adopt AI, not dupe you into buying some simple wrapper around Tensorflow leveraging your own data. We want to be your AI partner that will be cost effective, simple to integrate, and most importantly, functional from day one. We under-promise, and over-deliver.
Focal’s AI and OS was designed from the ground up to be simple to integrate with, yet yield powerful results. We provide your organization with “the right” data; actionable, real-time shelf-data (outs, productivity information, and more) that can literally drive your store for you.
Welcome to the most full-featured, hardened, easy to use Operating System for Retail. FocalOS is simple to pilot. With our “Zero Integration POC”, you can get started in literally days with no IT support. Just plug and play. And as your team gets on board, you can add more and more modules as you’d like to take advantage of the full ROI, or you can build on top of Focal’s platform, whichever you prefer.
This is the power of AI!
1 - Focal’s Shelf Cameras digitize your shelves every hour of the day
By monitoring your shelves and backstock 24/7/365 enterprise-grade, cost effective AI cameras, we provide accurate and actionable information that feeds FocalOS to “drive” your store for you.
2 - This detects “Chronic Outs” on a per store level to optimize Shelf Allocation per store, and eliminate outs
Since Category Management allocates shelf space to “average sales”, that means that half the shelves are under-allocated and half the shelves are over-allocated. Focal believes there is no reason for this other than technology.
Focal’s hourly scans find under-allocated SKUs that are constantly going out of stock in your stores and spreads those facings out, removing some facings on over-allocated SKUs with AI algorithms to find the optimal shelf allocation over all SKUs that maximize EBITDA.
3 - Focal’s AdaPOG (Adaptive Planogramming AI) creates recommendations to fix
Chronic Outs and Supply Issues to stop Out of Stocks at the root
The root cause of over half of the out of stocks in a store have nothing to do with store execution, it has to do with under-allocation and supply issues. Focal’s AI “adapts” planograms in real-time on a per store basis, to fix these issues as soon as they are detected. This dramatically increases On-Shelf Availability and Sales, while decreasing labor required to constantly fill under-allocated SKUs.
4 - AdaPOG puts you in control. Set it on “Cruise Control” or be in the loop. Up to you!
Focal’s AdaPOG interface allows Category Managers to see exactly what is happening on your shelves, what the algorithms are doing, and how you are performing in each store. You can be in complete control of what Micro-Resets get pushed to stores, or can let the algorithms go on “cruise control”. From AdaPOG, Category Managers can delete SKUs, add SKUs, impose category blocking, and more. Supply Chain Managers can update Known Supply Issues and COGS as well. From there, AdaPOG has it covered. AdaPOG will adapt shelf allocation uniquely for every store’s specific buying habits and availability to ensure full, healthy shelves, that maximizes EBITDA in every store.
5 - These “Micro-Resets” are automatically pushed to Focal’s Action Tool for Store Execution
Focal has designed the most intuitive POG execution tool available, no more print out packets. Focal’s Action Tool allows Stockers to quickly and easily execute all Resets and Micro-Resets and update the system when they are performed, and if they can not, to provide a reason why they could not.
6 - Finally, Focal’s Shelf Cameras scan to ensure POG Compliance
Once a stocker has updated Action Tool that they have completed the Reset, Focal’s shelf cameras scan again to measure POG Compliance to ensure proper POG execution automatically.
Now watch your EBITDA grow!
Our case studies have proven that adapting your shelf allocations to changing supply and demand can drastically impact OSA, Sales, Labor, and EBITDA.
The second a vendor tells you they can not fill their orders for a month, just update AdaPOG, and Focal will temporarily remove that SKU from affected stores, and spread out facings of an under-allocated SKU.
The second Focal’s cameras detect under-allocated SKUs, Focal will run our algorithms to determine the best thing to do for that store specifically.
This is the power of AI!