Insights
UST at NRF 2022: Revolutionizing the Retail Experience
The National Retail Federation's Annual Big Show (NRF) 2022 was three days of lively discussions, meaningful interaction, and deep insights. UST's retail solutions, including supply chain visibility, frictionless checkout, and smart cooler, were on full display at the show. The team had a great time demonstrating how UST is revolutionizing the retail experience. In fact, the Hamilton raffle was a popular giveaway. Vibrant conversations with an engaged audience added to the team's enthusiasm.
The NRF Big Show is known for its trendspotting, and this year was no different. Major retailers attending the show shared the view that retail's digital age is here to stay. NRF announced that e-commerce spending was up by 11.3 percent during the 2021 holiday season, and the retail industry is emerging from COVID stronger than before.
The accelerated evolution of the retail industry and shift to digital channels means an increased focus on innovation and emerging trends. These include frictionless and POS technologies, metaverse and NFT, AI and robotics, sustainability, diversity and inclusion, and the inbound supply chain.
Among the key trends highlighted at the show we found that consumers are looking for an elevated experience on the physical storefront side, as well. These experiences are enabled by emerging innovations in virtual reality, vision intelligence, AI, and machine learning. Innovation and a customer-centric culture will propel growth across all sectors.
UST unveiled its comprehensive retail offerings at the show, poised to help brands leverage AI, supply chain tech, and digital transformation to expand their retail experience. UST's retail services bring new levels of efficiency and innovation to revolutionize businesses and their customers' retail experience, thus building lifetime value.
A closer look at the featured services:
- Hyper-personalized Retail Stores: Leveraging existing technology to optimize the physical shopper journey like the online shopper journey. UST transforms existing security camera infrastructure into an AI vision intelligence system to centrally manage the shopper journey across all retail store locations.
- Frictionless Solutions: Frictionless solutions cut costs and increase customer loyalty. An autonomous point of sale through UST is a step beyond self-scanning checkout. UST increases the efficiency and velocity of checkout, leading to more customized shopper engagements.
- Blue Yonder Implementation: As a Blue Yonder Gold Partner, UST has the most experienced team of industry experts for implementing and optimizing the industry’s leading retail merchandise, assortment planning and allocation, and replenishment solutions available today.
- Supply Chain Security: C-SCRM Cybersecurity Supply Chain Risk Management is essential for all retailers to minimize the risk of supply chain disruption because of a cybersecurity event. UST provides a virtual portal with tools to evaluate all key suppliers’ cyber-readiness. Deployable anywhere to anyone via the Salesforce Cloud.
- Demand Forecasting: Consumers expect that products listed on retail and eCommerce websites are in stock and available. AI/ML insights and forecasting models will allow retailers to maximize their online operations with responsive, integrated business planning and operations, inventory visibility and orchestration.
- Supply Chain Visibility: UST's multi-echelon supply chain platform uses predictive analytics to help anticipate problems and leverage opportunities in real-time. Retailers get consolidated visibility into products across all international and domestic transport modes, including rail, ocean, and air.
We hope you’ve enjoyed learning about UST’s latest innovations at NRF 2022. Stay tuned for more cutting-edge technology on full display at NRF 2023.