International marketing consultancy dunnhumby announces it has acquired KSS Retail, a provider of price modeling and optimization solutions for retailers. 

This acquisition will enable dunnhumby to combine their analysis of customer buying patterns with KSS Retail's price modeling and optimization solutions for existing and future clients worldwide.

KSS Retail provides software which generates optimized prices based on consumer demand and that models and forecasts the effects of future pricing and promotional decisions for retailers in the grocery, drug, convenience, online and general retail segments. Clients include Kroger, Sonae (Portugal), Raley's, McKesson, Associated Food Stores, Brookshire Brothers, Balls Food Stores and others. 

KSS Retail will operate as an independent business unit of dunnhumby and maintain its existing management structure. Over time, KSS Retail will bring elements of dunnhumby capability to the marketplace.

 

Bob's Stores plans to improve communications between its retail operations team and head office by implementing Opterus Store Ops-Center at all 34 locations in the United States.

"We are very excited about the Opterus solution because of the enhanced functionality that it provides when compared to our previous system," said Kevin Campbell, AVP Store Operations, Bob's Stores. "There are a number of significant functional improvements that Opterus provides."

One of these improvements is the new mobile functionality which helps field management stay updated on new messages, tasks and issues that are assigned to the stores says Campbell. 

"The Opterus team has been extremely responsive throughout the entire process," adds Campbell. "Store Ops-Center has met and exceeded our expectations."

The store communications and task management portal will help Bob's Stores communicate with their stores through its software as a service (SaaS) model.

 

Robotic Vision-Based Solution Combats BOB Loss

Shoppers Food & Pharmacy, a division of Supervalu, combats bottom-of-basket (BOB) loss with a robotic vision-based solution from Evolution Robotics Retail. Using visual pattern recognition (ViPR) technology, the grocer is able to detect, identify and present BOB items directly to the point of sale, enabling cashiers to add those items directly to the transaction. "LaneHawk captures valuable transaction data to help us track what BOB items we are selling, and whether cashiers are actually ringing up BOB items," said Mike Mays, director of loss prevention at Shoppers. "It is an effective tool for both front-end operations as well as loss prevention."