Retail operates across channels (online, in-store, marketplace, mobile), locations (50-5,000 stores), and product assortments (10,000-500,000 SKUs) with thin margins where a 1% improvement in demand accuracy or markdown optimization saves millions. AI for retail must connect POS transactions, e-commerce behavior, inventory positions, and customer profiles into unified intelligence that drives decisions at the speed retail requires.
Retail AI drives revenue and reduces cost: demand forecasting (reducing overstock by 15-25%), dynamic pricing (optimizing margins in real-time), personalized recommendations (increasing AOV by 10-20%), computer vision for shelf compliance, and the customer analytics that predict which shoppers will churn.