At Wiser, we’re proud of our partnerships with industry giants like Ferrero and Mars, but we also work closely with mid-sized brands to help them optimize their retail strategies. One such example is a mid-sized beverage company, known for its sparkling water and energy drinks. Whether large or small, a flexible approach ensures that every brand can optimize its retail strategies without compromising on quality or support. While they had a smaller footprint compared to global giants, they faced many of the same challenges that larger brands experience—particularly in ensuring in-store execution consistency across multiple locations.
This is the story of how our partnership with this beverage brand evolved, starting with addressing their immediate needs and growing into a long-term collaboration focused on enhancing their in-store execution and overall retail success.
Background and Challenges
Like many others, this growing brand was experiencing difficulties with tracking store visits and execution, which were impacting their ability to grow sales and optimize merchandising strategies. With over 100 sales reps responsible for performing store visits, including tasks like merchandising the shelf, managing displays, and growing sales at each store, they needed a more efficient way to track performance and identify areas for improvement.
To drive better alignment, they required a solution that could make their store visits more efficient, integrate store-level data to enable more impactful actions, give their leadership team real-time visibility into execution, and streamline communication across departments.
How Wiser Helped
Wiser implemented our Retail Execution Management (REM) solution, providing the company with a unified platform to improve visibility, accountability, and performance across their field team. Here’s how we delivered value:
- Field Audits and Performance Tracking: Wiser’s REM app was deployed to over 100 sales reps, allowing them to capture insights, compliance issues, and accomplishments in real-time during store visits. Regional Managers and Key Account Managers leveraged these automated reports to manage performance at both the store and HQ level, ensuring consistency across all retail partners.
- Custom Dashboards and Metrics: The brand used templated dashboards along with custom reporting tools to track team competitions, progress-to-goal, and incentives. By using data integration to merge scan data, depletion data, and promotional performance, Wiser’s dashboards enabled the company to measure success, identify top-performing reps, and align internal strategies with store-level execution.
- Leaderboards for Accountability: A key feature of the solution was the introduction of leaderboards, tracking store visits by region and rep, display placements, and overall sales growth. This transparency empowered the field team to focus on high-priority accounts and consistently hit goals, improving overall store-level execution.
Expanding Their Capabilities
Wiser’s REM solution didn’t just stop at store visits. We integrated additional data streams, including store-level scan and depletion data, to give the brand a complete view of their sales and distribution performance. This data integration allowed their field teams to optimize future visits and promotional efforts by combining sales data with execution insights.
Another key component was Wiser’s leaderboard feature, which allowed the brand to monitor store visits, reps’ activities, and competitive actions across different regions. Our platform also helps the brand ensure that their reps are focusing on the highest-potential stores with access to features such as a 30/60/90-day coverage map, which helps point out gaps in coverage and allows the team to plan quickly and with high effectiveness.
As part of the solution, Wiser also helps streamline the company’s Quality Assurance processes. Field reps can now report product issues, such as damaged goods, directly to the Quality Assurance team using the REM app. This quick communication significantly reduces resolution times and improves product quality across stores.
Future Plans
The brand is also looking to expand their use of Wiser’s tools to cover more retail channels, including convenience stores and independent retailers. They are also aiming to improve retail partnerships, leveraging automatic compliance reports to help proactively resolve issues with a high level of precision.
As their operations continue to grow, the beverage brand expands their use of Wiser’s tools. They recently began implementation of a pilot of Wiser’s Perfect Store framework. This pilot includes the use of in-store image recognition, enabling field reps to conduct store visits quickly and efficiently. Additionally, reps can benchmark store performance against pre-defined standards without needing to perform additional in-store tasks. This pilot program has shown success in tracking display availability and compliance, improving their ability to meet retail execution goals.
From Small Beginnings to a Long-Term Partnership
What began as a small project to improve execution consistency quickly grew into a long-term partnership that has transformed how this mid-sized beverage brand operates in-store. Wiser’s solutions have empowered this beverage company to improve their in-store execution, enhance the performance of their field team, and increase overall sales through better data integration and reporting. By adopting a customized and scalable solution, this brand is now better equipped to navigate their retail challenges and continue growing in the competitive beverage market.
Wiser’s flexible solutions are designed to grow with your brand, whether you’re just starting to expand or are already an industry leader. Our tools empower brands of all sizes to optimize their in-store execution, drive sales, and build lasting retail success. We believe that no matter the size of your brand, Wiser’s solutions can help you achieve your retail execution goals while staying within your budget.
Final Thoughts
Wiser’s solutions aren’t just for global giants—we’re here to support brands at all stages of growth. If you’re a smaller brand wondering how to improve your in-store execution without stretching your budget, we’re ready to help you take the next step toward retail success.
