Convenience-store distributor Core-Mark is integrating BlueYonder Category Management solutions entirely to Blue Yonder’s SaaS (software as a service), completing the digital transformation of its space and floor offerings. Blue Yonder Global Professional Services will implement the project.
The partnership offers solutions for c-store retailers to better plan their space and floor layouts to determine local assortments that attract and retain customers.
Core-Mark has used Blue Yonder’s SaaS solutions in its operations in the western, southeastern and eastern regions, and the company was looking to upgrade its category management capabilities in the Midwest region to the cloud to fully digitalize its space and floor offerings, consolidate its toolset for planning staff and standardize the services offered to its customer base, it said.
“Our goal is to offer intelligent assortment and space planning insights to our small- to medium-sized c-store customers to help them succeed,” said Jim Hachtel, director of category management for Core-Mark. “To achieve this, we need to offer solutions that automate cumbersome tasks and provide robust recommendations to optimize their sales. Blue Yonder is the leader in category management, so we are leveraging their capabilities to expand our use of their cloud solutions. As a result of this initiative, we expect to extend the benefits we have been experiencing for the last five years with Blue Yonder’s cloud tools to our entire U.S. customer base.”
By expanding the utilization of Blue Yonder's SaaS-based Category Management solutions, Core-Mark will unlock several new capabilities, such as enhanced automation through Blue Yonder Planogram Generator and the ability to target strategies based on optimized store groupings through Channel Clustering.
“By standardizing and enhancing their merchandising offerings, Core-Mark will improve the speed and intelligence of their services, driving greater sales performance for their customers from coast-to-coast. This will strengthen their market position and enable further business scaling,” said Vince Beacom, president of global retail at Blue Yonder.
Scottsdale, Arizona-based Blue Yonder offers digital supply chain transformation. Retailers, manufacturers and logistics service providers worldwide use Blue Yonder to optimize and accelerate their supply chain from planning through fulfillment, delivery and returns. Blue Yonder’s artificial intelligence (AI)-driven supply chain platform and multi-enterprise, multi-tier network enable forecasting and dynamic management of capacity, inventory and transport.
Westlake, Texas-based Core-Mark offers a full range of products, marketing programs and technology solutions to approximately 50,000 customer locations in the United States and Canada through 37 distribution centers. It services traditional convenience-store retailers, as well as drug stores, big-box or supercenter stores, grocery stores, liquor stores and other specialty and small-format stores that carry convenience products.
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