Reaching for High Performance in Retailing

Retailers are under all sorts of pressure. Investors have priced growth into their current valuation of the retail market, and yet the retail marketplace has never been more complex or competitive. Some of the challenges retailers must conquer include:

• More demanding customers.
• Saturated home market.
• Product commoditization.
• Decreasing return on space.
• Price deflation.
• Competition from discount merchandisers.

To overcome these challenges, and also to take advantage of the growth opportunities that exist in emerging markets (real and virtual), retailers must move rapidly toward high performance. Accenture research shows that high performance in retailing means organizing the business around the customer. The characteristics of high performance in retail are:

• Clear strategic intent: Developing a clear strategy and then aligning everything around it is a vital principle that is often not fully implemented.
  
  
• Talent management: High performance always depends on high performers.
  
  
• Obsessive customer focus: Translate customer understanding into differentiated strategies.
  
  
• Operational excellence: Information technology plays a key role here.
  
  
• Innovation and execution to value: The key is creating innovations that lead to value creation.
  
  
• Alliance and collaboration capability: Collaborate with both business partners and entities within the same group.

To achieve high performance, retailers must excel in all these areas and Accenture can help them do just that

Alliances
To help our clients outperform their peers, Accenture has close alliances with some of the leading vendors in the retail industry. To learn more visit Accenture's Alliance Partners: Helping You Reach High Performance.

Accenture has the experience, insight and acumen to help retailers transform to achieve high performance, creating the ability to succeed whatever the state of the market. For companies wishing to begin or continue along the journey toward high performance, Accenture has a unique mix of capabilities that make us the perfect partner:

• Deep industry insight: We have been working in this industry for years, and have a track record of helping retailers around the world achieve high performance.
  
  
• Business acumen: Our continuing research into high performance ensures that we have a scientific understanding of the capabilities that underlie it. As the world's largest management consultancy, with a vast pool of business talent, nobody else can better help companies innovate intelligently to create competitive advantage.
  
  
• Global reach: The Accenture Global Delivery Network delivers key benefits for clients. Consumer goods and services companies can combine local insight with the power of a global capability. Our global network also opens up the skills and cost benefits of global sourcing, adding scalability and flexibility to business processes.
  
  
• Technological excellence: The capabilities enabling high performance are increasingly driven by technology. Accenture has the global capability to manage technology cost-effectively at higher service levels, supporting improved business performance.

Accenture is committed to partnering with you in your journey toward high performance, helping your company achieve its strategic goals in the most effective manner possible

Client Successes
Best Buy's customers are at the heart of a new strategy, called "customer centricity," which is the giant retailer's $50 million gamble that it can maintain its market-leading position by providing more and better service and high-end products. To learn more visit Best Buy: Customer Centricity.

Accenture has a number of distinct offerings that can be used to help your company progress toward high performance—or we can assist with an end-to-end transformational program. The specific services we offer are:

• Customer—centricity in the Retail Industry: Overview
• High Performance in Retail through In—store Optimization
• Supply Chain Optimization Services for the Retail Industry
• Supply Chain Academy Solution
• Outsourcing for the Retail Industry
• Business Process Outsourcing Services for the Retail Industry
• Talent Management for the Retail Industry
• IT Transformation for the Retail Industry