🔹 How AI & Tech Will Transform Grocery | Oliver Wright of Accenture at FMI 2025
🎙 OmniTalk Retail Podcast | Live from FMI 2025 🎙
Chris Walton & Anne Mezzenga sit down with Oliver Wright from Accenture to explore the technological trends transforming the grocery industry and beyond. Discover how AI, automation, and data-driven leadership are changing the way retailers operate and connect with customers.
⏱ Time Stamps & Topics:
🔹 [0:00] – Live from FMI 2025 at the Simbe Robotics Booth
🔹 [1:00] – Oliver Wright’s role at Accenture and the consumer industries he covers
🔹 [2:30] – Technology trends in retail and grocery – The impact of AI and generative AI
🔹 [4:45] – How AI is reshaping consumer decision-making and store experiences
🔹 [6:30] – The concept of a connected store and blending physical and digital retail
🔹 [9:00] – The human-AI flip – Transitioning from human-led processes to AI-assisted operations
🔹 [12:00] – Data leadership and the importance of technology adoption in retail
🔹 [15:00] – Global differences in technology adoption – Asia, Europe, and the U.S.
🔹 [18:00] – Leadership challenges and opportunities in adopting new technologies
📢 Don’t miss this in-depth look at the future of grocery retail with Accenture's Oliver Wright!
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#retailtrends #consumertrends #fmi #retail
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Transcript
Hello, everyone.
Speaker A:This is Omni Talk Retail.
Speaker A:I'm Chris Walton.
Speaker B:And I'm Anne Mazinga.
Speaker A:And we are coming to you live once again from the FMI conference in Marco Island, Florida.
Speaker A:Right, Ann?
Speaker A:Did I say that right?
Speaker B:He keeps calling it San Marco island, which is very.
Speaker B:It's more appropriate.
Speaker A:It does sound glamorous.
Speaker A:Yeah, I just like to glam things up.
Speaker A:And, you know, I'm all about the glam.
Speaker B:I do, I do.
Speaker A:And speaking of glam, we are at the simbi booth, booth108.
Speaker A:And we're going to be here all day today, all day tomorrow, doing interviews with folks like the man in between us.
Speaker A:So let me introduce Oliver Wright, the consumer industry group lead at Accenture.
Speaker A:Oliver, welcome to OmniTalk and thanks for joining us at FMI.
Speaker C:Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker B:Oliver, I have to know more about your role.
Speaker B:Cause it sounds pretty cool.
Speaker B:You cover a lot of areas, I'm sure.
Speaker B:Tell us a little bit about exactly what you do day in and day out and kind of what you cover.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So I lead what was called the Consumer Industries Group.
Speaker C:So for us is all the retailers, that's all the consumer goods manufacturers, and that's also travel for us.
Speaker C:So within Accenture, that focus really on what's happening with the consumer, what's happening with the customer, where is that going and how can we best meet their needs?
Speaker A:Got it, got it.
Speaker B:Can I, can I ask.
Speaker A:Of course, yeah.
Speaker B:Can I interrupt quick and ask a question?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:Are there areas especially, I mean, I'm especially interested in travel and retail.
Speaker B:Are there areas where you're seeing a lot of, a lot more crossover right now than other areas?
Speaker B:And what are those?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:So I think the logic for us bringing this together was because we used to have this as three teams that were operating more independently and they, we found that there were more and more occasions to link things together.
Speaker C:So questions around things like loyalty.
Speaker A:Okay, I was thinking you're going to say that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Questions around things like retail experience, where all three.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:We've got a lot of manufacturers that have retail outlets.
Speaker C:They're increasingly trying to have the percentage of revenue that companies have that's retail oriented, et cetera.
Speaker C:So there was a very natural cohesion between those different areas.
Speaker A:Yeah, it's a great question.
Speaker A:And I imagine the push towards retail media is causing some of that friction as well.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So, you know, rather than us name the trends, there's been a lot of trends that have been popping on the scene over the last few years, particularly, let's Go to you for that.
Speaker A:So what are the trends you're seeing in the industry that are going to particularly have a large impact on the grocery business?
Speaker A:Particularly.
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean, obviously we do a huge amount of conversation with the industry around what's happening with the latest technology, particularly for us, the dominant focus on gen AI and AI.
Speaker C:And we are seeing that that is going to have a huge disruptive impact on the industry over and that from the conversations that we have and the work that we're doing across the industry right now, that's going to.
Speaker C:Well, the industry will start to see that towards the end of this year.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker C:And then next year we'll start to see it more and more at scale.
Speaker C:And I think that will then have a very broad impact across this.
Speaker C:I think that's going to impact a few different things.
Speaker C:The first one I'd call out is what is it that consumers buy?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:And where they choose to buy it.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:Because what we saw, and we saw this in consumer feedback more than a year ago.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:Was consumers were saying that they could see the potential power of tools like ChatGPT and the Things will be available like that, and that they were expecting to use those to shape those consumption decisions.
Speaker C:So that was even when things were not that mature.
Speaker A:Yeah, pretty nascent.
Speaker C:Yeah, pretty nascent.
Speaker C:People are already saying that.
Speaker C:And that was true when we looked at this.
Speaker C:So this is not a, this is not just a US phenomenon, this is a global one.
Speaker C:So we looked at this across 18 different countries, the big sort of developed countries around the world, and more than 50% of consumers told us even a year ago that they were expecting to do this.
Speaker C:Wow.
Speaker C:Now what does that mean for retail?
Speaker C:What that means is you're going to have consumers doing increasing levels of focus on those consumption decisions and using that to get a much more precise view through tools like, like the equivalent of the future.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:On what those, what.
Speaker C:You know, what those, what exactly.
Speaker C:They should be looking to buy.
Speaker C:So.
Speaker C:And, and also then on where they should be looking to buy that as well.
Speaker C:And so we, our view is that that's going to cause obviously a huge dislocation in what it means for marketing.
Speaker A:Wow.
Speaker C:It's also going to cause a huge dislocation in what actually consumers choose to choose to actually buy and where they go to do it.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker A:So yeah, that brings up my next question too.
Speaker A:Like the grocery industry, you know, for all the technological innovation that, you know, it has taken on over the last few years, it's still, you know, it's Relatively difficult for some of these grocers to, you know, adapt things like ChatGPT or figure out, hey, how do I, how do I adapt this to my business?
Speaker A:Like, what have you seen successful already?
Speaker A:I mean, it is very early.
Speaker A:What have you seen retailers do that's been successful for that adaptation to get out of the gates?
Speaker C:I mean, I think your first point is that is an important one, which is that we are right at the start of it.
Speaker C:Yeah, right.
Speaker C:And when I, my comment about these kind of early, these sort of early signs, I think what we, what we are seeing is the receptivity of consumers to do this, but a recognition that this is going to drive probably the largest shift in the ways of working and the workforce in the grocery industry that we've seen frankly in our adult lifetime.
Speaker A:And not just grocery too.
Speaker A:Right?
Speaker C:Yeah, it's going to, it's.
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, when we, when we're talking about the shifts in productivity and what the art of the possible is and also frankly, fulfilling consumer and customer needs better, this is obviously, I think one of the biggest, the biggest ways that we can actually see that happening.
Speaker C:But the scale of impact on what that's going to mean for a working grocery store, what that's going to mean for a grocer overall is going to be huge.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker C:So there is going to be a clearly an impact on, as I said, what people choose to buy and where they buy it.
Speaker C:And there's clearly going to be a big kind of impact on what that kind of in store experiences and obviously all the relationship that people have with suppliers and the broader, the broader ecosystem as well.
Speaker C:So I think, you know, the sorts of things that we're starting to see are things like thinking about the blended experience of what a consumer can see in their E commerce experience with a retailer and how can that blend better to what's going to be happening into store.
Speaker C:So the sort of design work that we're now looking at is how is that we expect that to be much more of a fusion and we expect that more and more consumers will be, I mean, obviously consumers today, a lot of them are looking up things on their phones already in store, but the ability to have that as a much, much more blended, that's what we expect to see emerge.
Speaker A:So I don't want to put words in your mouth, but are you saying so then we should expect to see more of a move towards the connected store idea, essentially, that's what you're saying?
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah, I think so.
Speaker C:And I Think just across the board, the big jump that we expect to see happening as we think about these innovations in store operations, store efficiency and how we're using the workforce best is this shift from giving people better insights on what to do to going all the way through to next best action and having that be something which is put into the hands of the store employee with explanations of what they should be doing.
Speaker C:So that idea of that massive sort of step change where we know that what we're asking them to do is really the best next thing for them to do for the efficiency and effectiveness of the consumer experience and the value in the store makes sense.
Speaker B:Well, Oliver, you mentioned a few things, but I'd love to dive a little bit deeper into some of the retail technologies that you think are going to start to take priority now that people are kind of shifting their focus on the connected store.
Speaker B:What's going to make the most impact, do you think?
Speaker B:What kind of technology and what do retailers need to be doing to appropriately prepare for that?
Speaker C:Yeah, so I think the, the idea of having that feedback on what is happening in the store.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker C:Whether that's through on shelf or that through, you know, robots that are feeding that.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Is clearly going to be a massive driver.
Speaker C:I mean, you know, the fact that we're with you guys at Symbiote, that's an example of where this is going to.
Speaker C:This is going to go.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:And the ability turn those insights very rapidly into the sort of next best action piece.
Speaker C:So that idea of in effect having that so that you've got good on shelf availability, that there's good in store experience, but then obviously the feed of that through the entire supply chain, because what we are seeing, and this is true in the conversations we have with both manufacturers and retailers, is the fact that we can see this as a mechanism to really eliminate stock outs.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And to go even further and further up to really understand where consumer demand is going.
Speaker C:So if you think about the trend here, obviously this is going to really help with what we've got available in store and the accuracy of that.
Speaker C:But we're also now starting to see people saying, can we actually look at what those emerging consumer signals are, which has historically been hard to access through what's on social media, et cetera, and using that then to drive what we should have on the shelf, getting even further upstream with consumers.
Speaker B:Well, and Oliver, are you seeing particular technologies that are able to do this, I think better than we've been doing it manually in store?
Speaker B:I mean, do you feel like this is a process that we can continue to just use people for.
Speaker B:Or is it important for retailers to be thinking about the technologies that are going to support the store team's numbers to get that?
Speaker C:There's a broader thing that you're referring to, which I think is something that the industry is obviously in its infancy of, but we expect to see, which is what I would describe as the human AI flip.
Speaker C:So if we think about this, people, I would say this is true.
Speaker C:Even a year ago.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker C:People would have said, let's start with in effect, a human driven process and how can we weave the technology in?
Speaker C:Right, right.
Speaker C:What we are now expecting to see, and I think there'll be more and more pilots and showing this happening at scale is the flip of that.
Speaker C:So we're actually saying let's have a robotic or an AI led process with a human in the loop.
Speaker C:And the focus of the human is to say, how do we actually make this actually better?
Speaker B:Right, right.
Speaker B:And personalize it to our store experience, I imagine.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker A:Because when you're saying next best action that can take a lot of.
Speaker A:That can take in a lot of different arena can come in a lot of different arenas.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:It could be the next best action that the store employee is going to take.
Speaker A:It could be the next, next best action that the store merchandiser back at HQ could take next best action that the supply chain logistics manager could take too.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Am I thinking about that the right way?
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And I think that that's, that's where you hit the nail on the head is that when we, when we get to that, we know that today a huge number of leaders, a huge number of rental managers, a huge number of frontline employees are spending an enormous amount of time deciding what should they do next.
Speaker A:Or they're just checking tasks off their list daily, which might not be the most efficient allocation of their workload either.
Speaker A:Right, Correct.
Speaker A:That's the other thing.
Speaker C:And I think this is when we're having conversations with leaders, that's the big conversation, is that this actually implies a big flip.
Speaker C:So when we say let's just kind of go forward 12 months and say what should a leadership conversation look like?
Speaker C:It should have a much more clear focus on what is the next best action being recommended and what can we do based on the information we've got to make that better.
Speaker C:Let's not spend this much time looking at reports actually go directly to that.
Speaker C:So when we talk about the concept of.
Speaker C:Sometimes people describe it as data to leadership or algorithmic leadership, etcetera that's the jump we're talking about.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:And if you then think about what does that translate into the store experience and the way in which the store is going to operate, it's going to flatten this out massively.
Speaker C:Because our ability to take that collected inside to the top and have it really be useful, the front line.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker C:Gets changed fundamentally.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:You're speaking my language a little bit.
Speaker B:Speaking our language and our audience's language.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:I mean, there's a lot of people.
Speaker B:You can come back anytime.
Speaker A:I've always wanted to.
Speaker A:I've always wanted to.
Speaker A:I've always envisioned the Monday morning meeting that we all have, you know, just built around what you're talking about.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:So we're all on the same page.
Speaker A:We know where it's going and why we're doing it.
Speaker A:But.
Speaker A:All right, let's get you out of here on this.
Speaker A:So what's going to separate the haves and the have nots, particularly in grocery over the next three to five years?
Speaker A:What do you think is going to be the real separator?
Speaker C:I think, I mean, and you might be surprised when I hear you say this, is that because so much of this innovation is technology and data driven, the question about leadership being comfortable with what that means and taking that on board and looking at how can they innovate in that way is going to be very profound.
Speaker C:And so, I mean, this is a question.
Speaker C:I get a lot.
Speaker A:I got a follow up already.
Speaker A:Keep going.
Speaker C:Yeah, I get a lot, which is there is a huge amount of anxiety that we found that we're unlocking in these conversations about leaders being really comfortable in operating in the world.
Speaker C:And, and it got to the point where we actually put.
Speaker C:Ended up putting a survey out there to actually ask this question.
Speaker C:So we asked a lot of the big consumer industry players their view of looking across their top teams today.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:What was their comfort level in the sort of leadership skills are required now?
Speaker C:And the number that came back was about half.
Speaker C:So when I'm talking to a leadership.
Speaker B:Team and that's ideally like half that they're admitting.
Speaker B:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Who's.
Speaker A:Who's watching my.
Speaker A:What I put on this survey.
Speaker A:Right, exactly.
Speaker C:I mean, and I think.
Speaker C:So you know, what that does mean is that the level of interest in becoming much more taken data savvy is gone through the roof.
Speaker C:And the thing that's different about this is if you think about we're talking to a team now versus say three years ago, we would have said to A leadership team.
Speaker C:You need to become much more, you know, you need to, this technology needs to put in place.
Speaker C:But that was something where they were instructing changes in the rest of the company.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:With this, everybody we're talking to in the room.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Including all of the leadership, their own personal behavior is going to get changed.
Speaker A:Well, so, okay, so, so I, I don't want to age you, but I know most of us, you know, speaking on this live broadcast, we can remember the first time when E Commerce came about.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker A:And that was a big adaptation for a lot of retail executives.
Speaker A:How would you compare this to that?
Speaker A:Are retail executives more like, okay, yeah, I need to get on board or are they, as I don't want to say, I will say, dismissive of the trend like they were with E Commerce back in the day.
Speaker A:And it wasn't until 10 or 15 years later that Amazon showed them, you know, everything that could happen.
Speaker C:Yeah, I mean, it's a great question.
Speaker C:I mean I do remember the E Commerce conversations obviously.
Speaker C:Well.
Speaker C:And there was a lot more about this like really seriously, like, you know, it's a physical product, people have got to go into the store.
Speaker C:The economics, I mean, like.
Speaker C:Absolutely.
Speaker C:I think this is profoundly different.
Speaker A:This is different.
Speaker A:So you're seeing a different perception towards it.
Speaker C:Yeah.
Speaker C:And that's good enough just to give you a reference point.
Speaker C:So we've been doing the research work with the World Economic Forum.
Speaker C:So we basically, they ask us to do kind of compositions of briefings for executives for as we go through every year and they were just to have a, we're going to have a piece coming out in a.
Speaker C:About a month or so.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker C:On this.
Speaker C:We asked about 70, 80 different companies for how they were, you know, how this was reacting.
Speaker C:None of them, none of the people we talked to said, oh, this is like high blown smoke.
Speaker C:Yes.
Speaker C:People on the E Commerce side that were more suspicious of it.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:There was a question more about the timing of it.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker C:But the interesting.
Speaker A:How fast to run towards it.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But the, the thing that came through was about a third of them were saying that they expected to see this impacting the industry towards the end of this year.
Speaker B:Okay.
Speaker C:And about two thirds said they expect to see it impact the industry towards the end of next year.
Speaker A:26.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:Okay.
Speaker C:No one said, oh, it's going to go way, way out.
Speaker A:That's interesting.
Speaker C:Now one thing that came up a lot was the question about the industry tipping point.
Speaker C:And I said, well, you know, what do you mean by that?
Speaker C:Because it came Up a lot.
Speaker C:Basically what people were saying was because the industry is obviously slightly investment averse, is it, you know, isn't necessary for that.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker C:Once these proof points start to emerge at scale, a number of people said to us that they're expecting there to be quite a big adjustment to people saying actually we're going to need to get after this and make these adjustments in a much more compressed period of time.
Speaker C:Right, got it.
Speaker C:And so that's given us a thought that we may start to see a big adjustment in the uptake of the whole suite of technologies that we're describing, I would guess being more conservative sometime next year or towards the end of next year as these sort of scale proof points emerging.
Speaker C:But even with the work that we're doing, we can see that those proof points are going to emerge.
Speaker C:And I think this is going to happen.
Speaker C:That's going to be profound for the industry guys.
Speaker A:You're saying when the change does come, the impact will be exponential when it does happen.
Speaker C:That's what you're saying.
Speaker C:The analogy that some people have taken, if you remember, go back in the ways and tools, things like zero based budgeting.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:Place.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That was with nobody.
Speaker C:And then suddenly everybody was doing right.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:A lot of people have used that kind of metaphor as a way of thinking about this.
Speaker C:But the level of change we're describing here is way more.
Speaker A:Way more.
Speaker A:Well, yeah.
Speaker A:So I want to ask you too, so, because we, like I said, we don't get.
Speaker A:When we started, I said we don't get a chance to talk to folks like yourself all that much.
Speaker A:So, so do you see.
Speaker A:Because the one thought, the one point you raised at the very beginning has been interesting to me through this whole conversation that you're seeing that people are basically saying, you know, they're taking notice of this.
Speaker A:Is that different across continents, across, like, is the perception of this different in the US versus Europe versus.
Speaker A:I'm sure it is different versus Asia.
Speaker A:How is that?
Speaker A:Because we, we tend to be very US centric, US focused here.
Speaker A:But I'm curious, like, how are other countries perceiving this?
Speaker C:I mean, I think it's a, it's a, it's a realistic question.
Speaker C:I think we're seeing the most innovation in Asia.
Speaker A:Okay.
Speaker C:Wouldn't surprise you.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker C:And I think the willingness to kind of rethink the models, to rethink different types of store formats, etc.
Speaker C:Is much more profound there.
Speaker C:And, and I think recognizing having folks in the US understand that and make sure they're up to Speed with that, I think is really important because, I mean, one things that we get a huge number of requests for are conversations.
Speaker C:What we describe it as now near next.
Speaker C:So what's typically happening in the industry today?
Speaker C:What's current best practice?
Speaker C:And that's usually where we used.
Speaker C:Like if I go back again two or three years, that's largely where the conversation.
Speaker C:Right, right.
Speaker C:What we're now saying is what's next?
Speaker C:And this is technology and capabilities that we know are now doable but have not yet been scaled.
Speaker C:And so the conversation now is saying, we don't expect you to take on everything in every area.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:That's not right.
Speaker C:Right.
Speaker C:But you as a leader need to be aware of this and then to make decisions as to which of these technologies, ways of thinking and so on you should be adopting deliver on your strategy.
Speaker C:And that shift, I think is pretty profound and I think it's important.
Speaker C:Back to your point about who's going to survive and who's not.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker C:That mindset where people have got that external orientation, they're understanding what's happening.
Speaker C:I think that's.
Speaker C:That's particularly particular.
Speaker B:Even the curiosity to learn.
Speaker B:I mean, I think it just shows you can look at some of the companies and how well they're doing, especially the mass retailers here in the US and who's leading those organizations and what their willingness is to ask questions, to question what they know about the industry, especially after working so long.
Speaker C:I mean, I always love.
Speaker C:I don't know whether you guys have definitely done this with audiences, but I always loved just.
Speaker C:Just asking for a bit of a show of hands of who's experimenting with whatever that less is technology.
Speaker C:I used to do like who's got an Alexa like a way.
Speaker A:Right, right.
Speaker C:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:I used to do that when I speak.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker C:You'd look at like, what's the sure plans in the audience around.
Speaker C:Around that.
Speaker C:Like the people that have got that.
Speaker C:That have kind of experimented with it, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker C:That I think is going to be one of the really big determinants of.
Speaker C:Of how people are going to be successful or not in the future.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or our litmus test, which we always like to joke about in OMNITALK, is which CEOs are saying when they're asked what's the most important thing you got to get right in your organization, how many of them are saying data.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:Which I imagine you agree with too.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:All right, well, that was awesome.
Speaker A:Thank you, Oliver.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:From Accenture.
Speaker C:Thanks.
Speaker A:For joining us.
Speaker A:Thanks to partnering with us and sponsoring our content here from fmi.
Speaker A:And Anne, as always, be careful out there.
