Retail Tech Summit review – Personal touch enjoying growing premium over AI
As the use of technology and AI becomes increasingly prevalent throughout the retail sector it is, interestingly, highlighting just how the human touch remains at the heart of an industry that is very much about relationships and trust.
Speaking at the recent The Retail Bulletin ‘Retail Tech Summit 2026’ in central London Susannah Schofield OBE, Director General of the Direct Selling Association (DSA), told a roomful of delegates: “I’m not saying don’t use AI. It does the data bit and produces the first draft of documents but humans do the alchemy. AI can’t read a room. Efficiency [from AI] gets people through the funnel but it’s humans that then convert it.”
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She suggests that technology has pushed the transaction to being a commodity and that the relationship aspect of retail – involving people – has become the premium. Darren Sanderson-Williams, general manager at Specsavers, recognises this scenario and is hopeful that the retail industry will use AI to enhance human potential rather than use it to make them an unnecessary element of the sector.
“People will remain incredibly important. AI can give information to help colleagues but AI cannot give the human touch. Imagine a workplace where AI takes away all the boring, repetitive work so that people can concentrate on the things that require human insight. The debate is evolving and should be about looking at how to combine people with AI. To have AI working with people,” suggests Sanderson-Williams.
Rachel Ormerod, Product Operations Manager at FatFace, says it is about transparency and retailers needing to be clear about what they are trying to achieve with AI and not using it for replacing people. “We had an ‘AI September’ where we ran workshops, showed tools, guardrails, and AI policy etcetera. We showed how AI can help with processes. It was also an opportunity to myth-bust on people’s fears.” For AI to replace store staff Ormerod says it would have to be “phenomenal” technology because FatFace is very much a customer service-focused business.
AI enabling employees
One message retailers are conveying is that AI to enable employees to spend more time with customers. Jeremy Michael, Chief Revenue Officer of Serve First, says retailers have recognised that all age groups like personal service. “As many as 67% of Gen Z’s still like the in-store experience. We can be too quick to assume under-25-year-olds only want to do things on the phone,” he says.
Companies have a choice at the moment between whether to invest or save? “They can save by taking staff off the shop floor and have a single employee who has limited interactions with customers. Or they can double-down on staff and seek more conversions and better retention etcetera,” says Michael.
For David Fradgley, head of marketing at Aramark, the investment in tech and AI is about giving customers choices in how they want to deal with retailers and hospitality companies. “We look at what tech will help the customers. At a football stadium we introduced two [Amazon-powered] Just Walk Out (JWO) stores and we thought people would prefer to still queue for their pie and mash [at the traditional store] but they have been a raging success,” he says, adding that at the company’s University stores the students prefer to talk to shop staff rather than deal just with technology.
Reducing costs or powering growth
Russell Danks, founder of Future Factory LDN, says there tends to be a one-sided view of technology whereby it is about reducing costs rather than powering growth. At the moment he suggests lots of private equity-owned businesses are cutting costs through the likes of AI although he cites Holland & Barratt as an exception as it is undergoing a major transformation involving investment in digital that is helping it drive growth both online and in-store.
There is certainly a universal attraction to investing in AI, according to Lalit Suryawanshi, head of architecture at N. Brown, who says: “Boards want to use AI. Go to any conference and it’s all about AI.” But there is often uncertainty over what they want it to achieve and typically there is little oversight of the ROI (Return on Investment).
At N. Brown, like other established retailers, there has been a need to deal with legacy systems and dispersed data sources. “You need to sort out your data first, with an integration layer that connects to various systems,” he says. Aman Bhattarai, head of outcomes for enterprise EMEA at ThoughtSpot, agrees that data is a vital initial focus and suggests retailers ask: “How do we get at the data and use it for gaining insights and then acting on it [via AI]? Continuing to use spreadsheets means stale insights.”
Improving efficiency
The data within Lincolnshire Co-op is being used to improve efficiency through the use of AI and a focus on boosting the accuracy of forecasting and replenishment. Alison Hands, CEO of Lincolnshire Co-op, says the business is three years into this AI-powered journey and that there will be some payback from the project next year.
Steve Webster, founder of Barking Cat Advisory, believes there is all too often limited knowledge among retailers of determining the ROI when engaged in AI projects. He cites conflicting research, with Boston Consulting group finding 50% of businesses investing in AI making a return whereas McKinsey has found only 6% are making a significant return. Although he says Morrisons has stated that it expects to make £940 million of revenues from AI over the next three years he recommends retailers do not look outside their own operations for measurements for ROI involving AI because it is not yet an established area.
Limiting the magnitude of the numbers is the fact retailers are using AI for very basic initiatives, according to The IMRG, which found 80% of retailers who are investing in the technology are using it for images and copy creation. “It’s basic, high volume stuff that’s not having a fundamental impact on businesses,” says Webster, who adds that in contrast of the high performers as many as 75% have been redefining their operational processes.
Connecting ROI to the business case
Selina Butterfield-Mashoofi, chief finance, technology and property officer at Our Coop, says ROI has to be connected to the business case and she has four elements combined to calculate the ROI: financial, such as margin improvements and cost savings; operational, which makes life easier for colleagues; value to members; and the future-proofing of the business.
Ed Duggan, Financial & Commercial Director at Fishpools, agrees: “Every investment decision has to go back to the strategic objectives. The [ROI] numbers are the thing you get at the end of the strategy. Organise the business so the project has the greatest chance of success. Ensure someone handles the silos and that you also manage all the risks. This might not give you as high a ROI as you wanted but it is better for the overall project.”
Anna Hatfield-Shaw, senior customer success manager at Mitti, suggests all projects start small with one workflow and just a handful of stores and that feedback is garnered throughout life of the project. “The first 30 days is about adoption, the next 30 is the improvement part, and the final 30 days is whether it has worked and can it be scaled across the business,” she explains.
Since 85% of the customer journey at Kitchens International is human Graham Johnston, Owner & CEO at Kitchens International, says the technology has to enhance colleagues’ ability to speed up the journey. The company has also invested in better visualisation of its products online. “Seeing the improved conversion is the business case. We start small, prove it, and then roll it out. The test and learn element is absolutely critical. You need to know that it will be beneficial both financially and experientially,” he explains.
See and feel the product
There is certainly an ongoing strong demand for customers to visit the Kitchens International store and deal with people. It is the same with fashion retailer BatchLDN. Pim Vellenga, Head of Operations at BatchLDN, say: “Physical retail is still big. We can be 99% sure that a customer has the right material and fit etcetera and we could find this out in five questions online but still the customers want to come into store to see and feel the product.”
Chris McCullough, chief revenue officer at Rotageek, is seeking to help the teams in physical stores with optimised rotas created in real-time. “We’re optimising away from just footfall levels to brand optimisation as there is more of a move to experience-led in-store environments,” he says.
Other tools are being used in-store by the likes of WH Smith, with its X-hoppers solution involving headsets that connect employees across sites and enable queries to be conducted via voice. Graham Dixon, CTO of X-hoppers, says employees can broadcast to other colleagues who could be dispersed across multiple sites or in a large store such as a garden centre. This can be used to locate them for dealing with a customer or to request help with finding a product. The conversations are all recorded and can be transcribed if required.
“Employees can also ask questions of AI and if it can’t solve it then it will be passed onto the relevant person in the team,” he says, and when devices such as fridges have faults then alerts can be pushed through as a broadcast to the team and an employee can then accept it,” explains Dixon.
Driving customer engagement
For Josh Atkinson, retail sales and operations manager at Footasylum, such solutions are all about making it as simple as possible for the teams on the shop floor and for it to drive engagement with customers. “We try to keep the teams involved when we have new technology, through surveys so we understand what they want. It has helped our retention rate, with turnover going from 130% to 70% because they’ve bought into our plans. Tech has reduced our churn,” he says.
Technology is also being used for the retention of customers, according to Kate Murray, Digital Director of Nobody’s Child, who says: “Acquiring customers is the name of the game but great energy and focus has to also be on retention. We spend to acquire customers but then forget about them. It should be a two-way thing. Meta is probably our biggest acquirer but we will look to better use data on existing customers. It’s easy to go after low-hanging fruit rather than where the real value might be.”
Shetal Bhatt, Group Global Head of Digital Marketing, Loyalty & Consumer Engagement at Costa Coffee, says the company now has the ability to mine its data to deliver personalised messages as a way to drive loyalty and retention. “I’ve a data team that’s second to none but until now [with AI] I’d not been able to process it. Now I can do messaging that’s personal. It’s a game-changer to personally target people.”
Avoiding adding friction
Costa is being cautious in how it handles this capability – and its wider deployment of tech – because it does not want to add in any friction to the customer experience. “It’s not about whistles and bells, it’s about simplicity. Be true to the experience. With Costa Club we can keep customers loyal and maybe get them to try something different. We test and learn on adding incremental sales but not moving away from our heartland,” says Bhatt.
It is just such add-ons that Janis Thomas, Chief Marketing Officer of Clothes Doctor, experiments with at Clothes Doctor: “We’re a laundry subscription service and we have add-ons like a pumpkin spice-scent. It’s about creating a continued experience through a relationship that’s not stale and boring.”
For Nick King, Insight Director at Auto Trader, retention of customers in the car sector is often down to simply “looking after people” during the purchase journey. All too often he says the service delivered by prestigious brands can be disappointing and that this leaves them susceptible to competition from new brands – particularly from China – entering the market and being more responsive and looking after customers.
