Reasons to Read

Discover how retailers can win holiday 2026 by deploying AI, strengthening operations and building resilience ahead of peak demand.

Read this report to uncover answers to these and other questions around retail technology:

• How should retailers prioritize AI-driven search, discovery and personalization to capture holiday demand?
• Why is now the critical window to experiment with generative and agentic AI—and which use cases matter most?
• What operational steps—across lead times, integration and training—are essential to ensure readiness for peak season?
• How can retailers mitigate risks through infrastructure resilience, loss prevention and inventory visibility?
• What ethical considerations around data privacy and AI usage must retailers address to protect customer trust?

Companies mentioned in this report include: Amazon, AWS, Adobe, Salesforce, SAP, Workday, Blue Yonder, Manhattan Associates, Zebra Technologies, Vusion, Simbe Robotics, Avery Dennison, Honeywell, Impinj, Radar, Sensormatic, AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Starlink, Target, Walmart, Best Buy, Chewy, Lowe’s, Macy’s, Sephora, Google.

Data in this report include: retail innovation framework; retail connectivity technologies; loss prevention technologies and measures.

Other relevant research:

• Agentic Commerce—Google’s Universal Commerce Protocol Invokes “Multiplayer Mode.”
• CEO Brief: Intelligent Inventory—Achieving Inventory Excellence
• RetailTech: Empowering Retail’s Front Line, Creating Smarter Stores—Five Tech-Driven Strategies for Associate Enablement
• Playbook: GenAI to Agentic AI—From Pilot to Powerhouse
• Reinventing Store Checkout: Minimizing Friction to Drive Business Growth
• The Agentic AI Playbook: How to Redefine Retail with Intelligent Autonomy
• The State of In-Store Retailing 2025: The Dawn of New-Age Stores, Powered by Technology
• RetailTech: Loss Prevention—Understanding the Big Picture To Prevent, Mitigate and Recover “Shrink”ing Profits