Use case The challenge
Every promotion looked like a win.
The weekly report showed units up on almost every deal. Supplier funding covered part of each discount, so the team assumed the rest was paying for itself.
Nobody had time to check what each deal took from the products beside it. And because signage stays up for three to six months, a losing promotion kept losing until the posters came down.
Before Cortex
What the team saw first
- Promo unitsUp on 58 of 61 deals
- Supplier fundingCovers part of every discount
- CannibalizationNever measured
- InstinctMore promotions, more traffic
Same question. Different results.
The question“Which promotions aren’t generating value, and which ones cannibalize the most?”
Claude / GPT / Public LLMs
Uploaded file
Answer
58 of your 61 promotions increased unit sales. Chips 2-for-$4 had the biggest lift. Keep it running.
Just an answer.
Cortex AI
Connected intelligence
Cortex AI- Basket data
- Cannibalization
- Competitor shelf prices
- Supplier funding
- Price elasticity
- Footfall
- Weather
- Category margins
- Signage dates
- Rebate programs
- 23 deals losing money
- Chips 2-for-$4: 58% cannibalized
- 3 rebates never claimed
Answer
23 of 61 promotions lose money or need rework. Chips 2-for-$4 is the worst: 58% of its extra bags came from other chips. End 9, rework 11, add rebates to 3.
A decision.
The mechanic mattered more than the discount.
Cortex compared actual units with expected units for every promotion, store by store. Then it priced the discount, the extra margin, and what each deal took from neighboring products and pack sizes.
Multi-buys on snacks and energy drinks mostly moved shoppers between brands. Meal bundles and single-item price points brought new spend. Three losing deals had supplier rebates available that nobody had claimed.
What Cortex found
The promotions that need attention
Six of 61 live promotions, sorted the way Cortex flags them: losing money first.
End the losers, fix the mechanics, claim the money on the table.
- Ended 9 promotions at the next signage change.
- Reworked 11 from multi-buys to single-item prices or meal bundles.
- Added supplier rebates to 3 deals, which turned them positive.
