Productivity Pulse: Retail Technology Show Live 2026

SPEAKER_03: Welcome to the first live Rethink Productivity podcast, hosted by Solve By and Rethink at the after show party at Retail Technology Show. Can we let everybody know there's an audience here? Thank you. Now, just for the listeners, the boo was from the Tottenham fan.

And I'm delighted to introduce our first guest, Steve Young from Hardin, who is a Coventry fan. The bad news, Steve, is welcome to the Premier League. You won't be visiting Tottenham next season because they will be at Lincoln. Steve is head of productivity at Hardin Retail and also delighted to welcome Chris Chandler, who's head of store support integration at our co-op, formerly Mid County's co-op.

Thanks guys for joining. First of all, you've both been at the show today. We'll start with you, Chris. Initial thoughts about the show.

Any innovation or tech that's caught your mind? SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so it was a bit of an AI buffet out there today. And what was really interesting from coming to the this show compared to the last couple is that you're starting to really see some shape to that AI technology, I think. And it's starting to really properly integrate into other systems and the business partners that we've got, the AO technologies are really starting to talk to each other, and you're starting to see a real vision of where that AI stuff could could take us.

So I think that was the biggest takeaway from today. SPEAKER_03: AI more than marketing, so coming to fruition. And and Steve, I'll let you tell everybody what Harding Retail do. SPEAKER_01: Yeah.

So we run retail on uh cruise ships. So we're on about 85 cruise ships all over the world. And I guess we're in a different different place than most businesses. Because what we're trying to do is understand what the work content is for our colleagues, how we reduce that, and how we use that spare time to put those colleagues in front of more guests and increase our sales.

So a very, very different model from where most retailers are, because if I can save half an hour, it doesn't mean anything because I've still got that colleague on board ships and we still need to give them gainful employment. But if we can take away some of the mundane tasks so they can spend more time with guests and really working on that guest experience, it's really, really key to us. So I guess there's a couple of things that are really key for me today. But I th I thought I liked a lot of the apps around training.

So how we get that training to colleagues when we don't have a set workforce. So at sea, people work a six-month contract, they'll go home for three months and then they'll probably come back. So it's a very, very different uh way of looking at it. So those things where we can take that stuff and and and do that training on an app and make it consistent, I think is would be really, really useful to us.

And and like you, AI as well. I think AI forecasting for us would be the real holy grail in terms of because even year on year, if I've got a ship that's in Alaska, it will complete it'll trade completely different to someone in the Bahamas. So how how do we uh make sure that we can track by itinerary for demand rather than by ship? So yeah.

SPEAKER_03: For those retailers in the room, 1271 is the magic number. So we all know from the first of April that was the new national living wage. Chris, it's being described as the efficiency era. Is it accelerating your roadmap in terms of tech implementation or are you thinking differently about it?

Because clearly 1271 now, if we're sat here this time next year, who knows? Probably£13 and more. SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's it's definitely tech's definitely on the on the on the roadmap, but it's quite challenging because, like most retailers now, we've implemented e-cells, we've implemented self-checkouts across the board, we've done a lot of work over the last few years to sort of hit all those kind of low-hanging fruit areas. So technology suddenly becomes quite a challenging area because the return on the technology we're now doing is much less than the return on the technology we were doing a few years ago.

So actually, we're looking quite hard at a lot of sort of commercial arrangements, ways of working, ways of modeling and operating our stores, actually, more so probably than technology. So whether that's considerations around uh store management models, whether that's could we find a partner that could deliver in-store bakery to our store rather than actually us bake it ourselves? And we haven't decided on any of those things, but these are sort of things that we're working through at the moment.

SPEAKER_03: So forcing you to look wider than the store labor at more of the other commercials and the things in place. And Steve, technology must be tricky when you're in the middle of the sea. So how are you thinking about how that evolves in terms of you know just basic things, I suppose, like internet can be can be tricky and connectivity when you're at the bottom of a ship in the middle of the ocean? SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I think this there's two issues we've got with technology.

One is like you say, if we want Wi-Fi, it has to go through Starlink and and there's there's a cost to that. We we can't always download or every download data every day, so we have to store it, and then once we're in port, we have to flush that data back into the system, so it's difficult to see demand as it's it's actually happening and plans that. SPEAKER_03: Okay, so plans for 2026, 2027 around technology, productivity, and the use of AI. Chris, you touched on AI as kind of being more tangible now, and I think in in previous years it's fair to say it's been a solution looking for a problem.

Have you got definite plans for the next kind of 12 to 18 months, or are they still forming? SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so definite plans in terms of supply chain, in terms of workforce management, so enabling some of the AI-based technology in those areas. But I think the ultimate goal is starting to bring our suppliers together with an AI solution that can bring all the data that we've got into one place and produce a much better workflow for our colleagues. So it's we're gonna be in a position where our stores have less and less frontline colleagues, so we need to make sure they're as efficient as they possibly can be at all times.

So we need a solution that is driving colleagues into the right task at the right time. So rather than giving them a list of here's 30 things you need to do today, here's the thing you need to do right now, this hour, because that's gonna have the biggest impact on sales or customer experience or whatever it might be. So I think I think that's where the AI piece is really, really interesting, and it's it's that workflow delivery that we really need to nail down. SPEAKER_03: And Steve, technology at sea, where where's your mind at for the next kind of 12 to 18 months?

SPEAKER_01: It's a difficult one because with everything now being cloud-based, we're probably in a place where we need some something that's a bit older and sits on a PC and we can extract data from it from my part of the business. Anyway, I think in terms of AI, in terms of planning our demand and getting the stuff to ships from our warehouses, I can see a real user case for that. One of the technologies that's really I thought was good today we saw is using the QR codes instead of barcodes, so we can use one code right from one end of the supply chain to the other.

Because when you think we'll we'll pick we'll have suppliers Pickstock send it to us, that'll go to Bristol, and then we need to get that to anywhere in the world. Understanding that where that product is and how it's flowing and does it get there, really, really key to us. SPEAKER_03: Thank you. We'll open it up to questions from the audience.

Edward's got his hand up. SPEAKER_02: We've heard a lot about how AI is going to end up replacing human jobs. Do you think in your organizations the budget to buy AI is gonna come from OPEX, or do you think it's gonna come from the HR human budget? SPEAKER_00: I think it's probably a mixture of growing sales and saving on labour.

So I think most retailers in this room I imagine are talking mainly about growing sales and cutting costs at the moment, and that's the two kind of areas we're constantly talking about. And where I see when I talked about the workflow piece there, I think it's not just efficiency piece, it's also about driving sales. So it's saying there's an opportunity there to be growing your bakery sales if you go and top that product back up now because you've sold out and you sold more than that last week, and also retail is a very competitive place, so AI that can sort of help drive managers towards sort of uh targets and outperforming other people in the business, and those kind of things will really help drive those sales forward.

So I think there's a 50-50 business case between the labour operational efficiencies and probably and moving sales sales forward as well. SPEAKER_01: I think for us first piece is get the right people doing the right jobs in the in the right places, because I think as I said, taking a whole head out is is not something you can easily do, but then it's about understanding that spare capacity and how we can enrich the guest experience with that and drive the top line, and that creates the capital for what we we we would want to do, I guess.

SPEAKER_03: Any more questions from the floor? SPEAKER_02: Given that Martin Spencer has just given 11,000 members of staff co-pilot, do you think that staff members will have a token budget in the future so that they can build their own agents and deploy their own tools? SPEAKER_00: I think that's probably a fad, if I'm honest. I it's uh it's an interesting concept.

I I I think it's it's a positive story. I think it's uh I I can't see it being rolled out across across the board personally. I don't I don't think there'll be a strong enough business case for that in the long run. But I think I could see why they've done it, but yeah, no, I don't think it'll be rolled out any further.

SPEAKER_03: Any more questions? So we'll finish on one for both of you. So if you could take one piece of tape scene today at cost, no implementation, and it's live tomorrow on ships in the stores, what would it be? SPEAKER_01: I think the ability to track product from the start of the ply chain to the end of the supply chain, I think that would be a real game changer for us.

SPEAKER_00: Yes, I think I I think I've taught AI workflows to death, but the piece I haven't probably mentioned in that is and Steve mentioned it was the there's some really good suppliers with that L and D piece that ties in. So it's it's it's training in the moment at the right need. So it's driving based on the behaviour that that colleague is is displaying through the task management system or whatever platform they're using, it's saying we can clearly see that there's a training need here and it's training that colleague in the moment, and rather than going through cycles of six months training on this, and then here's another 15-minute module you need to do again for the third time in the last 12 months.

Actually, small 20-second, 30-second, two-minute videos that kind of train people in the moment and say you're doing this wrong, you need to do it slightly different. SPEAKER_03: Perfect. Well, we'll pause there and you can all enjoy some more food and drink. Thank you, Steve.

Thank you, Chris. Round of applause from the audience. If you're at the show tomorrow, come over and see us on the Rethink Stand. We'll show you the work we're doing with Ed and the team at SolvedByAI on the budget model forecasting.

We've also got our future ready benchmarking report, which we can give you a copy or download if you've not got it. And Ian Ed, Lee, and the team are obviously on the Solve By Stand as well, showing all the good things they do. So thanks for your time. Thanks for coming tonight and enjoy some food and drink.