Creating a Single, Accessible Source of Data Truth
Coop Trading relies on millions of data points to effectively manage their product catalog, coordinate with suppliers, refine pricing, and more.
To successfully juggle all this information, Insights Consultant Simon Bluhm Thomsen and the rest of the Insights team turns to TARGIT Decision Suite; an end-to-end BI and analytics solution that equips employees with actionable, up-to-date information.
Simon spends a lot of his time in TARGIT’s front end, creating custom reports, crunching numbers, and ensuring that his colleagues always have the most relevant information at their fingertips.
“We use TARGIT to empower colleagues with insights through new reports. For example, if someone needs a specific insight, I create it for them. We also do monthly reporting on key metrics like price trends and growth.”
Thanks to TARGIT, Coop Trading continuously monitors the figures that most impact their business operations. What’s more, Simon’s deep experience inside TARGIT means he can build a variety of reports and dashboards for his coworkers.
“I have been working with TARGIT on and off for nearly 20 years. I have worked at three different organizations that used TARGIT, and now, I can use most all the features confidently; everything from scheduled jobs to advanced calculations and coding.”
When it comes to sharing insights, TARGIT’s straightforward interface makes distributing dashboards a breeze. No complex handovers or technical instructions — just actionable data served up in a way that makes sense.
“TARGIT is a good match for us because of its user-friendliness,” Simon shares. “It’s intuitive and easy to learn, and it’s integrated into nearly all roles across our organization. Only a handful of employees don’t have access.”
Most Coop Trading employees only need view-only consumer licenses, which makes it quick and easy for them to get ramped up in TARGIT. When new employees start, they get to know the solution through a ‘buddy’ who understands their role and the dashboards made for that role.
Then, they meet with Simon for a quick run-through of TARGIT. From there, they’re ready to start using it, as Simon explains: “After our initial meeting, new employees can navigate, filter, and understand the basics, which I would say is fairly user-friendly to get that far in an hour.”
Building a Culture of Data-Driven Collaboration
Data is the lifeblood of modern business. For Coop Trading, having scattered data points was like trying to solve a puzzle with missing pieces. But with TARGIT, they’ve built a single source of truth.
Rather than spending time collecting and interpreting data, employees get what they need quickly and easily – no matter their background or level of technical experience with BI.
“There’s an exceptional amount of data tied to a ‘digital product.’ We use TARGIT to gather the data across our different applications, which makes it easy to focus on specific areas, like packaging for example, by pulling the relevant report for quick insights.”
One of their biggest wins? Price forecasting. Coop Trading uses TARGIT to analyze pricing periods and predict future trends. Armed with this knowledge, they can tackle supply chain vulnerabilities before they become problems.
“We use TARGIT to predict with great accuracy where prices are headed and identify which categories may face challenges or opportunities,” Simon explains. “This allows us to proactively address issues, like expanding our supplier base for vulnerable categories. We also know which categories will be challenged, and which have an upside.”
TARGIT helps the company compare price trends for raw materials in specific categories like wheat or olive oil. By comparing internal data to the market, Coop Trading can determine whether supplier price increases are reasonable and benchmark them against competitors. TARGIT is also used for category analysis to see which categories and items drive the most sales.
Beyond pricing, TARGIT helps track service levels and delivery times, both of which are critical to ensuring that supermarket shelves stay fully stocked.
Adapting to Market Trends and Competitor Performance
But it doesn’t stop there. TARGIT is becoming central to how Coop Trading anticipates market changes and keeps pace with competitors.
Take Nielsen data, for example. Simon and his team use this treasure trove of insights to monitor buying habits and emerging trends. By integrating it into TARGIT, they’re creating a holistic view of the market landscape.
“The data from our suppliers shows us which products they buy from us,” says Simon. “Nielsen data provides insight into what’s sold in the stores, including competitors’ sales and benchmarks for market performance, which enables market share analysis. Integrating these insights inside TARGIT will give us a next-level understanding of consumer behaviors and improve our forecasting.”
TARGIT also plays a role in new product development by helping Coop Trading measure the effectiveness of product launches and how new products’ performance compares to similar ones released in the past.
According to Simon, “If a new product needs development, like a new Änglamark product or a new flavor, TARGIT supports the relevant analyses like launch evaluations. For example, we might analyze how a product launched five months ago performed and decide whether to expand the line. We conduct this analysis with a combination of data from TARGIT and data from Nielsen.”
Shaping the Future with Insights from TARGIT
As Coop Trading looks to the future, TARGIT remains at the core of their growth strategy. Whether it’s collaborating with partners like Coop Norway or doing category development, TARGIT simplifies decision-making with actionable insights.
“TARGIT helps answer questions about which direction to go, the potential impact of different decisions, etc. In that way we use it for business decisions all the time,” Simon shares.
The road ahead? More data, more insights, and more opportunities. Coop Trading is diving deeper into consumer-driven strategies, combining internal data with Nielsen insights to stay ahead of the curve. Simon explains, “We aim to be much more consumer-driven and data-driven moving ahead. To do this, we’ll rely mainly on Nielsen data and TARGIT’s ability to analyze it alongside our internal data.”
