Category Desk
Retailers and Distributors
For Retailers and Distributors
Retail AI built for teams that own the shelf.
Crisp Halo gives retailer and distributor teams a shared data foundation for supplier collaboration and powers purpose-built solutions for buyer, category, and replenishment teams.
Ask questions, verify insights, and automate workflows.
Solutions to run every retail function
Each desk is built for a specific function, with the expertise, workflows, and AI capabilities your team actually needs. Pick where to start, or explore them all.
Quick links:
Make shelf decisions tied to real business outcomes
Built for category managers and space planning teams. The Category Desk unifies space, sales, and inventory data in a single layer. Planogram resets connect directly to business outcomes. Teams spend less time building planograms and more time making them perform.
Results include
- 25+ hours saved per reset – Brookshire Grocery
- 240+ planogram updates per hour – Petbarn
Core Capabilities - Explore All
Ask Crisp Halo your toughest questions
Example prompts:
Ask About:
- Planogram resets
- Blue Yonder services
- Store clustering
- Space-to-sales
- Fixturing rules
- Macro space automation
Crisp named Category Management Partner of the Year by Blue Yonder for space planning intelligence
“Before Crisp, we struggled to build planograms to hit a deadline. Now we’re building them to perform.”
Partner Desk
Retailers and Distributors
Enable suppliers with real-time insights and AI to drive performance
Turn your first-party data into a competitive advantage – and a revenue line. White-label analytics solutions give your supplier base access to daily POS, inventory, and distribution data under your brand, with AI built-in.
Results include
- 4,000+ supplier users on UNFI Insights
Core Capabilities - Explore All
Ask Crisp Halo your toughest questions
Example prompts:
Ask About:
- Supplier onboarding
- Fill rates and OTIF
- Seasonal planning
- Distribution gaps
- Promotional performance
Five ways CPGs can innovate with UNFI Insights and AI Agents powered by Crisp
“UNFI Insights helps suppliers strengthen collaboration with retailers across the U.S. and Canada with data-driven insights to support their business goals.”
Replenishment Desk
Retailers and Distributors
Automated ordering that improves availability, waste, and margin
Smarter ordering for every store and every SKU, including fresh categories. The Replenishment Desk combines store-level demand forecasting with simulated inventory to generate automated orders that reduce waste and protect margin.
Results include
- Fresh produce automation at 7,000+ stores
- 9.9% deli profit growth for top retailer
Core Capabilities - Explore All
Ask Crisp Halo your toughest questions
Example prompts:
Ask About:
- Fresh ordering
- Waste and spoilage reduction
- Demand forecasting
- Store-level availability
- Shrink modeling
CPG supply chains stay moving with these five AI Agent use cases
Buyer Desk
Retailers and Distributors
Native intelligence with built-in hierarchies, calendars, and logic
Built for retailer and distributor merchant teams who need daily visibility into what’s selling, what’s stocking out, and what needs attention. Buyer Desk provides store and SKU-level analysis with built-in category logic.
Core Capabilities - Explore All
Ask Crisp Halo your toughest questions
Example prompts:
Ask About:
- Availability gaps
- Category health
- Vendor scorecards
- DC performance
- Void detection
How retailers can activate a vertical AI data foundation
“Crisp helps us reduce time spent on manual tasks and shift our focus to strategy and accuracy.”
Why purpose-built AI matters for retail
General-purpose AI tools don’t understand the nuances of retail. Crisp Agentic tools are built on a retail-specific data foundation – and knows what your store formats, fiscal calendars, and planogram compliance rules all mean. Every AI recommendation, automated workflow, and presentation traces back to data your team can trust. Learn more about our vertical AI approach for retailers.
- Conversational analysis
- Workflow automation
- Scheduled reporting
- Custom apps
Interested in professional services?
Need something tailored to your team? Crisp offers customized solutions, consulting engagements, and accelerated product deployments on top of the Crisp Halo platform.
Frequently asked questions about Crisp for Retailers
What is a Crisp solution Desk and how do I know which one is right for my team?
A solution desk is a purpose-built workspace for a specific retail function, with the data models, AI capabilities, and workflows tailored to that team’s role. Most retailers use more than one, and they all share the same data foundation. Talk to our team to find the right fit.
- Buyer Desk is for merchant teams who manage categories and vendors.
- Category Desk is for shelf and space planning teams.
- Replenishment Desk is for demand forecasting and automated ordering.
- Partner Desk is for enabling your supplier base with white-label analytics and AI.
How does Crisp help retailers enable their supplier base with insights?
The Partner Desk delivers daily shipment, POS, inventory, and other distribution data to suppliers under your brand – giving them the visibility to improve OTIF, spot voids, and sharpen trade spend. UNFI Insights is an example, which is utilized by thousands of suppliers, with AI Agents, scheduled reporting, and data destinations built in. Partner Desk solutions are fully governable, so you can control what data is shared, how often, and to whom. Partners retain full control of their first-party data.
How does Crisp help with fresh category replenishment?
The Replenishment Desk combines store-level demand forecasting with shelf-life and shrink modeling to generate automated orders that reduce waste while maintaining availability. Dollar General has automated fresh produce ordering across 7,000 stores using Crisp’s replenishment capabilities.
How does planogram automation work with Crisp?
Crisp automates planogram production by applying merchandising strategy, product substitutions, and range changes across store groupings at scale. Petbarn serves an example of a retailer who has reduced planogram production from over three weeks to one day, and now processes 240+ automatic updates per hour.
Can I start with one desk and add more later?
Yes. Crisp is built to land with a single team and expand across functions. Each desk connects to the same underlying data, so adding a new one doesn’t require re-implementation.
Get started with your Desk now
See how Crisp helps your business. Pick a desk (or three!) and we’ll walk you through it.