Guide to staying agile amid tariffs and supply chain disruptions

As proposed tariffs pack onto the P&L, brands are focusing on high-performing SKUs and favorable margins.

CPG and retailer P&Ls are feeling the squeeze. United States tariffs – oscillating between proposed, paused, and impending – are hiking costs on everything from essential ingredients to packaging. Expected rates of 10-46% from major import sources could increase costs across all categories, squeezing margins and creating an urgency to act. Meanwhile, supply chain vulnerabilities persist, creating unpredictable lead times and availability gaps.

Yet within these challenges lies opportunity – the chance to optimize category mix, identify new growth pockets, and capitalize on shifting consumer behaviors to drive overall category expansion.

Market reports alone fail to provide sufficient insights to navigate fast-moving disruptions and shift strategies to protect and grow the bottom line. Daily data refreshes on inventory levels, store-level sales patterns, and category insights enable category managers to quickly detect and address gaps before they impact revenue, while pinpointing channel growth opportunities. Readily available On-shelf Availability (OSA) reporting provides incremental insights, identifying zero-sales streaks and phantom inventory, to ensure valuable shelf placements deliver maximum returns when every unit contributes to the margin.

Maximizing the performance of existing placements across both physical and digital shelves helps categories strengthen their position even as economic and competitive headwinds intensify. When store trips decline and each shopping occasion carries higher stakes, ensuring the right, profitable products are consistently available across touchpoints becomes the foundation of category management excellence.

Need for speed

Frequent category check-ins and real-time feedback loops are a new best practice. The shift from relying on delayed syndicated reports to leveraging real-time POS and inventory data has become essential for retailers and suppliers to effectively measure performance and respond to emerging trends.

With tariffs threatening margins at unprecedented rates, category managers must quickly identify which SKUs can absorb cost increases versus those that need strategic repositioning. Real-time sales velocity data reveals which products maintain strong demand despite price fluctuations, while elasticity insights show how sensitive different SKUs are to pricing changes. This data creates the ideal foundation for category managers to make precision assortment and pricing decisions across all touchpoints, from in-store displays to online marketplaces.

By your next category review, you can create store cluster-targeted strategies backed by indisputable sales data, placing the right products in front of the right audiences, at prices that will keep sales flowing despite economic pressures.

Ensuring all functions are operating from the same data foundation will support seamless execution and minimal disruption to the shopping experience.

AI enters the race: Structured data creates the necessary foundation for AI-powered retail intelligence. With clean, consistent information flowing through your organization, large language models (LLMs) can now deliver revelatory category findings through natural conversation, keeping managers armed with actionable discoveries that spark curiosity and drive better decisions faster than ever before.

With tariffs threatening margins at unprecedented rates, category managers must quickly identify which SKUs can absorb cost increases versus those that need strategic repositioning.

Do more with less (products in your assortment)

As proposed tariffs pack onto the P&L, brands are focusing on high-performing SKUs and favorable margins. This means zeroing in on maximizing velocity – how quickly products move off shelves – rather than just overall sales volume. It’s crucial to identify which items genuinely drive category growth versus those that merely occupy valuable shelf space and incur hidden costs, from (now greater) production costs to logistical complexity.

The smartest category leaders are already optimizing their assortment strategies, recognizing that not all products warrant equal investment in a constrained market. J.M. Smucker, for instance, developed a targeted cluster strategy for its pet dental products by leveraging detailed SKU and store-level sales data. The team identified high-demand store groups best suited for new dental innovations and adjusted shelf space in lower-performing clusters accordingly, seeing incremental sales growth as a result.

Optimizing assortments doesn’t have to mean halting product development. Category managers can confidently make space for exciting new inclusions with the data to back it up, understanding that not all SKUs are meant to weather this precarious, fast-changing chapter.

The smartest category leaders are already optimizing their assortment strategies, recognizing that not all products warrant equal investment in a constrained market.

Stay omnipresent

If a smaller store assortment has you down, know that fewer products on physical shelves can actually drive increased demand for your brands across digital channels. As consumers search for familiar products, they increasingly turn to online marketplaces and e-commerce platforms, creating new opportunities for brands with optimized digital presence.

Major retailers like Target and Kroger have seen continuous double-digit online sales growth due to their investments in blending digital and physical shopping experiences. CPGs who invest in their digital shelf presence with readily available reports by these retailers see dividends beyond just capturing lost in-store sales. Optimized listings can unlock new revenue streams, offsetting margin pressures and shelf competition concerns. 

As a measurable way to pressure-test new channel strategies, category teams can connect with marketing on retail media campaigns, or an Instacart strategy, to increase impressions and gather real-time feedback on what’s resonating. 

As retailers call for their supplier partners “not only to ensure product availability across these digital channels, but optimize them,” brands that respond effectively gain an advantage in both partnership strength and consumer reach.

CPGs who invest in their digital shelf presence with readily available reports by these retailers see dividends beyond just capturing lost in-store sales. Optimized listings can unlock new revenue streams, offsetting margin pressures and shelf competition concerns. 

Know your worth

This is a category manager’s moment to shine, not shrink. Narratives suggest waning consumer loyalty, but the truth may be quite the opposite: in times of uncertainty, shoppers often gravitate towards the reliability of established brands and retailers (especially when there’s a defined value differentiation). By offering products that align with both market trends and your core audience segments, you can maintain healthy category growth and mitigate increased production costs with optimized assortments that offset economic pressures with greater sales velocities.

The question isn’t whether brands and retailers will weather this year’s challenges, but rather which ones will leverage them as catalysts to deepen consumer connections and emerge stronger on the other side.

Become one with your valuable sales and inventory intelligence. Book a demo of Crisp today.