7,800+
connected CPG partners
120+
retail banners
30,000+
daily active users
25+ yrs
of demand science
QKS SPARK Matrix Leader 2025 · IRP&PO
The problem, named
AI everywhere, but it only sees half the deal
Trade is planned on one side of the table and executed on the other. Retailers price and promote in one system; CPGs fund and forecast in another. Nothing wrong with the data — it simply never meets. Every hand-off is another place margin quietly leaks.
$500B
in annual trade spend flows between retailers and CPGs
72%
of trade promotions fail to break even (Nielsen · McKinsey)
82%
of trade teams still spend 10+ hours a week reconciling deals by hand
CPGs fund 40 to 60 percent of every promotional event, and trade spend runs 15 to 25 percent of gross revenue for most grocery operators. The problem is not trade spend. It is that both sides have never worked from the same record.
Unilateral vs. bilateral
Trade software has always served one side of the deal
One side plans, the other executes, and the records never match. A bilateral model is not a feature bolted onto a single-sided tool. It is a different starting point — one record, two views.
Unilateral trade management
- Retailers optimize pricing and promotions in one system; CPGs manage funds in another.
- Mismatched records become disputed deductions and reconciliation that lands months late.
- Promotion calendars are built on assumed vendor dollars, not committed ones.
Bilateral trade management
- Both sides input, both sides see the same output, on every deal, fund, and settlement.
- The deal a supplier funds is the deal the retailer prices and executes.
- Discrepancies surface at the source, while there is still time to fix them.
The closed loop
Plan, Fund, Execute, Perform, Reconcile — one connected loop
Both sides, one data model, across the full lifecycle, with agentic AI acting on the shared data. The point is not better deal management. It is a closed-loop commercial process where planning, execution, intelligence, and reconciliation happen on one record.
Plan
Both sides co-plan every promotion against committed dollars, not assumed ones.
Fund
Trade funds committed, tracked, and visible to both sides in real time.
Execute
The co-planned deal becomes the priced, promoted event at shelf, synced live.
Perform
Lift, ROI, and fund utilization update against live deal data.
Reconcile
Planned terms vs. actual billing, resolved at the source, not months late.
One record, two views
What changes when both sides share one record
A shared deal center: open deals, funds at risk, AI confidence on every offer, and buyer intelligence — visible to both sides, updated live. The retailer and the CPG are not exchanging files. They are looking at the same screen.
Plans are built on committed dollars
Promotion calendars stop resting on assumed vendor funding. Both sides commit to the same numbers before the event runs.
Discrepancies surface at the source
Mismatches appear while there is still time to fix them, instead of arriving as a disputed deduction months later.
Reconciliation closes the loop
Planned terms and actual billing meet on one record, so performance flows straight back into the next plan.
Illustrative product composition with representative data.
Why now
Margin pressure met agentic AI
Two forces make a bilateral record urgent rather than nice to have. Margins are too thin to leak, and AI has arrived — but AI is only as valuable as the data it can see. Point it at one side of the deal and it summarizes. Give it the whole record and it acts.
Agentic AI augments the judgment of your merchants and account teams. It does not replace it. Humans own strategy, relationships, and final approval.
15–25%
of gross revenue is trade spend for most grocery operators — the single largest margin lever after cost of goods.
Up to 20%
of deductions are invalid, yet dispute them without a shared record and you burn the relationship (industry estimate).
55% / 40%
of grocery retailers and food & beverage manufacturers name insufficient retailer–CPG collaboration their #1 supply-chain gap (IDC).
Questions buyers ask
Frequently asked questions
What is Commercial Trade Intelligence?
Commercial Trade Intelligence™ is a bilateral platform that connects retailers and their CPG partners on one shared data layer, so both sides plan, fund, execute, and reconcile every promotion from the same information. Instead of separate versions of the truth across spreadsheets and disconnected systems, the same deal a supplier funds becomes the same deal a retailer prices and executes, connected from co-planning through settlement, with agentic AI acting on the shared data.
What does bilateral mean in trade promotion management?
Bilateral means both sides of the deal work from the same record. In a bilateral model, retailers and their CPG and broker partners input to, and see the output of, the same deal data, fund balances, and financial outcomes. Unilateral trade software serves one side of the table: retailers optimize pricing and promotions in one system while CPGs manage trade funds in another, so the records never match. Bilateral is not a feature added on top of a single-sided tool. It is a different starting point.
Why don't retailers and CPGs have visibility into their trade spend today?
It is not a lack of data. The data exists. Planning, execution, and settlement happen in separate systems that were never designed to connect, so every hand-off between retailer and supplier is another chance for information to drift apart. By the time a quarterly review arrives, both sides are often reconstructing what happened from memory and spreadsheets rather than a shared source of truth.
How is Commercial Trade Intelligence different from traditional trade promotion management (TPM)?
Most TPM tools were built for one side of the relationship. Retailers optimize pricing and promotions; CPGs manage trade funds and customer planning. Commercial Trade Intelligence is bilateral: both organizations work from the same deal data, fund balances, and financial outcomes, which removes the reconciliation gaps and disputed deductions that single-sided systems create.
How does agentic AI improve trade promotion management?
AI is only as valuable as the data it can see, and an assistant limited to one side of the relationship can do little more than summarize. With visibility across the entire commercial relationship, agentic AI can identify mismatches before promotions launch, surface risks during negotiation, recommend next best actions, monitor live execution, and simplify reconciliation afterward, acting throughout the trade lifecycle rather than behaving like another chatbot. It augments the judgment of merchants and account teams. It does not replace it.
Who is Commercial Trade Intelligence for?
It is for retailers, CPG suppliers, and the brokers who connect them. Retailers use Revenue Optimization to plan, execute, and evaluate base price, promotions, and markdowns against one demand model. CPG suppliers and brokers use Trade Intelligence to co-plan, fund, and settle deals from the same data their retail partners execute against. Both suites run on one shared data model — a live network of 7,800+ CPG partners and 120+ retail banners — so the deal one side plans and funds is the deal the other side prices and promotes.
How does Commercial Trade Intelligence support joint business planning (JBP)?
Joint business planning fails when each side plans in its own system and meets over a spreadsheet. In Commercial Trade Intelligence, retailers and their CPG partners co-plan the joint business on one shared record — commit the dollars, execute the events, and settle every deal against the same data. The plan and the money never separate, so the JBP review starts from agreement instead of reconciliation.
See the category running, not described
A 30-minute walk of the platform against your deal, fund, and settlement workflow — the retailer and CPG experience, side by side, on one shared source of truth.