Toolio vs Excel: Optimize Your Retail Workflows

Increase Planning Efficiency by Automating Manual Tasks

Spreadsheets

Automated actualizations save time for decision-making

Time wasted on data pulling and formatting

1-click scenario creation with easy comparison of assumptions

Difficult and time-consuming to create scenarios on the fly

Automated aggregations over time and across departments

Manual consolidation of Open to Buys from different stakeholders

Improve Collaboration Across the Organization to Avoid Surprises

Spreadsheets

Seamless collaboration with modern, cloud-based tools

Siloed data between finance, planning, and merchandising

Centralized source of truth for all reports

Hard to consolidate plans/actuals in a single report across the organization

Reconciled planning approaches ensure accurate buys

Disconnected Store Plans and Merchandise Plans hinder reconciliation

Provide Strategic Insight for Smarter Decision Making

Spreadsheets

Exceptions are highlighted for rapid decision-making

Hard to identify trends and anomalies

Automated data cleansing to capture missed opportunities and events

Cannot account for past data issues (e.g., out-of-stocks and promotions)

Enhanced plan accuracy with automated seeding and forecasting

Inability to plan at lower levels reduces forecast accuracy

Optimize and Localize Assortments

Spreadsheets

Assortments are reconciled with top-down merchandise plans to avoid over-buying

Not reconciling to top-down plans causes SKU proliferation and over-buys

SKU rationalization ensures optimized assortments that meet demand

Limited rigor around assortment rationalization leads to SKU proliferation

AI/ML-based cluster creation ensures localized assortments with higher accuracy

Clustering is labor-intensive and inaccurate

Improved Forecasting Accuracy

Spreadsheets

One-click analysis of historical demand trends with True Demand (fully in-stock & non-promo weeks)

Historical demand is assessed based on sales vs. actual demand

Speedy like-for-like forecasting leverages True Demand and AI models

Like-for-like forecasting is challenging and inaccurate

Improved initial allocations through missed opportunity analysis and cluster-level de

Wrong initial allocations due to inaccurate location-level demand

Provide Strategic Insights for Smarter Decision Making

Spreadsheets

Assortment planning integrates with top-down and bottom-up merchandise plans for alignment

Disconnected top-down and bottom-up planning leads to missed opportunities

Single source of truth that integrates seamlessly with your tech stack, improving alignment

Siloed data across different teams causes planning inefficiencies

1-click PO creation down to size and location level for fast, accurate purchasing decisions

Labor-intensive processes to create new purchase orders

Improved Collaboration

Spreadsheets

Cloud-based collaboration with a single source of truth across departments

Siloed data between teams leads to slow decision-making

Version control with automated snapshots to track changes and ensure alignment

Limited versioning and no automated snapshots

Easy, real-time collaboration across teams for fast decision-making

Collaboration troubles result in wasted time

Automate Allocation for Efficiency and Accuracy

Spreadsheets

Automated, intelligent allocation based on real-time demand, location, and presentation constraints

Manual, labor-intensive allocation processes

Allocations are dynamically updated with real-time integrations and automated processes

Allocation decisions are delayed due to time-consuming data compilation

Automated transfer order creation directly within your ERP from Toolio

Manual steps required to transfer data to ERP or 3PL for actioning

Improve Forecasting and Reduce Out of Stocks

Spreadsheets

AI-powered forecasting accurately predicts SKU x location demand for optimized allocation

Allocation relies on incomplete or outdated demand data, leading to over/under-stocking

True Demand data (e.g., fully in-stock weeks, non-promo periods) drives precise forecasting

Historical data often overlooks missed opportunities (e.g., out-of-stock issues)

Automated, actionable alerts highlight overstock risks and potential shortfalls

Lack of visibility to past and future exceptions

Enhance Collaboration and Planning Integration

Spreadsheets

Centralized, real-time data enables collaboration across teams and departments

Data and processes are siloed across teams, making collaboration difficult

Fully integrated allocation and merchandise planning for aligned decision-making

Lack of alignment between top-down plans and allocation.

Improved initial allocation with integration to Assortment Plan.

Inaccurate initial allocations due to challenges in aligning pre-season decisions

Toolio vs Spreadsheets

Merchandise Plan

Assortment Plan

Allocation

Increase Planning Efficiency by Automating Manual Tasks

Improve Collaboration Across the Organization to Avoid Surprises

Provide Strategic Insight for Smarter Decision Making

Optimize and Localize Assortments

Improved Forecasting Accuracy

Provide Strategic Insights for Smarter Decision Making

Improved Collaboration

Automate Allocation for Efficiency and Accuracy

Improve Forecasting and Reduce Out of Stocks

Enhance Collaboration and Planning Integration