Blue Yonder's Chief Innovation Officer - how retail AI shifted from 'budget to spend' to delivering value

Andrea Morgan-Vandome, Blue Yonder's Chief Innovation Officer, attended NRF 2026 in New York last week - the industry’s major retail event - and she outlined how the conversations she was having with retail buyers were notably different from the previous year. “AI was everywhere”, of course, but the discussion had evolved compared to just 12 months ago. She says:

What I found was there was a difference in the discussion around AI generally from last year. Last year it was more "we've got a budget, how can we use it, it solves everything." This year it was very much more around "how do we use this pragmatically, practically?" It's here to stay, but how do I make this deliver value?

A shift towards pragmatism from buyers is welcome in an industry where hype appears to be driving most vendor conversations. For Blue Yonder, the vendor has spent the ...