Empty shelves aren't just a retailer problem - they're a supplier blind spot. Learn the three overlooked levers suppliers control to optimize placement, support stretched store teams, and expose phantom inventory that masks the real on-shelf availability crisis.
“Give the consumer what they want, when they want it.” It’s the oldest retail axiom - and still the hardest to consistently get right.
More than two-thirds of shoppers have walked out of a store because the product they wanted wasn’t on the shelf.
The impact isn’t just a lost sale - it’s lost loyalty, wasted inventory, and a long-term hit to brand trust.
The pandemic put On-Shelf Availability (OSA) in the spotlight, yet five years later, the challenge is still far from solved - or improved.
For retailers, OSA sounds simple: the right product, in the right place, in the right quantity, at the right time.
In practice, it’s anything but simple - and while retailers may track the KPI, suppliers own many of the levers that determine success.
Here are three challenges suppliers must help solve to keep shelves full and give the consumer what they want, when they want it.
OSA isn’t just about inventory being in-store - it’s about having it in the right spot.
Category assortment, shelf facings, and placement drive conversion. Get it wrong, and bestsellers sell out early while slower movers eat up valuable space.
Supplier lever: Use data and analytics to shape assortment, facings, and cross-promotions that prevent empty shelves where demand is highest.
Example: Seasonal Candy at a Mass Merchandiser
A major retailer runs a Halloween promotion where high-demand candy SKUs are buried in secondary aisles while slow movers dominated end-caps. Fast sellers run out early, while others linger post-season and have to be marked down.
Supplier lever in action:
The candy supplier partners with the retailer to use planogram analytics and historical sales data to optimize placement, giving top-performing SKUs additional facings and prime visibility during peak weeks - reducing markdowns and maximizing sell-through.
Retailers today are running lean - with fewer in-store managers and store associates than ever. That means replenishment often lags behind real-time demand.
Supplier lever: Partner with retailer counterparts to highlight priority items by day and by store, ensuring limited labor hours go toward what matters most.
Example: Replenishment Delays at a Drug Chain
Walgreens has publicly acknowledged labor shortages impacting store operations - particularly restocking. Shoppers looking for OTC medicines or personal care items often find empty shelves, despite products being available in the back room.
Supplier lever in action:
Best-in-class suppliers collaborate closely with major retailers to develop priority stocking lists that sync with promotional calendars and POS trends. They invest in merchandisers and make sure these in-store execution teams know exactly which items to focus on and what actions to take, supplementing limited in-store labor to keep high-velocity products, such as toothpaste or diapers, fully stocked during peak periods such as weekends or holidays.
Retailers use gap scans, perpetual inventory, and mystery audits - but each comes with blind spots.
Supplier lever: Share insights from POS, shipments, and predictive models to spot phantom inventory and highlight true gaps in shelf availability.
Example: Phantom Inventory at a Grocery Chain
A large market location in the Midwest repeatedly shows full inventory on key items - but the shelves are empty. The root cause is phantom inventory: mis-scanned returns and inaccurate stock counts.
Supplier lever in action:
Top supplier uses a mix of POS data and predictive analytics to flag anomalies between sales velocity and on-hand counts. This helps the supplier provide an influential story to the retailer HQ team, pinpointing stores with likely phantom inventory issues, and take targeted actions such as reallocate product or perform manual audits, to reduce false availability metrics.
The result: increased sales and happier consumers!
Empty shelves aren’t just a retailer problem - they’re a shared responsibility.
The fragmentation between supplier and retailer silos often means each party assumes the other is “handling” availability.
Suppliers that lean in - with the right data, tools, and a truly collaborative mindset - can be the difference between frustrated shoppers and loyal fans.
When suppliers actively partner with retailers to close the loop on product availability, the benefits cascade across the business:
Because at the end of the day, full shelves mean full carts - but only if those shelves are stocked consistently, intelligently, and collaboratively.
