The challenge
Pebble Beach is best known for its world-class golf courses and the world-famous Lodge at Pebble Beach on California's Monterey Peninsula, but it is also a diverse organization with 1,500 employees and more than 40 brands. Offering the right merchandise, in the right place, for the right customer makes retail a significant source of revenue and a critical area of focus for the company.
Between 15 stores, an online store, and three to four merchandise tents during each major event, Pebble Beach runs a full-service retail operation — each store with a different merchandise mix, for a total portfolio of more than 30,000 SKUs spanning everything from resortwear to golf equipment.
In recent years the complexity and scale of that business began to outstrip Pebble Beach's aged data and ERP systems. With only one finance-focused team member, it was challenging and time-consuming for business users to access and interpret data, and reconciling information from one program with another was nearly impossible. With persistent data-quality concerns, Pebble Beach felt like it was “flying blind” in parts of retail decision-making — without a reliable way to connect sales-forecast data with inventory levels and actual sales, the company often struggled with stock-outs in stores or excess inventory in the warehouse.
Pebble Beach set a goal to drive 3–5% retail growth primarily through its existing stores, and estimated that reducing stock-outs by just 0.5% — even on flat revenue — would outweigh the cost of a new solution. Plans to host the USGA 2018 U.S. Amateur and 2019 U.S. Open Championships added further urgency to work smarter and faster in the retail arena.
The solution
To address its data and planning issues, Pebble Beach defined a clear set of criteria: leverage existing systems while improving connectivity and data quality; provide simple, consistent access to data whether users are on-site or traveling; present data in dashboards useful to senior leaders; and supply strong education and change-management resources to ensure adoption.
After reviewing several technology options, Pebble Beach selected IBM Planning Analytics — and called on Incede.ai to ensure a successful implementation. Together, Pebble Beach and Incede.ai homed in on the biggest areas of need and identified a way to make fast, incremental progress.
Incede.ai helped Pebble Beach enable its existing systems to communicate with one another by implementing IBM Planning Analytics on the cloud. The platform delivered the collaborative planning, forecasting and analysis Pebble Beach needed, with an accessible Excel-based interface that allowed for faster user training and onboarding. With the cloud-based service, Pebble Beach could dedicate server resources to other functions and free its IT team to focus on priority initiatives instead of server administration and monitoring.
The results
With IBM Planning Analytics, Pebble Beach satisfied the criteria set out for the project while enabling its retail team to spend less time compiling data and more time optimizing forecasts, store performance and customer experiences. Where a data request from senior leadership once took several days, the team can now access, analyze and present the information within minutes.
Since introducing IBM Planning Analytics, Pebble Beach has seen a heightened level of accountability that is driving positive change across the retail business. When a forecast is missed or a stock-out occurs, the company can zero in on the data to illuminate the issue and share insights to improve future outcomes.
Pebble Beach implemented its new solution quickly and thoughtfully thanks to Incede.ai's expertise and consultative, phased approach, which helped build internal credibility and ensure the long-term success of the solution. The retail team also found the implementation process itself a benefit, giving employees a unique opportunity to think strategically about the goals and needs of the business.
“I found a trusted advisor and long-term partner in Incede.ai,” said the Director of Retail at Pebble Beach Company. “Incede.ai is technically smart about integrating data from legacy systems and also business-minded and collaborative around driving the organizational changes necessary to accelerate our retail operations.” In partnership with Incede.ai, Pebble Beach is well on its way to a nimble, responsive retail organization that continues to evolve and grow through data-powered decision-making.
About Pebble Beach Company
Pebble Beach Company, headquartered in Pebble Beach, California, owns and operates the world-famous Pebble Beach Resorts — including The Lodge at Pebble Beach, The Inn at Spanish Bay and Casa Palmero — along with four renowned golf courses: Pebble Beach Golf Links, Spyglass Hill Golf Course, The Links at Spanish Bay and Del Monte Golf Course. The company employs 1,500 people across more than 40 brands and annually hosts premier events including the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance and the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. Site of the 2019 U.S. Open, Pebble Beach Golf Links has hosted six U.S. Opens, four U.S. Amateurs and one PGA Championship.
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