case study

How Cargill Unlocked Real-Time Market Visibility Across 10,000 Stores 

The Client

Leading Global Food & Agriculture Company

The Situation

Cargill’s Water Quality division spent more than a decade operating without reliable point-of-sale visibility. Existing tools provided limited insight into pricing, competitive movement, and retailer execution, leaving teams without a clear understanding of what was happening in the market after products shipped.  

To address this challenge, Cargill partnered with Datasembly to gain real-time, store-level visibility into pricing, assortment, and competitive activity across thousands of retail locations nationwide. 

Key Challenge

Cargill relied on fragmented and incomplete market intelligence, as its internal web collection tools covered only a small fraction of stores and lacked the scale and accuracy needed to support effective decision-making. The team faced several challenges, including limited visibility across nearly 10,000 retail locations, with point-of-sale coverage restricted to a small sample of just 50 to 75 stores through manual collection efforts. This made it difficult to gain meaningful insight into competitive pricing and regional trends, while also requiring significant manual effort for analysis. As one stakeholder noted, “For over ten years, we knew where our product shipped, but we didn’t know what happened to it afterward.” Without timely and reliable intelligence, Cargill struggled to respond quickly to market changes or engage in retailer conversations with confidence.

Solution

Cargill selected Datasembly for its extended retailer coverage, real-time visibility, and store-level accuracy. The platform provided a unified view of both Cargill products and competitor activity in a single place.  

With Datasembly, Cargill gained: 

  • Nationwide retailer coverage including non-participating retailers 
  • Real-time, hyper local competitive pricing visibility  
  • Automated alerts for pricing and assortment changes  
  • A single source of truth for actionable insights  

“We didn’t find anything that even made it out of the launch pad except Datasembly.”  

Implementation was structured and efficient, with strong support from onboarding through ongoing use. 

“Service after the sale is everything and Datasembly’s team set the bar.”  

Outcome

Datasembly transformed how Cargill’s teams operate by replacing manual processes with real-time intelligence, enabling faster and more strategic decision-making. Analysis time was dramatically reduced, allowing teams to shift their focus from gathering data to acting on it—“What used to take me 10 hours, I can now do it in half the time.” With access to clear, store-level insights, Cargill also strengthened its retailer engagement, elevating conversations around pricing, promotions, and competitive positioning.

Measurable Business Impact 

Cargill attributes millions of dollars in growth to improved visibility and faster execution.  

The team now benefits from: 

  • Improved pricing response  
  • Better promotional planning  
  • Increased productivity  
  • Full market transparency  

“Datasembly lets you create a customized, 360-degree view of whatever market you’re looking at.”  

AHA! Insight

At a major retail event, a retail partner described their process of manually checking competitor pricing across nearby stores. Using Datasembly, Cargill quickly identified the store location, mapped the surrounding market, and surfaced pricing across multiple competitors in seconds.  

The real-time visibility immediately demonstrated value. That partner placed an order for a full semi load of product on the spot, and the interaction sparked additional interest from other retailers. 

This moment highlighted how instant access to market intelligence can directly influence sales outcomes and differentiate Cargill in competitive conversations. 

Datasembly app image showcasing retail data collection