Global Director of Retail Strategy & Insights
CI&T
Melissa is the Global Director of Retail Strategy & Insights at CI&T, a global AI Deployment partner for companies such as Domino's, Johnson & Johnson, Nestle and more. Previously she was a senior advisor at Gartner, covering omni-channel, e-commerce, mobile commerce, and social commerce. Melissa is a retail futurist whose methodology is rooted in cross-industry consumer insights and innovation. She graduated with an MBA from Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management and began her career at Target focusing on merchandising strategy. She has been featured on CNBC EMEA Squawk Box and CNBC US YouTube. She is a RETHINK Retail Top Influencer and member of the RetailWire BrainTrust.
Sunday Jan 10
4:00pm - 4:30pm
Exhibitor Big Ideas Stage 5
AI agents aren't a future consideration for retail, they're already shopping. CI&T's latest research found that 74% of consumers have used an AI agent to shop, and retailers are splitting into two camps: those proactively rearchitecting their roles and customer experience, and those reacting after the fact. This panel unpacks what's actually shifting, how the retailer's role changes when an agent is doing the browsing, comparing, and buying and what omnichannel has to mean in a world where "channel" increasingly includes a non-human intermediary. Hear from leading retailers on how they're shapeshifting their strategy, tech stack, and customer experience to keep pace with a rate of change the industry has never had to move at before.
