Applied · Kontoor Brands, Inc. · Current
Reading the digital shelf for Wrangler & Lee
A retail shelf is easy to walk; a digital one has to be read in data. As a Walmart Sales Intern, my job is to turn that data into something the team can decide on.
Note: this case study describes my process and the kinds of questions I work on. Specific figures, internal reports, and proprietary data are omitted to respect Kontoor and Walmart confidentiality.
The context
Kontoor Brands owns Wrangler and Lee, two of the most recognizable denim and apparel brands in the U.S., and Walmart is one of their most important retail partners. On the supply side that relationship is enormous and well-run. The part I support sits on the digital shelf, Walmart.com, where availability, page presence, and how a brand stacks up against competing assortment all play out in data rather than on a physical rack.
What I actually do
I support Walmart sales operations for Wrangler and Lee by analyzing Walmart.com supply, inventory flow, line releases, and competitive assortment to surface eCommerce opportunities. In practice that means watching the gap between what should be live and what is, tracking how new lines land, and reading the competitive set closely enough to notice where we're under- or over-represented.
The second half of the role is translation. Raw inventory and assortment data isn't useful until someone turns it into a clear picture, so I organize product, market, and inventory insights into clear summaries for retail strategy and business planning. The goal is something a sales lead can pick up and use without re-doing the analysis themselves.
How I approach the data
- Start from the question, not the spreadsheet. Before pulling anything, I get clear on what decision the analysis is meant to inform. Otherwise it's just a prettier export.
- Watch the gaps. Out-of-stocks, missing variants, and stalled line releases are where eCommerce opportunity (and risk) usually hides.
- Read the competitive shelf. Assortment only means something relative to what shoppers see next to it, so I map our presence against the competitive set.
- Make it decision-ready. The deliverable isn't the data, it's the one-screen takeaway and the recommended next step.
What I'm taking away
This role is teaching me how strategy works at the scale of a major retail partnership: the analysis has to be rigorous, but it also has to be fast and legible, because the people reading it are making real assortment and planning calls. It's the clearest example yet of the thing I care about most: connecting the dots in messy data and helping a team see the full picture.
Skills in play
- eCommerce and digital-shelf analysis (Walmart.com)
- Inventory, supply, and assortment data interpretation
- Competitive benchmarking
- Turning analysis into decision-ready summaries for non-analysts
Tools
- Microsoft Excel (PivotTables, lookups)
- Retailer and internal reporting platforms