"Retailers are consistently faced with annual ebbs and flows of demand based on seasonality and trends. Traditionally retailers rely on forecasting models that utilize recent sales data, or gut intuition, which can often lead to stockouts during peak periods or excessive overstock in slower seasons," said Dax Dasilva, Founder and CEO of Lightspeed. "Lightspeed's new Seasonality Forecasting model changes the game by analyzing year-over-year trends to help predict demand more accurately. Merchants in key verticals like Sporting & Outdoor Goods and Home & Garden can now make smarter purchasing decisions, ensuring they have the right products at the right time."
With the addition of Seasonality Forecasting, retailers will be able to drive even more accurate order recommendations that consider seasonal events like holidays, repetitive annual celebrations, seasonal temperature changes, major sporting events, etc. For merchants using Lightspeed Insights, this has already translated into ~$13,000 higher gross profit based on the typical value of inventory held by Lightspeed merchants1.
Unlike other solutions that require third-party integrations or manual data analysis, Lightspeed's Seasonality Forecasting is built directly into its POS platform. By offering this level of embedded intelligence, Lightspeed continues to lead the way in retail innovation.
How Lightspeed's Seasonality Forecasting Helps Retailers Stay Ahead
Based on a recent Lightspeed Retailer Sentiment Survey, retailers have identified major challenges in inventory planning. Lightspeed's Seasonality Forecasting and new data-driven tools can help address these issues:
- Inaccurate Forecasting: ~39% of merchants want better insights into ordering quantities2. Seasonality Forecasting enhances forecasting accuracy for seasonal peaks by analyzing past sales trends instead of just recent data.
- Out of stock & Overstocking: Merchants spend an average of 22 hours per week on inventory tasks and 20 hours on ordering and restocking2. By automating replenishment recommendations, Lightspeed helps minimize stockouts and overstocking while optimizing cash flow. Merchants with Lightspeed Insights experience ~26% fewer days out of stock for top-selling items3, which can help boost sales by restocking high-demand products faster.
- Time-Consuming Manual Reports: ~50% of merchants desire reduced manual effort for generating reports2. Lightspeed Insights streamlines operations with custom reporting, scheduled reports, and automated order recommendations.
In addition to Seasonality Forecasting, Lightspeed Insights now also provides increased capabilities to help retailers better understand their operational challenges. With the new Sales Visualizations, Lightspeed enables merchants to dynamically view sales trends through interactive line graphs. This feature simplifies complex data and allows businesses to track and compare performance over time, ensuring they can stay ahead of market shifts, and empowering decision-makers to act with greater confidence and precision.
Lightspeed is also enhancing NuORDER's Order Trends feature, giving retail buyers greater visibility into top-performing products, categories, sizes, and colors. Top 25 product trends and top categories in both size and colour sales are all trends which are available through NuORDER offerings. This is now available to United States based NuORDER customers.
These overall enhancements empower buyers with trend-based insights, ensuring they can stock the most in-demand products to drive sales and reduce waste.
Now available to all Lightspeed Retail merchants across North America, Europe, and beyond, the new Lightspeed Insights features can help reduce human errors, foster better inventory planning, and increase overall profitability—empowering retailers to make data-driven decisions with confidence.
To learn more about these new features, visit Lightspeed's website.
Methodology
1 $13,373 represents the estimated gross profit difference between (1) customers actively using Lightspeed Insights to drive their replenishment ordering and (2) those who have access, but are not actively using Lightspeed Insights. This is calculated by multiplying the respective sample groups median GMROI by the median inventory value held by Lightspeed merchants in the three months ended December 31, 2024 and then taking the difference. Results outside such samples could vary depending on locations and other factors. "GMROI" does not represent revenue or gross profit generated by Lightspeed.
2 Lightspeed initiated a consumer survey throughout July 2024 using third party survey vendor Medallia. Over 2,000 responses were collected amongst North America, South America, Asia, Europe, Africa, the United Kingdom and the Middle East. Respondents were required to be using point of sale software to sell retail goods.
3 Top selling items means the top 5% of SKUs (by way of revenue) over the analysis period (the three months ended December 31, 2024). 26% represents the difference in proportion of days out of stock between (1) customers with access to Lightspeed Insights and (2) a cohort of similar sized merchants who do not have access to Lightspeed Insights. Specifically, the median of sample group (1) experienced stockouts 20% of the time, whereas the median of sample group (2) experienced stockouts 27% of the time. Results outside such samples could vary depending on locations and other factors.
About Lightspeed
Powering the businesses that are the backbone of the global economy, Lightspeed's one-stop commerce platform helps merchants innovate to simplify, scale, and provide exceptional omnichannel customer experiences. Our cloud commerce solution transforms and unifies online and physical operations, multichannel sales, expansion to new locations, global payments, financial solutions, and connection to supplier networks.
Founded in Montréal, Canada in 2005, Lightspeed is dual-listed on the New York Stock Exchange and Toronto Stock Exchange (NYSE: LSPD) (TSX: LSPD). With teams across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, the Company serves retail, hospitality, and golf businesses in over 100 countries.
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Forward-Looking Statements
This news release may include forward-looking information and forward-looking statements within the meaning of applicable securities laws ("forward-looking statements"), including information regarding Lightspeed's product offerings and planned product roadmap. Forward-looking statements are statements that are predictive in nature, depend upon or refer to future events or conditions and are identified by words such as "will", "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "plans", "believes", "estimates" or similar expressions concerning matters that are not historical facts. Such statements are based on current expectations of Lightspeed's management and inherently involve numerous risks and uncertainties, known and unknown, including economic factors. A number of risks, uncertainties and other factors may cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements contained in this news release, including, among other factors, those risk factors identified in our most recent Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations, under "Risk Factors" in our most recent Annual Information Form, and in our other filings with the Canadian securities regulatory authorities and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, all of which are available under our profiles on SEDAR+ at www.sedarplus.com and on EDGAR at www.sec.gov. Readers are cautioned to consider these and other factors carefully when making decisions with respect to Lightspeed's subordinate voting shares and not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements contained in this news release are not guarantees of future performance and, while forward-looking statements are based on certain assumptions that Lightspeed considers reasonable, actual events and results could differ materially from those expressed or implied by forward-looking statements made by Lightspeed. Except as may be expressly required by applicable law, Lightspeed does not undertake any obligation to update publicly or revise any such forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
SOURCE Lightspeed Commerce Inc.
For further information: Lightspeed Media Relations: [email protected]; Lightspeed Investor Relations: Gus Papageorgiou, [email protected]
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