Robert Hetu is a VP Analyst and KI Leader with the Gartner Retail Industry Services team. His responsibilities involve tracking the technology markets and trends impacting the broad-based retail merchandising and planning areas. Mr. Hetu is an expert in the areas of brand, vendor and assortment management, merchandise planning, allocation, and replenishment.
Prior to joining Gartner, Mr. Hetu's industry experience spans 28 years with leading retailers and manufacturers such as Macy's, VF Corp. and Kmart, as well as retail dot-com organizations in senior merchandising positions. As VP of Vendor Collaboration for Macy's, he was directly responsible for building stronger business relationships with key brands through use of technology and business process improvement focused on the areas of assortment management, replenishment, business intelligence and vendor performance scorecards. Previous experience includes extensive replenishment, planning and store management positions within Macy's and Kmart; general merchandise director for a dot-com company; as well as retail support and vendor-managed inventory with two major manufacturers.
Macy's Merchandising Group
VP - Vendor Collaboration, Replenishment & Size Analysis
Pillowtex Corp.
VP - Performance Improvement
VF Corp.
Retail Floor Space Management Team
Unified Retail Commerce for Digital Business Execution
B.S., Business Administration and Finance, Jacksonville State University
1Retail merchandise management and optimization applications including price, promotion, markdown, assortment, size & pack, space, replenishment & allocation
2Retail business and technology trends
3Deep learning, machine learning, artificial intelligence for retail.
4Retail behavioral segmentation
5Retail digital business strategy