NEW YORK
- Target creates first chief AI officer role as retailers accelerate deployment of autonomous shopping tools
- Companies use AI for product discovery, purchasing, inventory, logistics, marketing and employee support
Retailers worldwide are expanding artificial intelligence beyond conventional chatbots, deploying the technology to build shopping baskets, complete purchases, forecast demand, manage inventory and assist employees.
Target on Tuesday appointed Chandhu Nair as its first chief AI officer, giving him responsibility for coordinating AI across customer experiences, employee tools, inventory management and business decision-making.
Here is how some major retailers in the US, Europe and Asia are integrating AI:
Target
Target’s AI strategy includes Trend Brain, a generative AI platform that analyzes emerging styles, colors and materials to accelerate product development.
The retailer has also launched conversational shopping and gift-selection tools and integrated its product catalog into external AI platforms.
Nair will oversee a company-wide strategy spanning shopping, inventory and internal decision-making.
Walmart
Walmart has developed retail-specific AI agents for product comparisons, personalized recommendations, customer support, merchandising and supply-chain management.
Its consumer-facing assistant guides shoppers from discovery to purchase, while internal tools help workers manage inventory and analyze stores.
Walmart has also partnered with OpenAI and Google to offer shopping through ChatGPT and Gemini.
Amazon
Amazon introduced Alexa for Shopping in May by combining its Rufus shopping assistant with Alexa+.
The agent can compare products, monitor prices, build carts, reorder essentials and automatically purchase products when they reach customer-set prices.
Amazon said Rufus helped more than 300 million customers research, compare and buy products in 2025.
Kroger
Supermarket operator Kroger is rolling out Google Cloud-powered meal-planning and shopping assistants nationwide.
Customers can ask the AI to suggest meals based on budgets, dietary requirements and family preferences, create ingredient lists and add an entire meal to their carts.
Kroger is also using AI to analyze calls to stores and identify customer problems.
Lowe’s
Lowe’s developed Mylow, a customer-facing home-improvement adviser, and Mylow Companion, an assistant used by employees.
Mylow provides project instructions and recommends products, while the employee version supplies product details, project advice and inventory information.
Mylow Companion was deployed across more than 1,700 stores.
The Home Depot
The Home Depot’s Magic Apron provides conversational project advice, recommends products and directs shoppers to the aisle and bay where an item is located.
The company also uses AI to generate contractors’ materials lists and anticipate delivery problems by analyzing weather, road conditions and site-access restrictions.
Best Buy
Best Buy partnered with Google Cloud and Accenture to develop a generative AI customer-support assistant.
The tool helps troubleshoot products, alter delivery schedules and manage software, Geek Squad subscriptions and membership accounts.
Separate AI systems summarize calls, detect sentiment and offer real-time recommendations to customer-service employees.
Gap
Gap is using Google Cloud’s Gemini and Vertex AI across its Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic and Athleta brands.
Applications include product design, planning, pricing, personalized recommendations and marketing.
Gap products are also being integrated into Gemini and AI-powered search services, allowing customers to move from conversational discovery toward checkout.
Carrefour
French supermarket group Carrefour became the first major European retailer to integrate grocery shopping directly into ChatGPT in March.
Customers in France can request recipes, filter products according to dietary needs, check availability and build shopping baskets through natural-language conversations before completing payment on Carrefour’s website.
The integration builds on Hopla, the ChatGPT-based assistant Carrefour introduced in 2023 to suggest menus and prepare baskets according to customers’ budgets and preferences.
Tesco
Britain’s largest supermarket chain is testing an AI assistant built into its mobile app with around 280,000 employees before a planned customer launch later in 2026.
The assistant suggests recipes based on cost, cuisine, dietary requirements and ingredients customers already have.
It can then use shopping history and preferences to select products and build a basket.
Tesco has also signed AI partnerships with Mistral AI and Adobe covering internal operations and personalized customer experiences.
Zalando
German online fashion retailer Zalando offers an AI assistant across its European markets in local languages.
The assistant, powered by Zalando’s models and OpenAI technology, considers location, weather, occasion, customer preferences and purchase history when recommending clothing.
During testing, deeper personalization generated a 40% increase in “high-value interactions,” such as customers liking or adding recommended products to their carts.
Kingfisher
British home-improvement group Kingfisher, which owns B&Q, Screwfix and Castorama, developed the Hello Casto AI assistant for customers undertaking home projects.
The tool provides step-by-step instructions and product recommendations, while the group also uses AI for personalization, clearance pricing, stock management and supply-chain visibility.
Kingfisher said its recommendation systems generated up to 10% of e-commerce sales at some banners.
IKEA
IKEA has developed an AI-powered home-design and shopping assistant that recommends furniture according to room dimensions, personal style, budget and sustainability preferences.
The retailer also uses AI-powered drones for automated inventory checks and acquired logistics software company Locus in 2025 to improve delivery planning and route optimization.
Alibaba
Alibaba has embedded AI shopping assistants into its Taobao and Tmall platforms.
Taobao’s Wenwen assistant compares products and generates personalized recommendations through conversational queries, while Alibaba’s Qwen app can order food, make in-chat payments and complete other multi-step transactions.
During the 2025 Singles’ Day campaign, an AI customer-service assistant handled 300 million queries.
Alibaba said AI-assisted customer support helped participating merchants increase conversion rates by 30% year-on-year.
JD.com
Chinese e-commerce company JD.com developed Jingyan, an AI shopping assistant offering search, product comparisons, recommendations and review summaries across its app and website.
The company said Jingyan had surpassed 50 million users.
JD.com also applies AI across more than 3,000 scenarios involving retail, warehouses, delivery, supply chains, healthcare and merchant operations.
Rakuten
Japan’s Rakuten integrated its agentic Rakuten AI tool into the Rakuten Ichiba mobile shopping app in January.
The assistant uses browsing behavior, purchasing trends and other data to recommend products and help customers navigate the marketplace through natural-language questions.
Rakuten is developing AI as a common gateway to more than 70 services covering shopping, travel, payments, telecommunications and entertainment.
