Which grocers and consumer goods companies are furthest along with AI?

In the Enterprise AI diffusion report, Coca-Cola, Kroger, Nestlé, Target, Unilever, and Walmart are at Piloting and Costco, Dollar General, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, and Tyson Foods are at Experimenting. A stage follows from the returns and rollouts a company has publicly reported in the last 18 months, not from its spending or plans.

How does Walmart use AI compared with other grocers?

Walmart runs every associate AI tool on Element, a company-wide platform it built in 2022, and reports more than 900,000 associates using its conversational assistant each week (Jun 2025), the largest reach among grocers. Walmart credits AI digital twins with a 19% cut in Walmart U.S. refrigeration maintenance spend in 2024 (reported Aug 2025), and that single return places Walmart at Piloting alongside Target, which credits its personalization engine with billions of dollars in incremental sales (Mar 2026), and Kroger, which has up to 150,000 associates using its Sage assistant (Jan 2026). Costco and Dollar General are at Experimenting: Costco shares the credit for pharmacy script growth between AI and other drivers, and Dollar General says its long-term financial framework assumes no benefit from AI (Aug 2026). Walmart's reports that Sparky shoppers spend about 35% (Feb 2026) and 40% (Aug 2026) more per order compare users with non-users and do not count as a return credited to AI.

How do food and beverage companies use AI?

Food and beverage companies use AI in sales and ordering, marketing content, plants and employee assistants. Coca-Cola reports a 4% to 6% sales uplift at direct customer outlets using its Suggested Order algorithm, an internal estimate (Feb 2026), and builds marketing tools such as Fizzion with Adobe. Nestlé gives every employee Microsoft Copilot Chat (Nov 2025) and is moving to SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition so it can embed SAP's Joule copilot across the group. PepsiCo runs PepGenX, its internal generative AI platform on Amazon Bedrock (May 2025), added Google's Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform in Apr 2026, and tests digital twins at a Gatorade plant (Jan 2026). Tyson Foods runs AI refrigeration controls at 5 facilities, a Claude assistant on its foodservice website (Aug 2025) and Tyson Translate for every team member. Coca-Cola and Nestlé are at Piloting; PepsiCo and Tyson Foods are at Experimenting.

Which AI platforms and models do grocers and consumer goods companies use?

Grocers and consumer goods companies mostly build their own AI platform and buy models from several providers. Walmart runs OpenAI, Anthropic and its own Wallaby models on Element, Kroger built an AI gateway that runs its own models alongside outside technology such as Google Gemini and Anthropic Claude (Sep 2026), Procter & Gamble gives teams an AI factory for building and monitoring agents and gives employees 4 proprietary generative AI tools led by chatPG (Dec 2025), and PepsiCo offers foundation models through Amazon Bedrock in PepGenX (May 2025). Unilever chose Google Cloud's Vertex AI in Feb 2026 as the base of an enterprise data and AI backbone, Coca-Cola runs about 80% of its infrastructure on Microsoft Azure (Jul 2025) and uses OpenAI through Azure with Google, Meta and Anthropic models, and Target gives corporate teams ChatGPT Enterprise (Nov 2025). Costco and Tyson Foods have no named enterprise AI platform, and Dollar General was still staffing an internal agent platform in Oct 2026.

How grocers and consumer goods companies deploy AI

Grocers and consumer goods companies have handed AI assistants to some very large workforces, but the money shows up in machines and order algorithms. Walmart's AI digital twins cut refrigeration maintenance spend 19%, Coca-Cola estimates its Suggested Order tool lifts sales 4% to 6% at the outlets that use it, and Target credits its personalization engine with billions of dollars in incremental sales. Costco credits recommendation carousels with just under $500 million of quarterly online sales and never calls them AI.

Verified Nov 5, 2026See methodology

How grocers and consumer goods companies have deployed AI

Findings

What the food, beverage and household profiles show

4 companies in the sector credit AI with a business return, each in a single use case: Walmart a 19% cut in Walmart U.S. refrigeration maintenance spend in 2024 from AI digital twins (reported Aug 2025), Target billions of dollars in incremental sales from its AI-driven personalization engine (Mar 2026), Coca-Cola a 4% to 6% sales uplift at direct customer outlets using Suggested Order, an internal estimate (Feb 2026), and Unilever 1% to 2% of premium ingredients saved by an AI digital twin mixer at its Cu Chi, Vietnam factory (Jun 2026). No company in the sector has an AI-credited return in a second function or a firm-level AI figure, so none is at Scaling or Embedded.
Kroger and Nestlé reached Piloting on company-wide rollouts with a user count and a named owner, without an AI-credited return: Kroger says up to 150,000 associates actively use Sage, its AI assistant for associates (Jan 2026), and Nestlé says every employee has access to Microsoft Copilot Chat and more than 100,000 are regular AI users (Nov 2025). Walmart reports the largest reach in the sector, more than 900,000 associates using its conversational assistant each week (Jun 2025). Target, Unilever and Procter & Gamble count licenses or training instead of users: Target more than 10,000 new AI licenses (Aug 2025), Unilever more than 40,000 employees trained to use AI (Jun 2026) and Procter & Gamble more than 4,000 executives through an AI program (Dec 2025), with no chatPG user count since Jul 2024. Costco, Dollar General, PepsiCo and Tyson Foods have not said how many employees use AI tools.
The sector's largest savings figures credit AI together with other levers and give AI no share: Nestlé's CHF 1.1 billion of Fuel for Growth savings in 2025 (Feb 2026) and roughly 16,000 job cuts planned by 2027 (Oct 2025) are credited to procurement, shared services, automation and simpler structures; PepsiCo credits its record 2025 productivity savings (Feb 2026) to automation, digitalization and simplification together; Kroger's about $4 billion of annual cost savings (Oct 2026) is a 2029 target that mixes technology and AI with direct sourcing and procurement; Walmart CFO John David Rainey credited technology, AI and supply chain automation together for returns in the 20% range (Aug 2025); and Procter & Gamble does not split its productivity savings by cause.
Several executives in the sector have said AI is not yet in their numbers: Walmart's Doug McMillon said in Aug 2025 that AI was not yet lifting sales, Kroger CFO David Kennerley called Kroger's AI work early-stage on Mar 5, 2026, and Dollar General CFO Donny Lau said on Aug 27, 2026 that Dollar General's long-term financial framework does not contemplate any potential benefit from AI. Nestlé CIO Chris Wright said in Jan 2026 that the revenue effect of Nestlé's agentic sales assistant could not yet be measured.
Food, beverage and household manufacturers report factory and field AI mostly as pilot operating measures with no cost attached: PepsiCo reports a 20% throughput increase on the initial deployment of its Siemens and NVIDIA digital twins at one U.S. Gatorade plant (Jan 2026), Tyson Foods a 12% to 15% cut in site electricity at one facility during a 2024 AI refrigeration control pilot (Aug 2026), Nestlé a 20% to 35% time saving for its agentic sales assistant in pilot markets (Feb 2026), and Procter & Gamble a 15% cut in out-of-stocks in Brazil (Dec 2025). Unilever's Cu Chi ingredient saving (Jun 2026) is the one plant result in the sector that counts as a return credited to AI.

Stages

Where grocers and consumer goods companies stand

Piloting
Coca-Cola, Kroger, Nestlé, Target, Unilever, Walmart
Piloting means the company reports a business return it credits to AI in at least one use case, or a company-wide AI rollout with a user count and a named owner.
Experimenting
Costco, Dollar General, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, Tyson Foods
Experimenting means the company has reported neither a business return it credits to AI nor a company-wide AI rollout with a user count. Pilots, partnerships, plans and spending alone keep a company at Experimenting.

Returns

The returns grocers and consumer goods companies credit to AI

Only realized returns the company reported and credited to AI itself, with their dates: revenue, cost, headcount, losses avoided or output per employee.

Company	Use case	Return
Coca-Cola	Suggested OrderCustomers and bottlers	4-6% sales uplift at direct customer outlets using Suggested Order, internal estimates (Feb 2026)Source
Target	Personalized Target Circle offersDigital and loyalty	Billions of dollars in incremental sales from the AI-driven personalization engine (Mar 2026)
Unilever	AI ingredient dosing in Cu ChiManufacturing	1% to 2% saved on premium ingredients, credited to an AI digital twin mixer (Jun 2026)Source
Walmart	Digital twins for store maintenanceStores and real estate	Walmart U.S. refrigeration maintenance spend down 19% in 2024, credited to AI digital twins (Aug 2025)Source

Compare

Food, beverage and household side by side

Company	Ownership	Platform	Models	Hosting	Reach	Stage
Coca-Cola	Chief Digital Officer Sedef Salingan Sahin, reporting to the CEO since Mar 2026	Hybrid: Microsoft Azure and Azure OpenAI; tools built with Adobe, Nvidia and WPP	OpenAI through Azure, plus Google, Meta and Anthropic models, Adobe Firefly and Stable Diffusion	About 80% on Microsoft Azure, the rest on AWS and Google Cloud (Jul 2025); own data centers retired about 2019; Fizzion on Adobe Firefly services	Not disclosed; employees use a ChatGPT tool on internal data (Oct 2025)	Piloting
Kroger	Chief Data and AI Officer Milen Mahadevan, also president of 84.51°	Hybrid: AI gateway and 84.51° models built; Google Cloud tools bought	Proprietary plus third-party models; Google Gemini and Anthropic Claude named	Google Cloud for the Gemini tools; 84.51° runs Databricks on Microsoft Azure; other hosting not disclosed	Up to 150,000 associates on Sage (Jan 2026)	Piloting
Nestlé	Chris Wright, head of Nestlé IT and digitalization, reporting to the CEO (set Jan 2025)	Hybrid: Copilot Chat and SAP bought; NesGPT, content, recipe and sales tools built in-house or with partners	Microsoft Copilot Chat, NesGPT, SAP Joule, NVIDIA AI Enterprise; models not named	Microsoft's cloud for Copilot Chat and the content service, and reportedly for the SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition core; own data centers not disclosed	100,000+ regular AI users; Copilot Chat access for every employee (Nov 2025)	Piloting
Target	Prat Vemana, EVP and Chief Information and Product Officer; Chief AI Officer Chandhu Nair reports to him (Aug 2026)	Hybrid: In-house tools on an internal AI platform; ChatGPT Enterprise bought	OpenAI in ChatGPT Enterprise and through APIs; models behind in-house tools not disclosed	ChatGPT Enterprise hosted by OpenAI; own data centers, store edge, Google Cloud and Azure (2022); in-house model hosting not disclosed	ChatGPT Enterprise used by ~18,000 (Nov 2025); Store Companion in ~2,000 stores since 2024	Piloting
Unilever	CDTO Sam Kini, reporting to supply chain and operations chief Willem Uijen	Hybrid: Google Cloud Vertex AI backbone plus in-house tools	Google Gemini; other providers not named	Microsoft Azure since a 2023 migration; data and key applications moving to Google Cloud from 2026; no own data centers named	40,000+ employees trained in AI (Jun 2026)	Piloting
Walmart	EVP AI Acceleration Daniel Danker, on the Executive Council; Global CTO Suresh Kumar runs the platform	Hybrid: Element built in-house; ChatGPT Enterprise and Claude bought	OpenAI, Anthropic and Walmart's own Wallaby LLMs, chosen by task and cost	Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Walmart's own data centers, plus edge computing in stores; ChatGPT Enterprise and Claude are vendor-hosted	900,000+ weekly assistant users (Jun 2025)	Piloting
Costco	No named AI chief; CIDO Javier Polit runs technology and reports to the CEO	Hybrid: AI built into its own systems; partner AI for members	Not disclosed; Google Cloud Vertex AI reported by Constellation	Not disclosed; Microsoft Azure hybrid cloud and Costco data centers, with Google Cloud Vertex AI reported; partner AI runs on vendor systems	Not disclosed; no employee AI assistant announced	Experimenting
Dollar General	SVP, Chief Data and AI Officer Travis Nixon (Jun 2026); EVP and CIO Carman Wenkoff runs IT	Hybrid: Agent platform built in-house; RELEX planning AI bought	Not disclosed; RELEX, QSIC and Shelf Engine bring their own	Not disclosed for AI; postings name Microsoft Azure, Azure ML, Databricks and Snowflake; a company data center, with apps moving to the cloud	Not disclosed	Experimenting
PepsiCo	Athina Kanioura, Chief Strategy & Transformation Officer, also CEO of Latin America Foods	Hybrid: PepGenX built in-house on Amazon Bedrock; Gemini Enterprise and Agentforce bought	Amazon Bedrock foundation models, Google Gemini, Salesforce Agentforce	AWS (PepGenX on Amazon Bedrock) and Google Cloud under a multi-cloud strategy, Salesforce's cloud for Agentforce, and a data foundation on Microsoft Azure with Azure Databricks; no own data center inference disclosed	Not disclosed; PepGenX open to developers and technical teams (May 2025)	Experimenting
Procter & Gamble	CIO Seth Cohen; P&G has not published his reporting line	Built: AI factory and chatPG suite, built in-house	OpenAI at chatPG's launch; several LLMs chosen by task since	Microsoft Azure (preferred cloud for digital manufacturing since Jun 2022) for the data lake and plant edge models; Google Cloud for consumer data since 2020; chatPG hosting not disclosed	30,000+ chatPG users (Jul 2024); no later count	Experimenting
Tyson Foods	No named AI owner; Global Technology under a CTO (Mike Wheeler from 2025); board Technology Committee	Hybrid: Own vision models plus bought tools; AWS and Google Cloud	Anthropic Claude 3.5 Sonnet on Amazon Bedrock for the foodservice assistant; own vision models; SAP Joule being secured	Amazon Bedrock on AWS for the foodservice website assistant (Aug 2025); Data@Tyson analytics on Google Cloud BigQuery, with Palantir Foundry and SAP (Oct 2026); other AI hosting not disclosed	Tyson Translate for every team member; approved AI tools for professional staff	Experimenting

Questions

AI in food, beverage and household, answered

Which grocers and consumer goods companies are furthest along with AI?: In the Enterprise AI diffusion report, Coca-Cola, Kroger, Nestlé, Target, Unilever, and Walmart are at Piloting and Costco, Dollar General, PepsiCo, Procter & Gamble, and Tyson Foods are at Experimenting. A stage follows from the returns and rollouts a company has publicly reported in the last 18 months, not from its spending or plans.
How does Walmart use AI compared with other grocers?: Walmart runs every associate AI tool on Element, a company-wide platform it built in 2022, and reports more than 900,000 associates using its conversational assistant each week (Jun 2025), the largest reach among grocers. Walmart credits AI digital twins with a 19% cut in Walmart U.S. refrigeration maintenance spend in 2024 (reported Aug 2025), and that single return places Walmart at Piloting alongside Target, which credits its personalization engine with billions of dollars in incremental sales (Mar 2026), and Kroger, which has up to 150,000 associates using its Sage assistant (Jan 2026). Costco and Dollar General are at Experimenting: Costco shares the credit for pharmacy script growth between AI and other drivers, and Dollar General says its long-term financial framework assumes no benefit from AI (Aug 2026). Walmart's reports that Sparky shoppers spend about 35% (Feb 2026) and 40% (Aug 2026) more per order compare users with non-users and do not count as a return credited to AI.
How do food and beverage companies use AI?: Food and beverage companies use AI in sales and ordering, marketing content, plants and employee assistants. Coca-Cola reports a 4% to 6% sales uplift at direct customer outlets using its Suggested Order algorithm, an internal estimate (Feb 2026), and builds marketing tools such as Fizzion with Adobe. Nestlé gives every employee Microsoft Copilot Chat (Nov 2025) and is moving to SAP S/4HANA Cloud Private Edition so it can embed SAP's Joule copilot across the group. PepsiCo runs PepGenX, its internal generative AI platform on Amazon Bedrock (May 2025), added Google's Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform in Apr 2026, and tests digital twins at a Gatorade plant (Jan 2026). Tyson Foods runs AI refrigeration controls at 5 facilities, a Claude assistant on its foodservice website (Aug 2025) and Tyson Translate for every team member. Coca-Cola and Nestlé are at Piloting; PepsiCo and Tyson Foods are at Experimenting.
Which AI platforms and models do grocers and consumer goods companies use?: Grocers and consumer goods companies mostly build their own AI platform and buy models from several providers. Walmart runs OpenAI, Anthropic and its own Wallaby models on Element, Kroger built an AI gateway that runs its own models alongside outside technology such as Google Gemini and Anthropic Claude (Sep 2026), Procter & Gamble gives teams an AI factory for building and monitoring agents and gives employees 4 proprietary generative AI tools led by chatPG (Dec 2025), and PepsiCo offers foundation models through Amazon Bedrock in PepGenX (May 2025). Unilever chose Google Cloud's Vertex AI in Feb 2026 as the base of an enterprise data and AI backbone, Coca-Cola runs about 80% of its infrastructure on Microsoft Azure (Jul 2025) and uses OpenAI through Azure with Google, Meta and Anthropic models, and Target gives corporate teams ChatGPT Enterprise (Nov 2025). Costco and Tyson Foods have no named enterprise AI platform, and Dollar General was still staffing an internal agent platform in Oct 2026.

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