In today’s fast-paced retail market, transaction data often reveals trends before official financial reports are released. When shoppers become more cautious, they don’t usually stop buying all at once. Instead, they make small changes, like skipping a pair of sneakers, waiting to buy jeans or searching for better deals.

Michael Gunther, senior vice president of research and market intelligence at Consumer Edge, said the company is able to drill down into U.S. consumer credit and debit card data. “It covers anything that a credit or debit card can touch,” he told Sourcing Journal, adding that it gives his team “a full view of the consumer economy, whether it’s restaurants, apparel or TV subscriptions.”

The firm’s client base spans financial institutions like hedge funds, private equity and venture capital firms to corporate clients who work with us to figure out what’s going on with their competitors “on a near real-time basis.” The data also tells a story not only about an individual company but also about what’s going on in a broader context.

For example, Gunther said his team recently analyzed the direct-to-consumer sales for Levi Strauss & Co. and found the denim brand’s U.S. direct-to-consumer performance “deteriorated relative to the apparel industry through July and August before improving sharply in September,” he said.

“The brand is still underperforming the industry year over year, but the gap narrowed considerably last month,” Gunther said.

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