The $250 Million decision: How a global CPG leader simplified SKUs

It was a Monday morning, and the executive team of one of a global CPG company faced a familiar headache: its SKU portfolio. Tens of thousands of products, spreading across markets, each with its own production, marketing, and distribution costs. On paper, the portfolio looked impressive. In reality, complexity was choking growth, and no one knew which products were helping and which were hurting.

Meetings stretched for hours. Finance reported losses, marketing defended campaigns, sales pushed for visibility, and no one could get a clear answer. Every decision seemed to hit a wall of data gaps, misaligned priorities, and siloed opinions. Delisting underperforming SKUs could take two years per product. The cost of inaction was mounting, but the path forward was unclear.

The leadership team knew something had to change. They needed clarity, speed, and alignment, and that’s when they turned to Fractal.

At Fractal, we didn’t just want to put AI technology to use. We wanted to enable teams to make decisions with confidence and clarity.  Together, we built an AI supported SKU simplification solution that could see the whole picture, point out underperforming SKUs and enable teams to delist and save costs at the right time. The AI platform didn’t just flag weak SKUs, it explained why they were underperforming, analyzing sales, margins, market growth, and consumer behavior, bringing transparency to the teams making decisions. But insight alone wasn’t enough. Fractal took a leap forward and co-created a delisting process, mapping every step, from halting production to clearing inventory and removing SKUs from shelves, enabling humans (marketing, sales, finance and supply chain teams) to track and close the loop. Roles were clear, timelines were set, and accountability was visible. Bottlenecks disappeared. Teams started moving together, making delisting decisions at a rapid scale.

The results were dramatic:

• 100,000+ underperforming SKUs were flagged and ready for delisting.

• The delisting process shrank from 24 months to just 6 months.

• By acting decisively, the company unlocked $250 million in savings across the value chain.

And the impact went beyond dollars. Teams became more aligned. Decisions were faster and more confident. Leaders could now focus on high-performing SKUs, invest in growth, and experiment with new products. AI illuminated insights, but the company’s people made the strategy real.

The lesson is clear: complexity is not inevitable. Even the largest, most fragmented portfolios can be simplified if the organization has clarity, process, and uses AI as an enabler to drive growth.