The latest ONS Business Insights survey, published on 2 July, found that 46% of AI-adopting retailers are now using the technology to improve their business operations — placing retail alongside transport, storage and manufacturing as a sector where AI has cleared the pilot stage. A further 40.8% of retailers not yet using AI for operational purposes say they plan to do so within three months.
The survey comes alongside a new report from home-delivery platform Parcelhero, which mapped the adoption pattern across its own customer base. "The question is no longer whether retailers should adopt AI. It has already arrived," said David Jinks, Head of Consumer Research at Parcelhero. "The retailers that will lead their industries by 2030 are those investing in data quality, digital infrastructure and workforce capability today."
Build versus buy is dividing the sector. Only 5.9% of retailers using AI have developed their own solutions — sharply below the 14.9% of manufacturers who have built in-house. Most retail AI runs on purchased external software (41.3%) or free-to-use tools, with 53.6% of AI-using retailers opting for the latter.
The jobs question, which has dominated coverage of AI in retail, looks less alarming in the ONS numbers than in the headlines. Just 10.8% of AI-adopting retailers say they are using it to automate or replace roles; 47.6% report no change in headcount. Among companies planning to introduce AI within three months, 57.8% expect no staffing effect and 4.6% say it will increase their headcount.
Beyond operations, retailers are using AI for customer personalisation (25.4% of AI adopters), market exploration (15.1%) and new product development (12%). The pattern suggests AI is spreading across the business rather than concentrating in a single function.
Parcelhero has deployed AI across two of its own customer-facing systems: a tracking platform that identifies customs delays in real time and a chatbot it calls AI Hero for first-contact enquiry handling. The company is preparing to launch Parcelhero Pro, Parcelhero Pro Scale and ParcelVision — a SaaS suite aimed at businesses managing delivery at scale.
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