Partner of the Year

This award honors a company that exemplifies the best in the industry. In today's world, customers prefer to align with organizations that not only deliver based on an exceptional service mindset but also foster a strong, positive culture for their employees. This award recognizes entities that prioritize these core beliefs — even when faced with disruptions and making challenging decisions. To qualify, applicants must demonstrate comprehensive excellence, including impactful philanthropy, a customer-first approach, and a thriving employee culture, all supported by measurable results.

Best Kept Secret

You have a great solution or service with stellar customer success stories, but do you feel like not enough people know about your brand or its unique differentiators? Share your key value propositions and success stories, including why your solution or service could be a game changer for the industry.

VIP Challenge

2025 theme: AI Innovation and Application: AI has, and continues to fundamentally change the retail landscape and customer experience. Describe the way you partnered with retailers to come up with new solutions, or have materially enhanced your products to supercharge efficiency and experience.

You tore down barriers and leveraged speed, agility, and resourcefulness to stand out from the status quo. You developed an original and inventive solution or significantly changed your business model to support your clients’ evolved needs and goals. Share how you’ve demonstrated innovation in partnership to solve a new client hardship or pain point — or how you successfully turned a new industry disruption into an entirely new business opportunity.

Retailer's Favorite

You are always there for clients, in good times and bad, and there’s never any drama, friction, or frustration. Your customers consistently reach out to you, even for things outside your expertise, and they know you will provide a timely and thoughtful answer. Apply here and explain why your customers say they wish all their partners were like you.

Best Longstanding Partnership

You and your client have forged a long-term relationship with effective communication and collaboration at the foundation. You’ve had your fair share of wins and adjustments, but every step of the way, you have built trust, remained innovative, and found new ways to work together for mutual benefit. As a result of your committed partnership (which has been in place for at least five years), your client continues to reap the rewards. Describe the expectations, agility, and results that are driving this sustained relationship.

Retail Transformation of the Year

(SUBMISSIONS FOR RETAIL COMPANIES)

This award recognizes a retailer that has embarked on a transformation journey that has delivered sustainable change and measurable results. Submissions for this award should share details on a cross-functional initiative, business model transformation, technology modernization project, organizational culture transformation, or significant business process change. The entry must demonstrate how the transformation has delivered quantifiable, ongoing, and sustainable business impact and results. Highlighting partners that contributed to the success is a plus! This award is for retail companies to enter only. Use code RETAILERNOM to complete your entry upon checkout.

Retail Partner: Person of the Year

The Retail Partner of the Year Award recognizes a retail executive who is a pioneer, an innovator, a lifelong learner, and a mover and shaker. He or she is a leader who leaves a path for others to follow and embodies the Vendors in Partnership mission in everything they do. When working with their partners, they demonstrate vulnerability and trust as all parties come equally to the table and establish successful long-term partnerships. This executive also demonstrates to those they lead how all boats rise in a committed partnership, enabling future leaders to build a stellar company culture and advance effective, mutually beneficial business relationships.

Best Unified Customer Experience

Retailers need to build immersive branded experiences that meet their customers’ expectations. That means connecting cross-channel customer information and integrating operations, as well as all critical engagement touchpoints. Describe how your solution empowers brands to bring the best customer experience to life, no matter where someone decides to shop.

Best Breakthrough Technology Solution

Cutting-edge technologies have transitioned from unfamiliar entities into targeted solutions designed to meet clear goals and expectations. Explain how your company uses emerging and breakthrough tech, such as AI/ML, Augmented Reality (AR), Robotics, Livestreaming, Voice, or others, to position retailers for success.

Best Commerce or Multi-Vendor Platform

Essentially, all aspects of commerce have evolved, from the continued rise of marketplaces to the mainstream adoption of composable commerce solutions powered by strong partner ecosystems. Describe how your solutions or services provide brands and retailers with appropriate flexibility, robust functionality, and/or seamless integration to help them determine the right business strategy, optimize customer experiences, and improve employee operations while benefiting other key stakeholders.

Best Marketing Automation

Retailers need to communicate seamlessly across multiple customer segments and touchpoints so they can create seamless and personalized experiences wherever consumers decide to interact. Describe how your B2B or B2C solution addresses any (or all) multi-faceted marketing touchpoints across the website, mobile, social, direct mail, call centers, paid media, and email.

Best Enabler of Commerce Media

The commerce media landscape is vast and growing by the day. Media networks powered by retailers and other entities are bringing shoppable moments to new creative formats, from e-commerce ads to in-app videos and interactive connected TV (CTV) experiences. While these organizations are setting new standards for advertising excellence, agencies and solution providers are enabling success by offering new strategic, planning, measurement, and optimization services. Describe the distinct role that your organization plays in this exciting and fast-evolving landscape, including tangible examples of offerings, campaigns, and results.

Best Retail Insights

Data is only as powerful as the actionable insights users can glean and apply from it. Describe how your solution interprets foundational business data (such as customer information, pricing, financials, and operations across channels), responds to dynamic interactions, and delivers tangible value for retail clients. Including real-life examples and results is a plus!

Best Business Intelligence and Analytics Platform

Today's dynamic retail climate requires business intelligence that is interactive, intuitive, and real-time so retailers can acquire insights and agility to manage business changes. Describe how your solution, technology, and execution deliver the foundation for accurate and critical business analysis.

Best Distribution Center Innovation

Innovations driving distribution center (DC) productivity, cost reduction, and speed to destination are critical to competing and responding to heightened shopper demands. Describe how you successfully serve the industry using robotics, automation, AI, or simulation, bringing state-of-the-art methods to efficient merchandise handling.

Best Sustainability Initiative

Sustainability is a powerful value proposition for business leaders and consumers. Industry players must combine operational excellence with social and environmental responsibility, transparently demonstrating their environmental influence and support of the broader community. Describe the initiative that demonstrates your environmental values (including the tangible impact it has had on your company), as well as the benefits brands and retailers have seen when working with you.

Best Payment Innovation

A frictionless, personalized user experience is critical for driving conversions. Now, even the payment experience can influence a consumer’s overall satisfaction and brand loyalty. Describe how your solution enables these critical outcomes by empowering retailers to offer new payment options, gateways, integrations, and innovations and how your services ensure a seamless implementation.

The Retail Voice

The retail community needs valuable information from those who best understand the changing market. These experts not only know what’s happening today, but they also have the savvy to predict what’s coming next and interpret what all of these changes mean for the industry at large. If your passion is keeping the industry informed as an analyst, journalist, blogger, podcast host, or media resource, highlight the great value and experience you bring to the industry.

Best Security Solution

Protecting operations, customers, and employees from fraud, risk, and interruption is a daily concern for retailers. Describe how your solutions help clients discover, mitigate, protect, and recover from security threats and other business challenges.