Customer Case Study · Trade Spend ROI
Distributor and retailer schemes are among the largest lines in the P&L, and the hardest to prove. HMC built a trade-spend control room for a beverage major's finance team: it measures the extra cases each scheme really created, simulates new schemes before launch, checks every claim before payout and forecasts the month-end accrual.
Figures indicative; validated metrics available on request.
Finance could say what was paid. It could not say what the payment bought.
Schemes were judged on total cases sold, including cases that would have sold anyway.
Big outlets crossed slabs on natural growth and collected payouts for doing nothing different.
Thousands of distributor claims a month; only a small sample checked by hand.
Month-end provisions were trued up a quarter later, swinging margins.
Built with commercial finance, sales operations and the distributor management team.
Select a step to see what happened.
Mapped every step from the annual trade budget to the payout.
Deliverable: Trade spend flow map and leakage baseline.
Test-and-control outlet matching as the standard for ROI.
Deliverable: ROI method and claim rule book.
Dashboard, simulator, claims engine and accrual model.
Deliverable: Trade spend control room.
No new scheme without a simulated ROI.
Deliverable: Pilot in two regions.
Traditional trade, modern trade and HoReCa.
Deliverable: Roll-out plan.
Synthetic schemes, outlets and claims for illustration. Follow the money through the flow, see which schemes paid back, design one of your own, check claims and close the month.
Optional. Every module runs on sample data and built-in rules. Add your OpenAI key to read scanned distributor claims and to write the scheme recommendation and the close note for the CFO.
Each moving dot is money. Grey dots buy cases that would have sold anyway; red dots leak through bad claims. Switch to After to see the claim gate and ROI loop at work. Select any step for detail.
Each bubble is a scheme: spend across, ROI up, size by extra cases. Select a bubble to see its outlets against matched control outlets week by week. The map shows ROI by state.
Quadrant bubble chart: spend × ROI · bubble size = incremental cases · line = break-even (1×)
Difference-in-difference: weekly cases per outlet, scheme outlets against matched control outlets
Choropleth: incremental margin per ₹ of trade spend
Scheme spend split: extra cases, the baseline paid for, and pull-forward
Synthetic schemes and sales. Scheme and brand names are generic; figures are illustrative.
Set the slabs and payouts. Every dot is an outlet deciding whether the extra effort for a slab is worth it. Grey outlets get paid while adding less than 4% beyond their normal growth, so most of their payout buys cases they would have sold anyway. Run it to see cost, extra cases and ROI.
Unit chart: each dot is an outlet, dropped into the slab it chose · red = grew 4% or more beyond normal · grey = paid but added little · blue = cooler visibility only
Scale every payout up or down: spend against extra cases, with the ROI line
60 simulation runs with different outlet behaviour
Run a simulation, then draft the recommendation.
Outlet behaviour is a simple economic model: each outlet weighs the payout against the effort of extra growth. Gross margin assumed ₹38 per unit case.
Six checks run on every claim against distributor sales, the outlet list and scheme rules. The UpSet chart shows which problems occur together; select a bar to filter the claims.
UpSet chart: bars = claims with exactly this set of flags · dots = the flags
| Claim | Distributor | Scheme | Claimed | Allowed | Status |
|---|
Type it in, or upload a scanned claim (needs a key)
Liability builds through the month as outlets sell; claims arrive weeks later. The model forecasts the month's liability with a range, so finance books the provision on day 2 of close instead of truing it up next quarter.
Forecast with an 80% range, earned to date and claims received · dashed = provision to book
| Journal entry | Region | Debit ₹ | Credit ₹ |
|---|
Activity rings: month's scheme budget consumed · outer ring North
The note explains the provision, the range and what drives it.
Measuring uplift, simulating before launch and checking every claim moved money to schemes that pay back.
Pictorial chart: each bottle filled to its ROI (full = 2×)
Cumulative payback curve: margin from extra cases against spend, schemes ranked by ROI · dashed = break-even
Figures indicative; validated metrics available on request.
Measure against a matched control; total volume flatters every scheme.
Slab design decides how much of the payout subsidises the baseline.
Automated checks cost less than the leakage a sample misses.