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RetailX Report · In association with KIBO Commerce
How retail changes when AI shopping agents meet agentic retailers
The retail landscape is shifting. In 2026, the rise of agentic AI, capable of planning, utilising tools and executing complex tasks independently, has completely changed the strategic roadmap for brands. As consumers increasingly rely on their own AI assistants to browse, evaluate and complete transactions, how can traditional retailers avoid getting left behind?
This report provides an operational framework for conducting an infrastructure reality check, bypassing monolithic vendor lock-in, and engineering an agile, technology-agnostic supply chain built for machine-paced demand.
Download the Report ↓About the report
In a traditional ecommerce environment, brands optimised storefronts exclusively for human eyes. Now there is another audience reading every page: AI agents, built to shop, compare and transact on a human’s behalf. Retail professionals must master multiple disciplines, presenting engaging experiences for real-world consumers while serving structured data to customer-directed AI agents.
Preparing for Agentic Commerce, produced in association with KIBO Commerce, combines exclusive retail executive insights with RetailX research. The report maps a realistic path towards operational readiness, highlighting practical steps brands can take to adapt and stay flexible and agile as AI reshapes consumers and retailers, now and into an unknown future.
Executive insights & takeaways
While 70% of retail and D2C leaders agree that AI will fundamentally transform their corporate business model within the next five years, only 10% believe their infrastructure is fully prepared today.
Budget constraints (11.4%) and board hesitation (6.0%) are rarely the true points of friction hindering AI adoption. More important factors are a lack of time (16.3%), confusion from using too many tools (14.5%) and a lack of strategic clarity (13.3%).
The line between human consumers and machine agents is blurring. RetailX data indicates that 42% of consumers are comfortable allowing an AI assistant to autonomously add items to their digital shopping carts, provided they retain final approval before a purchase is completed.
The largest marketplaces are suspicious of customer-directed AI systems. However, two-thirds of surveyed consumers explicitly state they prefer using their own general-purpose, personal AI assistants rather than relying on retailer-specific tools.
When backend retail architecture is closed or rigid, there’s a risk of a retailer’s anti-bot infrastructure accidentally blocking a consumer’s shopping agent. This friction results in severe brand damage and a loss of automated search discovery.
What’s inside · three steps into the age of agentic AI
A deep dive into evolving search strategy from classic Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) to Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) and discovery optimisation.
A step-by-step auditing framework to ensure your supply chain moves at the speed of algorithms.
A blueprint for maintaining long-term technical and legislative agility that incorporates open standards such as Anthropic’s Model Context Protocol (MCP).
Real-world benchmarks included
Of retail and direct-to-consumer executives acknowledge that next-generation agentic AI will completely rewrite their business models by 2031.
Of corporate leadership teams have actively aligned their current quarterly focus around embedding AI protocols directly into internal operations and team productivity pipelines.
Of retail organisations confess that their existing technical foundations require significant structural overhaul before they can credibly support autonomous commerce traffic.
Download the report
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Produced in association with KIBO Commerce.