Sena reads the balance shoppers would take, in every market it sells in.
Product mix optimization decides the volume balance across the items a range already carries: how much should be sold at entry, in the middle, and at the top. Three properties of the usual inputs bend the target toward last year.
The target mix is the achieved mix with a margin adjustment. What the range achieved reflects what it pushed, what was in stock, and what carried promotion, so the target inherits all three.
Mix is steered toward high-margin lines because margin is known per unit. Whether shoppers will take that balance is a separate question, and it goes unasked until the volume lands wide.
Moving volume upward is treated as a pricing and promotion exercise. Which buyers trade up from which item, and at what gap, sits with the shopper and appears in zero mix reports.
Sena is the decision AI with access to real-world data. It records how volume distributes across a category in each market and asks shoppers what would move them between tiers, so a target mix follows measured demand ahead of last year.
Category receipts show how volume splits across tiers where the whole market is counted, per outlet type.
Promotion, availability, and push are flagged, so the achieved mix separates from the demanded one.
The stated response returns the price and format gap at which a buyer moves upward.
Product mix optimization sets the volume balance across items a range already carries. It sits between two other decisions: which items exist at all, and what each one sells for. The mix question is what proportion of volume each should hold, and it is the decision most often answered by extrapolating the last period.
Assortment optimization decides which items the category carries, and product mix optimization decides the volume balance across the ones carried. Product portfolio management sets which products exist at all, and price pack architecture sets what each one sells for.
Product mix in a commercial range means the balance of volume across items. In marketing teaching, product mix means the breadth and depth of everything a business sells, taught alongside price, place, and promotion.
| Output | What it settles | Where it goes wrong |
|---|---|---|
| Tier split | How volume divides across price tiers. | Copied from the achieved mix. |
| Format split | How volume divides across pack sizes. | Weighted to what the plant runs. |
| Trade-up path | Which buyers move upward, and from where. | Assumed from the price ladder. |
| Mix contribution | What the balance returns after cost. | Read at period end, once the volume has gone. |
Product mix analysis is the measurement behind the decision: how volume currently splits, how that split moved, and what it contributed. It runs on three comparisons, and the third is the one that changes a plan.
What the range intended to sell at each tier, against what it sold.
How the split moved, with promotional weeks separated.
How volume splits across tiers when the whole category is counted, which is the comparison an internal file leaves out.
The third is what distinguishes a range under-indexed at entry from a market that buys little there.
Four collected inputs stand behind the balance, market by market.
| Input | What it answers |
|---|---|
| Receipts | How category volume splits across tiers and formats, dated. |
| Store captures | Which tiers each outlet stocked, and at what price. |
| Geo-verified photos | Each pack on the fixture, captured and dated. |
| Stated preference | The gap at which a buyer moves between tiers. |
The team's own numbers join separately. Volume history, cost lines, promotional calendars, and production constraints connect through 250+ integrations, so internal mix reporting meets market-wide purchase.
Three questions live beyond a sales mix report, and each one changes the balance.
Real people share what they buy and prefer, under explicit consent. Sena captures it directly at the source, so every figure traces back to where it came from whenever a number comes under question.
The same shoppers supply the purchases and the trade-offs, with the market and the week attached to each.
The category's tier split and the range's split read side by side, market by market.
Receipts show whether entry growth is existing buyers moving down or new buyers arriving.
The stated response counts the entry buyers a narrower gap would move upward.
Product mix optimization built on internal volume history can report the range's own balance and struggles to judge it. Sena captures real-world signals from the packs photographed on a real fixture through to the receipt showing which tier a shopper chose.
Category purchase is recorded across the market, so the range's balance reads against the category's.
Reads which tiers and formats each outlet stocked and at what price, off images captured in real stores.
Signal arrives from the consumer network under explicit consent. The gap that moves a buyer between tiers comes from that buyer.
Volume history, cost lines, promotional calendars, and production constraints connect over 250+ integrations, so internal mix reporting meets market-wide purchase.
Market and capture week sit on every figure, so a mix target opens onto the purchases behind it.
Volume histories, promotional calendars, and prior mix plans load in, covering every cycle the category has been scanned in.
Four teams work the same mix target, and each one needs a different cut of it before they can act.
The target mix. Needs the market's tier split alongside the range's.
The mix effect. Needs push separated from shopper choice.
Blended realized price. Needs the mix effect split from the price effect.
The production balance. Needs the mix target settled early.
The same tier read, run against whatever each industry treats as a step up.
Tier and format split against the market's, per outlet type.
Single-serve against multipack, read by occasion.
Tier balance across a launch window, with trade-up measured.
Own-label against branded balance, read per counter.
One mechanism, applied per market and per category. Each step is documented, which is what carries a mix target through a commercial review.
Receipts return how category volume splits across tiers and formats, per market, dated.
Sena reads the range's balance against the category's, with promotional volume flagged separately.
The stated response counts the buyers a narrower tier gap would move, so a target mix rests on measured willingness.
Most product mix work runs on internal volume history, which reports what the range sold and holds zero rows on how the category divides. Sena covers both.
| Capability area | Typical setup | Sena |
|---|---|---|
| The dataset | Internal volume history. | Category volume across the market, per outlet type. |
| The target mix | Last year's balance, margin-weighted. | The balance shoppers take, measured. |
| Push against pull | Combined in one figure. | Promotional volume flagged and separated. |
| The market's split | Beyond reach. | Counted across the category, per market. |
| Trading down | Volume moving to entry. | Existing buyers moving, or new buyers arriving. |
| The trade-up gap | Assumed from the ladder. | Stated by buyers, with the reachable volume. |
| Evidence in a review | A mix variance table. | Open any tier onto the purchases behind it. |
Three mix questions the internal file holds zero answers to.
Read the range's tier split against the category's, so an internal drift separates from a market shift.
Establish whether entry growth is existing buyers moving down or new buyers arriving.
Measure the gap at which entry buyers move to the middle tier, before the ladder changes.
A measured balance settles how volume divides across the range. The four decisions below are what a category team runs around it.
Every category decision Sena answers, in one place
Which items the category carries
Decides which items are carried, ahead of the balance across them.
Explore assortment optimization 02The space each item receives
Turns the balance across items into space at the shelf.
Explore shelf space optimization 03The verdict on a period
Reports what the balance returned across the period, item by item.
Explore category performance analysis 04The measurement, every cycle
Measures how the balance performed once the items are set.
Explore category analyticsThe walkthrough takes one category in one market, reads the range's tier split against the category's, and sizes the entry buyers a narrower gap would move upward while the team watches.
Name the category and the markets it sells in, and we will read the balance against the market.