SOLUM and Gander partner to help retailers reduce food waste with smarter, simpler markdown execution

SOLUM, a retail technology solutions provider, and Gander, a food waste reduction technology specialist, today announced a strategic partnership to help grocery retailers simplify markdowns on short-dated products and reduce food waste.

The partnership brings together Gander’s expiry-based pricing intelligence with SOLUM’s Newton Electronic Shelf Labels (ESLs) and Aims SaaS platform, making it easier for retailers to ensure the right price is applied at the right time, directly at the shelf edge.

With UK retailers under increasing pressure to balance sustainability objectives with tight margins and limited in-store resource, the partnership focuses on making markdown processes more consistent, less manual and easier to manage across multiple stores.

By connecting expiry-led pricing decisions with real-time shelf updates, retailers can reduce the need for manual interventions in store, helping teams stay compliant while freeing up time for other tasks.

The integrated solution will be unveiled at the Retail Technology Show 2026 (RTS) in London, showcasing how retailers can bring together expiry‑driven pricing decisions and real‑time shelf‑edge updates within day‑to‑day retail operations.

Gander’s technology identifies short‑dated products and automatically applies optimised, rule‑based markdowns based on retailer‑defined parameters. It also gives retailers clear visibility of waste performance, compliance, and sell‑through rates, while promoting reduced‑to‑clear products across multiple consumer‑facing channels to help accelerate demand.

Integrated with SOLUM’s Newton ESL platform, expiry-led pricing decisions are automatically synchronised and displayed on shelf-edge labels in real time. Built on the Newton protocol, the integration enables fast, reliable communication between central pricing systems and the shelf edge, ensuring updates are executed consistently across store networks. The result is a connected workflow linking centralised pricing logic, expiry intelligence and shelf-edge execution—reducing errors, improving consistency and easing the operational burden on store teams.

Together, SOLUM and Gander support retailers in moving away from time-consuming manual markdown processes towards a more data‑driven and scalable approach to food waste reduction. The result is improved sell‑through of short‑dated products, better margin protection, and a practical way to support r sustainability goals without adding extra pressure on store teams.

Stacey Williams, Gander business development director, said: “Through our partnership with SOLUM, grocery retailers can turn every markdown decision into instant, accurate shelf-edge execution. By combining Gander’s real-time optimisation and demand activation with SOLUM’s ESL infrastructure, retailers improve sell-through, protect margin, and reduce food waste, all without adding operational complexity in store.”

Mark Duckworth, country manager UK & Ireland at SOLUM, added: “As increasing numbers of large UK grocery retailers adopt SOLUM’s ESL solutions based on proven quality and trust, open collaboration with ecosystem partners like Gander represents an important step forward. Through these partnerships, we are able to deliver sustainability‑driven solutions that genuinely reflect the evolving needs of both the market and our customers.”