Client notes

What teams say after a mapping lands in their meeting

These notes reference specific Cedarpath engagements—category maps, seasonal scans, shelf reviews, and narrative briefings—rather than generic praise.

“The category trend map for our body-care line showed that cream-gel hybrids had already taken the mid-bay role we still treated as experimental. We adjusted the autumn assortment before the trade presentation, not after.”

Mai Phương · Category manager, personal care brand · Personal Care Category Trend Map

“I wished the seasonal scan had covered a second haircare subcategory in the same week. Even with that limit, the texture notes gave our merchandising team a shared vocabulary for the Tet reset.”

James Okada · Trade marketing, haircare distributor · Seasonal Format & Texture Scan

“Their shelf pattern review matched what our field reps had been saying about adjacency next to oral care, and put it in language the retail buyer accepted. We moved two facings and left the hero SKU where it was.”

Thảo Lê · Retail development, oral care · Retail Shelf Pattern Review

“The positioning briefing did not invent a slogan for us. It did show that three competitors were crowding the same 'calm skin' claim cluster while texture proof sat almost empty—useful before we briefed agencies.”

Elena Võ · Brand lead, skincare · Positioning Narrative Briefing

Extended client stories

Remapping a skincare subcategory before a mid-year assortment freeze

Personal Care Category Trend Map

A Hanoi brand team asked for a category map six weeks before their mid-year assortment freeze. Shelf observation showed serum-cream hybrids taking space that their plan still labelled as niche.

We mapped formats, claim clusters, and price bands across modern trade and specialty beauty in Hanoi, then compared those patterns with the client's current lineup. The map recommended holding one hero serum while accelerating a mid-weight cream-gel that already matched visible shelf roles. The team entered the freeze with a documented rationale instead of a last-minute debate over anecdotes from a single store visit.

Shelf adjacency for a new body-mist launch

Retail Shelf Pattern Review

A distributor preparing a body-mist launch compared two proposed bay roles using internal preference alone and nearly chose a fragrance-only adjacency.

The review placed facing density, claim hierarchy, and nearby categories beside the client's launch brief. Observation favoured a body-care adjacency where mist formats already held secondary facings, even though fragrance bays looked busier. After three pilot stores, sell-through supported the body-care placement and the client locked that pattern for the first wave.