In 2011, Wal-Mart shook up the marketing world by declaring that sales data from its stores was a strategic asset and the company would no longer provide access to the data to outsiders. A decade later, in July 2011, Wal-Mart agreed to provide access to its sales data to Nielsen—the market research company. In the meantime, the sales climate had changed, from the high-increases of the early 2000s to eight-consecutive quarters of declining sales in 2010 from stores open at least a year. Cindy Davis, newly appointed as Wal-Mart executive vice president for global customer insights noted that “We plan to share our point-of-sale information to help us identify category growth opportunities sooner and collaborate with our manufacturer partners to develop more impactful customer-driven programs going forward” [Zimmerman and Lamar 2011].