For example, a channel check could include one or multiple conversations with a store manager to understand their targeted customer.
Analysts generally look for top products, customer buying patterns and past performance.
Suppliers may also give an indication of the raw material availability, finished product inventory levels, promotion plans to the Analysts.
Channel checks can give insights complementary to balance sheet analysis, such as distributor and retailer attitudes towards a product and its competitors, seasonal and geographic variation, inventory levels (notably channel stuffing), and so on.
In the United States, the Securities and Exchange Commission has clarified that channel checks are legitimate tools of business research but they should not make illegal use of insider information.