Retail Remix

Jim Inglis has a 60+ year career in retail including a long tenure at The Home Depot. With his book Breakthrough Retailing: How a Bleeding Orange Culture Can Change Everything, he reflects on his time with the home improvement retailer and, most of all, what other brands can learn from the company’s rise, stagnation and rebirth.  
 
During this week’s Retail Remix, Jim shares lessons from the retail trenches, including how to: 

• Create a differentiated brand from the ground up; 
• Design a culture that employees love;  
• Tackle logistical issues such as pricing and supply chain; and   
• Inspire employees to build their skill set and foster a career in retail.  

RELATED LINKS 

• Buy a copy of Jim’s book  
• Learn more about Jim’s career 

Rebag sits perfectly at the intersection of sustainability and luxury. Consumers are becoming more mindful of the products they purchase and how they get to their doorsteps, but at the same time, they also have a hunger for higher quality products that last a long time.  
 
Rebag is capitalizing on these behaviors by creating an ongoing cycle of engagement that encourages clients to purchase and resell merchandise continuously. During this week’s episode, Alicia Esposito takes a look inside Rebag’s client engagement machine with Geronimo Chala, the company’s Chief Client Officer. They discuss:  

• The state and future of the luxury resale market;  
• How Rebag invested in its digital experience to capitalize on the surge in consumer demand; and  
• Why Geronimo focuses on creating a client loyalty loop versus simply driving one-time conversions. 

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Rebag 
• Register for the Retail Innovation Conference virtual experience to hear how other brands, like e.l.f. Beauty, Petco, Parachute and Neiman Marcus are using cutting-edge tech to create new engagement opportunities.  

As an executive, Kristin Smith is always focused on finding “wide open spaces.” She believes these spaces or gaps highlight real customer needs and present new opportunities for businesses to differentiate and grow. 
 
And she found a lot of these opportunities in Fernish, which ultimately inspired her to invest in, advise and join the company as President and Chief Operating Officer. After seeing a significant spike in demand during the pandemic, Kristin and the rest of the team are focused on growth mode. This week, Alicia Esposito chats with her about:  

• How the Fernish mission has evolved during the pandemic;  
• The demographic trends driving new expansion opportunities and growth for the business;  
• Top operational challenges and investments Fernish has had to make as the business scales; and  
• How collaboration and brand partnerships can inspire innovation.  
   

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Fernish 
• Register for the Retail Innovation Conference virtual experience to hear more about how Fernish collaborates with Crate & Barrel to unlock new opportunities.  
   
   

To create a new product and brand that can compete in the ever-growing ecommerce world, you need an incredible amount of insight. With its proprietary CLAIRE™ intelligence platform, 100.co has the power to map connections between unrelated data to identify which opportunities will drive the most value.  
 
How can other brands and retailers reap similar benefits? 
With this week’s Retail Remix, hear how 100.co is using data and powerful analytical capabilities to shape a new era of brand innovation and how you can, too. Get his recommendations for driving private label brand growth by:   

• Tapping deep customer insight and embracing new analytical channels;  
• Thoroughly assessing the competitive landscape to identify new gaps and opportunities; and 
• Embracing strong brand-building techniques to reinforce customer needs and product differentiation. 

 RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about 100.co 
• Register for the Retail Innovation Conference to learn how other brands, including Gap, are using data and analytics to unlock new business opportunities

Model No. has one key goal: to minimize waste in the home and commercial furniture space. To accomplish this mission, the company has had to focus on building trust and credibility through its customer experience.  
 
During this week’s Retail Remix, Phillip Raub, the CEO of Model No., reveals the brand’s key investments across manufacturing, fulfillment and digital marketing and engagement. Listen to get Phillip’s perspectives on: 

• How furniture brands can close the knowledge gap using high-quality content and cutting-edge technology;  
• The future of manufacturing, including micro-factories and 3D printing; and 
• Why Model No. decided to break into marketplaces and how the brand is making it work. 

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Model No.  
• Register for the Retail Innovation Conference to learn from more of the industry’s most innovative brands 

The elimination of cookies is going to make it essentially impossible for retailers to get the third-party data they need to fuel their personalization initiatives. But with the right methods, your loyalty program can save the day!  
 
During this episode of Retail Remix, Alicia Esposito sits down with Rob Garf and Natasha Janic of Salesforce to discuss all of the major shifts happening in the marketing space, including Apple’s changing privacy guidelines and Google’s removal of third-party cookie tracking, and how that drives major data in loyalty programs. Specifically, they dig into:   

• The value of zero- and first-party data and how to collect it across channels;  
• New ways to create value and a mutually beneficial relationship with consumers;  
• Recommendations (and requirements) for building trust and transparency around data collection practices; and  
• How to power “data democratization” across the organization, including in stores.  

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Salesforce 
• Get more insights on how to improve loyalty program performance 
   
   

If you can distill retail down to a single principle, it’s “supply versus demand.” And pricing is a key way to influence this demand and, most of all, consumer perception of your brand. 
 
But now more than ever, there are so many factors that are disrupting retailers’ pricing strategies, including new competitors, new channels and new economic issues, such as inflation. How can brands and retailers effectively balance them all and still make the best decisions for their business — and their customers? Matthew Pavich of Revionics breaks down how to navigate this increasingly important space by sharing:  

• How data and analytics can help brands manage consumer expectations and better respond to competitor pricing strategies;  
• What role omnichannel services and fulfillment strategies play in pricing strategies; and  
• The impact of inflation and supply chain constraints, especially leading into the holiday season.  

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Revionics 
   
   

Over the course of the pandemic, consumers’ buying needs completely changed. Some consumers switched suits for athleisure, while others focused less on a full face of makeup and more on clean skincare.
 
These behaviors are still evolving as the state of the world continues to change. That means the spotlight is on planners and Liza Amlani believes that’s a good thing. During this week’s Retail Remix, we dig into how demographic and psychographic shifts are driving a new era of product development and merchandising, and what issues are rising to the top. Listen to learn:  

• How sustainability and inclusivity are influencing merchandising decisions;  
• Why product teams need to tap new data sources (especially social media) to uncover new innovation opportunities; and  
• The power of deeper, qualitative customer research such as shopper interviews and walking the store floor.  
   

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about Retail Strategy Group 
• Connect with Liza on LinkedIn  

 COVID-19 postponed many weddings around the world, but that didn’t stop couples from planning. Lizzy Ellingson and her team at David’s Bridal knew this — and that’s why they focused first and foremost on continuing to empower their customers every step of the process. 

During this week’s episode, hear the Chief Digital Experience Officer’s thoughts on how social media and other digital platforms influence brides, grooms and everyone in between, and how David’s Bridal:  

• Reimagined the customer journey through the lens of digital engagement;  
• Used augmented reality (AR), appointments and other tactics to close the digital-physical gap; and  
• Embraced agile product development to inspire ongoing risk taking and improvement.  

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about how David’s Bridal uses AR  
• Access Lizzy’s session at retailX  
• Register for the Retail Innovation Conference online experience to learn how other brands are transforming the customer experience  

 
A whopping 81% of consumers plan to maintain or increase their digital usage, even as COVID-19 restrictions lift, according to a survey from FullStory. Is your business prepared to deliver an easy, friction-free experience? 
 

During this episode of Retail Remix, Kirsten Newbold-Knipp, CMO of FullStory, and Elizabeth Simmer, Head of Onboarding & Professional Services, sit down to discuss some of the biggest issues consumers face while shopping online, and how these struggles ultimately impact their loyalty. Listen to learn: 

• Why digital experience is more critical than ever in an omnichannel world; 
   
• The overlooked facets of digital customer experience that hurt customer engagement and loyalty; and 
   
• How digital experience intelligence (DXI) empowers all areas of the retail organization to design experiences with empathy and deep customer understanding.  
   

RELATED LINKS 

• Learn more about FullStory  
• Get more retail resources, courtesy of FullStory 
• Download the ecommerce optimization guide 
• See customer success stories 
• Access more data from the survey