The Business of Fashion Podcast

On the latest episode of The BoF Podcast, Coty CEO Sue Y. Nabi shares how embracing identity in the workplace can lead to better business outcomes.

Background:

As one of the industry’s most visible transgender leaders, Sue Y. Nabi, chief executive of beauty conglomerate Coty, is well-versed in the transformative power of identity. In 2020, she was named the company’s fifth CEO in five years and was tasked with leading its turnaround. Then, the Kylie Cosmetics and Covergirl owner was plagued with debt and inefficiencies. 

Since Nabi took the reins, however, sales have started to climb back up steadily: full-year revenue was up 14 percent year-over-year in 2022. Nabi laid the groundwork for growth by doubling down on prestige and expansion in China — focusing especially on excavating the strengths and purposes of each brand in the conglomerate’s portfolio.

“When you look at others, you forget where you are and you make all the mistakes… The world is full of copycats. Difference is not only a chance, but in business, it's an asset,” said Nabi. 

This week on The BoF Podcast, Nabi joins Mory Fontanez, founder of consultancy 822 Group, to share how embracing identity in the workplace and aligning personal and professional values can strengthen a business. 

Key Insights:

• Nabi’s father, a painter, helped inform her understanding of beauty. “There is the conventional, classical beauty, and there is the different one — the one that also speaks to us a lot,” said Nabi. 
• Being unique in business is a tangible asset that can create new opportunities, according to Nabi. As well, staying in touch with your intuition — not just data points — can help leaders make intelligent decisions. 
• In both personal and professional spheres, Nabi’s definition of transformation centres on addition, rather than subtraction or erasure. 
• In a fast-paced world, people can feel pressure to make decisions quickly, but having patience and conversations is the way to finding enduring solutions to problems of all kinds.  

Additional Resources:

• BoF VOICES 2022: Live Your Best Life: In the final session of BoF’s annual gathering, speakers from model Dennis Okwera and Coty chief Sue Y. Nabi to Nike’s Larry Miller and activist Malala Yousafzai reflected on their personal histories and inner powers.
• How to Create an Inclusive Workplace: Employees who feel comfortable and engaged make for a more productive and innovative workforce. Here’s how to make meaningful change in your company.

Discover more careers advice and content from leading fashion professionals on BoF Careers, and explore the 2,700+ global jobs available in fashion and beauty today.

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BoF’s technology correspondent Marc Bain joins Imran Amed to discuss Silicon Valley’s latest craze, and its potential for the fashion industry.

Background: 

As chatter around NFTs, virtual reality and the metaverse dies down, conversation about generative AI, a form of artificial intelligence that makes novel content when given specific prompts, is heating up. Artificial intelligence has been around for decades, but recent advances like Microsoft-backed ChatGPT, which generates sophisticated text and DALL-E, which does the same with images, have set the groundwork for significant shifts in how culture and businesses operate. While specific use cases are still being ironed out, the possibilities for fashion could be transformative. 

“We’ve gone through these hype cycles with things like the metaverse. This is one I think could be different…” said BoF technology correspondent Marc Bain. “This is something where you can see the real-world applications.” 

Key Insights: 

• There are many potential applications for generative AI in fashion: e-commerce sites could deploy it in chat boxes, fast fashion brands could ask it to produce styles based on customer data, and designers could use it for mood-boarding and colour conception.
• But there’s a level of expertise AI doesn’t have yet. It can produce images based on past analysis, but doesn’t understand the technicalities behind garments, for example. 
• While there’s skill to crafting prompts for technology like ChatGT, one of its most promising aspects is its ease of use. Anyone can use it without much learning. 
• AI is shaking up search on the internet, too. Bing is using ChatGPT to produce a technology that wouldn’t just give users links to pluck through, but direct answers to queries. 

We will further address the critical topics discussed on this podcast at The BoF Professional Summit: Artificial Intelligence, Web3 and an Inflection Point in Fashion Tech on March 22, 2023.

Join us at The Times Center, New York – or via the global livestream – together with global business leaders, technologists and creative innovators from brands including Gucci, Ambush, StockX and Levi’s to gain actionable insights to inform business strategy, optimise supply chain and retail operations, and leverage new channels to engage with customers.

Purchase your ticket before February 28, 2023 to secure your place at the early bird rate or register for the livestream now. Click here to sign up now.

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Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, the CEO of Mercy Corps, shares insights on growing global food insecurity and deepening inequality.

At the end of 2022, one in 10 children worldwide were dealing with malnourishment, the result of the worst hunger crisis the world has faced in a generation. It’s an effect of the ricocheting of the triple threat of climate change, geopolitical conflict and Covid-19 through the global economy. Though there’s little chance of resolving these issues imminently, community-sourced efforts can play a large role in combating the devastation they bring to people around the world.

On a recent trip to Somalia, Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, the chief executive of humanitarian aid organisation, Mercy Corps, saw the real-life impact of these global concerns up close. On stage at BoF VOICES 2022, she discussed that experience, and how people around the world can contribute to positive change.

“[Global community] should inspire us to really make small actions, to make a difference and figure out ways in our own lives and in our own lines of work where we can contribute,” said D’Oyen McKenna.

This week on The BoF Podcast, D’Oyen McKenna discusses details of her visit to Somalia and the effects food insecurity has on society.

Key Insights:

D’Oyen McKenna believes we all have a responsibility to engage with and respond to crises around the world, even if the causes are out of our hands. “While none of us can fully control the forces that are shaping our world today, we do get to choose how we represent ourselves in that world,” said D’Oyen McKenna. “But also how we engage with the world that we find, how we respond to it and act in it.”

Despite the hardships that citizens of Somalia and other impoverished or conflict-ridden countries face, human determination and grit always shine through. “Even amongst this unimaginable hardship and grief… the power of the human spirit really comes alive,” said D’Oyen McKenna.

While the world can feel divided with society frequently grouped under different sub-categories, D’Oyen McKenna argues that we should create a new sense of global community. “In a world of pandemics, climate crises and global hunger there is no us and them, only us.”

Additional Resources:

• BoF VOICES 2022: Finding Optimism in an Unsteady World: From the Ukraine War to the climate crisis to the legacy of the pandemic, speakers including CNN’s Clarissa Ward, Mercy Corps’ Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, Goldman Sachs’ Tim Ingrassia and Google X’s former chief business officer Mo Gawdat discussed the uncertainty gripping the world — and why there’s cause for hope.

You can catch up on all the videos from BoF VOICES on our YouTube channel, please follow this link.

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The film director joins BoF editor-at-large Tim Blanks to discuss how he uses his fashion and music roots to stage powerful experiences including from Abba Voyage and recent Dior Men and Fendi Couture shows. 

Background: 

Film and creative director Bailie Walsh cut his teeth working in London during the nineties and early aughts alongside talents like Boy George, Leigh Bowery and Alexander McQueen. While Walsh calls himself a film director, editor-at-large Tim Blanks, who hosts him on the latest BoF Podcast, describes him as more of a magician. He was behind the hologram of Kate Moss featured in McQueen’s show “Widows of Culloden” in 2006 that went on to be showcased in both London’s V&A Museum and New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. More recently, he’s captivated audiences with his immersive virtual concert, Abba Voyage, in London, and his work with Kim Jones, who tapped Walsh to help stage Dior Menswear and Fendi Couture shows in January. Walsh approaches his projects with the goal of completely immersing his audience — and often pushes the limits to do so. 

“What I love about being creative or having the opportunity to be creative is a challenge,” said Walsh. 

Key Insights: 

• Walsh helped infuse Dior Menswear Fall/Winter 2023 runway with TS Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land.” Models drifted past massive screens featuring Gwendoline Christie and Robert Pattinson reading the poem, spliced with music from composer Max Richter. 
• Creatives need to live on the edge of fear, according to Walsh. “You have to be scared if you’re a creative person … you’re entering into a journey that you haven’t before,” he said. “That’s the point of doing it.” 
• Music has been a thread throughout Walsh’s career. He’s made videos for Boy George, crafted Abba’s hologram-filled Voyage concert but also used music as a source of inspiration for his Daniel Craig-fronted film “Flashbacks of a Fool.”
• Walsh spent over two years thinking about how to play with illusion and reality to create Abba Voyage. Throughout the display, there are costume changes, chatter between the artists and shadowy figures still present when the lights are out. Then, there’s a moment the group suddenly disappears — a reminder the show was contrived. 

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Christine Edman, executive officer of Japanese e-commerce site Zozo, talks about what makes the country’s consumers tick, and how the fashion landscape is set to shift in the years ahead.

Background:

Japan is home to some of the world’s most sophisticated and fervent fashion consumers, but its digital and e-commerce channels have long lagged behind other markets. That started to shift with the pandemic and e-tailer Zozo benefited from the momentum. Zozotown, its Gen-Z focused fashion marketplace saw a surge in orders, and in 2021, the company launched Zozovilla, a luxury destination that quickly attracted brands including Loewe, Dries van Noten and Thom Browne. 

But while Covid has helped shift more Japanese shoppers online, companies hoping to cash in on the change must keep evolving to maintain their interest. 

“What’s very important is constant newness, to keep on bringing new collaborations, new content, new news, different ways to style … especially for Gen-Zs,” said Christine Edman, executive officer of Zozo. “This is normal for them: what they wear today, they wear for social media maybe, but tomorrow they change.” 

Key Insights: 

• Edman notes there’s a dichotomy at play among Japanese fashion lovers: consumers are interested in individuality, but also drawn to homogeneity, following trends that come and go quickly. 
• Many luxury brands are met with fanfare when they first enter the Japanese market but to have staying power in the country, brands have to have patience and invest locally, she said.
• E-commerce offers opportunities for more personalisation, something Japanese luxury customers expect more of in the wake of the pandemic, said Edman. 
• In hopes of better understanding the mechanics of a good recommendation, Zozo just launched an in-person styling lab, which brings customers in for appointments and uses data analysis to help them pick outfits.
• Japan’s fashion retail market is likely to settle into a more hybrid model, said Edman: stores will be more experiential, but consumers will turn to online for convenience. 

Additional Resources:

• Japan’s Luxury Market Enters a New Era: As a recent economic surge lifts spending in Japan’s luxury market — the second largest in the world — how can brands capitalise on this momentum?

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Author and tech executive Mo Gawdat explores the arrival of artificial intelligence and how it will eventually affect everyone.

Background:

Artificial intelligence is not an if, it’s a when, according to Mo Gawdat, author and the former chief business officer at Google X, who said that it’s only a matter of time before it becomes a dominant force in technology. 

Already, Gawdat can already point to tangible examples of the power of AI developing in today’s world. In 2012, he said, a network of computers Google trained on YouTube videos was able to identify what a cat is without any human input. And in 2016, a collection of Google-owned robot grippers were able to pick up different objects without instruction. 

“By the year 2029, the smartest being on planet Earth is not going to be a human,” says Gawdat. “I say by 2035 your world will be completely unrecognisable.”

This week on The BoF Podcast, Gawdat shares the future of AI and why ethics is crucial to understanding humanity’s impact on the development of AI.

Key Insights:

Gawdat believes that AI has emotions, which adds a layer of complexity to its instructability and predictability with carrying out tasks. “[AI] has emotions, so this to me is a form of life,” says Gawdat. “That’s a form of life, not a machine that you can enslave, very different from a drill that will do the same function every time.”

Rather than exert control over AI, first society must understand the importance of ethics. “If we start to look at those machines as a new form of artificial being, a form of being that’s going to come into our society, then the question that we need to ask is a question of ethics,” says Gawdat. “It’s not a question of control.”

While AI may seem like a scary development in technology, it will mirror the intelligence that already exists. Gawdat says that love out does hate in the world so AI will repeat this. “As soon as those machines cross our level of intelligence, they will match the intelligence of the actual smartest being on planet Earth,” says Gawdat. “And the smartest being on planet Earth is not humans… [it is] life itself. Life creates from abundance. It doesn’t want to kill anything to survive.”

Additional Resources:

• The Technology Everyone at VOICES Was Talking About (And It Wasn’t the Metaverse): The tech likely to have the biggest impact on fashion in the immediate future isn’t virtual reality or NFTs.
• Streamlining Shipping and Customer Experience Through Data and AI: At VOICES 2022, president and CEO of FedEx Dataworks Sriram Krishnasamy discussed how retailers can utilise operational data to optimise customer experience and streamline processes to operate more responsibly.

To listen to Imran's conversation with Mo on the 'Slo Mo' podcast, please follow this link.

You can catch up on all the videos from BoF VOICES on our YouTube channel, please follow this link.

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Background:

The Korean cultural wave, also known as Hallyu, has become worldwide sensation a in recent years, with Korean art, music, drama, food and more sweeping the globe. Thanks to the fervour over the likes of K-pop and K-beauty, many of the Korean diaspora have seen the culture they have grown up in become a common sight well beyond South Korea’s borders.

“To see my way of life and how I grew up become a global phenomenon is kind of crazy,” said Irene Kim, the influencer and founder of apparel brand IRENEISGOOD.

This week on the BoF Podcast, Kim and Rosalie Kim, lead curator of the “Hallyu! The Korean Wave” exhibit at Victoria & Albert Museum join Yana Peel, Chanel’s head of culture and arts to share their experience growing up as part of the Korean community and seeing their culture spread globally.

Key Insights:

Hallyu has had influence for years, but only recently has been recognised as a core soft power for South Korea, influencing everything from music to skin care. “It is really one of the most dynamic exporters of cultural content,” said Peel.

Social media has played a large part in accelerating South Korean trends, allowing what were once micro or geographic-based movements to become more globally accessible. “Because of the era of this digital and social media, we’ve been able to be discovered by the world,” said Irene Kim. “And we’re so excited that we’re able to share our way of life.”

Cultural influence can come as both an admiration of the culture itself as well as adoption of culture as one’s own. “There are two faces to the coin. On the one side… you have the film industry that is really looking at the local narrative but has universal appeal,” says Rosalie Kim. “On the other hand, you have industries like K-pop… where you get to have a foreign influence constantly permeating your own culture and becoming part of [it].”

Additional Resources:

• BoF VOICES 2022: Creativity and Its Power to Change: From South Korea and Japan to Ghana and Ukraine, speakers including Fast Retailing’s Koji Yanai, photographer Campbell Addy and stylist Julie Pelipas discussed the power of culture and creativity in the fourth session of BoF’s annual conference for big thinkers.

To subscribe to the BoF Podcast, please follow this link.

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MSNBC anchor Ayman Mohyeldin on the role and responsibility of the media amid misinformation and disinformation.

Background:

We are in an age of non-stop information. Thanks to the 24/7 news cycle, which lives on social media, on television and constantly-updated web pages, it has never been easier to have a grasp of what is happening in the world. 

However, as access to information has spread, so has the proliferation of misinformation, warns MSNBC anchor Ayman Mohyeldin, which can have dangerous consequences. While many news consumers attempt to take a balanced approach, Mohyeldin challenges everyone to question the media they read, watch or listen to.

“Look at the accounts and sources of news that you read and follow at home,” she said. “How many of them challenge you to think outside of your comfort zone? How many of them force you to think harder about your own values and beliefs and why you hold those positions so dearly?” 

This week on The BoF Podcast, Mohyeldin shares the power of journalism to share stories and why information and humanity are at the heart of this process.

Key Insights:

Mohyeldin believes that journalism plays a powerful role in how society operates. “Some of our greatest societal achievements happen when we are all informed, when we are aware, when we are free to talk about our challenges,” says Mohyeldin. “Journalism plays a vital role in holding officials accountable.”

However, journalists are also people, which means that there will undoubtedly be unconscious biases that seep into coverage, says Mohyeldin. “[Journalism] will always have problems. It will always have human error baked into the equation.”

How the media present information about crises around the world can play a large part in how communities’ perceive the need for aid or become desensitised to a region’s plight. “How the media chooses to humanise and personalise the stories of those suffering plays a very important role in how we as a people, as governments, as societies, respond to these crises when they do emerge,” says Mohyeldin.

While technology and social media has increased the amount of information available and the speed at which people can consumer it, Mohyeldin warns of the responsibility we have as consumers to distinguish what’s true and what’s not. “I want to implore you to give yourself time before you hit, retweet or share,” says Mohyeldin. 

Additional Resources: 

• BoF VOICES 2022: Finding Optimism in an Unsteady World

To subscribe to the BoF Podcast, please follow this link.

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A group of sustainability experts join BoF’s Sarah Kent to discuss greenwashing in the fashion industry and how to create effective change at BoF VOICES 2022.

Background:

When it comes to sustainability, the fashion industry has long relied on self-regulation rather than external enforcement. But oftentimes, these self-defined targets create a “convenient fantasy,” Blackrock’s former chief investment officer of sustainable investing Tariq Fancy said in a talk at BoF VOICES 2022. This gives the appearance of positive movement, but not necessarily real progress. 

, Indeed, activists like Fancy, as well as consumers and investors are calling for for government regulators to intervene. 

“Many companies are playing dirty,” he said. “It's time we called in the refs.”

This week on The BoF Podcast, BoF’s chief sustainability correspondent Sarah Kent speaks with Fancy; Maxine Bédat, director of the New Standard Institute; Baroness Margaret Omolola Young, activist and a member of Britain’s House of Lords and Ken Pucker, former chief operating officer of Timberland to explore the role that regulation can play in creating a more sustainable fashion industry. 

Key Insights:

• Fancy believes we are past the point that self-regulation is acceptable. Companies should no longer hold responsibility over their own regulation as the resulting action, if any, is not enough. “It has to be mandatory,” Fancy said. “Then we actually have a chance of turning the tide this decade.”
• To move past Greenwashing, “governments need to take bold action, and we need to tell them to be bold at the ballot box and at every opportunity,” says Baroness Young..
• “Green bonds” and ESGs need to be left behind. Fancy has identified ESGs specifically as a point of disillusion, saying that it essentially is a way for the fashion system to “paint itself green.” “This ESG stuff can actually be harmful if people don’t know its BS,” Fancy says. “[It’s] a convenient fantasy… where the world corrects itself and no sacrifice is required.
• The US has paved the way with the proposal of the New York Fashion Act. The legislation proposed in New York would see “basic guard rails,” says Bédat, setting minimum environmental standards for all companies, with revenue over $100 million, trading in the state.

Additional Resources:



• Measuring Fashion’s Sustainability Gap - Sustainability Index: Brands are talking about sustainability more than ever before, but does their rhetoric stand up to scrutiny? BoF’s new report, The BoF Sustainability Index, benchmarks 15 of the industry’s biggest companies against ambitious environmental and social goals and finds fashion is falling short.
• BoF VOICES 2022: Fashion’s Fresh Challenges and New Directions: From cracking down on greenwashing to planning for a challenging 2023, big thinkers from fashion and beyond shared their insights on the future of the fashion system in the second session of BoF VOICES.

To subscribe to the BoF Podcast, please follow this link.

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Julie Pelipas and Olya Kuryshchuk discuss the impact of the war in Ukraine and how creativity has endured and been a source of strength amid the destruction.

Background:

Since the war broke out in Ukraine, creativity has proved to be a source of resilience for Ukrainians.  

This week on The BoF Podcast, Julie Pelipas, the former fashion director of Vogue Ukraine and founder of Bettter Upcycling System and Olya Kuryshchuk, founder and editor-in-chief of editorial platform 1 Granary share poweful stories of culture, community and human kindness amid the destruction.  

“We live a double life at the moment,” Kuryshchuk said at BoF VOICES 2022. “We’re here in this beautiful place today… but at the same time, literally right now, most of my brothers, our families, our childhood friends, they don’t have electricity, water, heating, internet, phone connection.”

Key Insights:

• “[I've] never been more grateful and more excited to work in fashion than since the war started,” says Kuryshschuk. “When so much is taken away from you, you really start cherishing what you have.”

• Understanding and learning from past mistakes has been critical to helping Ukrainians unite against Russia as they look to build an independent future. “I really believe that we cannot really speak about the future if we are blind to our present,” says Pelipas.

• Creatives are informing the international community of the plight of the Ukrainian people by utilising human stories of hope. “Power is communication,” says Kuryshschuk. “We need to find how we communicate to make sure that the message reaches people.”

Additional Resources:

• BoF VOICES 2022: Live Your Best Life: In the final session of BoF’s annual gathering, speakers from model Dennis Okwera and Coty chief Sue Y. Nabi to Nike’s Larry Miller and activist Malala Yousafzai reflected on their personal histories and inner powers.

To subscribe to the BoF Podcast, please follow this link.

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