The Modern Retail Podcast

Amazon’s Prime Big Deals Days has fundamentally altered the retail calendar, turning October into the official kickoff for holiday shopping. What started out as a summer event has expanded into a crucial Q4 marker. The deals are now driving consumers to research and buy earlier each year amid sustained inflation.

In just a few short years, the fall event has become a key acquisition channel and testing ground for sellers ahead of Black Friday. Consumers are increasingly researching deals days in advance, comparing prices and deals before making purchases.

On this week’s Modern Retail Podcast, executive editor Anna Hensel and senior reporter Gabriela Barkho are joined by Joe O’Connor, senior director of innovation and growth Tinuiti, to discuss the evolution of Amazon's Fall Prime Day.

This episode dives into:

Three years since the debut of TikTok Shop, brands are still weighing whether it’s worth investing in the social commerce channel.

In the past year, Whisker, the maker of Litter Robot, finally took the plunge, joining TikTok Shop primarily to secure an early adoption advantage on the platform and reach younger demographics like Gen Z and Gen Alpha.

Whisker CMO Hew Loyd joined this week’s Modern Retail Podcast to discuss the pros and cons of DTC brands betting on TikTok Shop.

Despite being a high-consideration item at $699, Litter Robot found early success on TikTok Shop due to its unique, visually-appealing features. The product’s automated self-cleaning process is what the company calls a "thumb stopper” for audiences, which gets curious users to pause and see how it works. This virality and subsequent TikTok Shop sales have created a halo effect for the brand, with Whisker anticipating that its TikTok Shop presence will drive sales across other channels, like its direct-to-consumer website and Amazon.

In this episode Loyd discusses:

Increasingly, people are asking ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini for product recommendations, and it's changing how brands position themselves online.
Brands are used to optimizing their products for physical shelves and digital storefronts. But now, they also increasingly have to think about the AI shelf, a concept recently outlined by tech writer Deana Burke in the newsletter Boys Club. Burke decided to test AI bots by creating a completely fictional natural deodorant brand to see if she could get it recommended on the AI shelf. And the experiment actually worked.
As product discovery evolves from the physical shelf to the digital shelf, and now to the AI shelf, there are a few question marks. How do these algorithms decide which products to surface? And if you're an emerging brand, how do you ensure your products take space on that AI shelf?
Joining the Modern Retail Podcast this week to unpack the AI shelf revolution is Jessica Wright, senior vp of product at Spins Foundry.
This week’s podcast episode digs into:

Footwear brand Rothy's, which crossed $211 million in sales last year, is an example of a company that has managed to successfully navigate the volatile direct-to-consumer shoe category, even as competitors like Allbirds have failed.

Brands that began as strictly DTC are increasingly looking at what they can do to survive and grow beyond just putting out digital ads. But doing so without burning money is a challenge and requires discipline. 

So how has Rothy’s not only survived but stayed profitable at a time when many of its DTC-era peers have gone under? By growing its operations intentionally, according to Rothy’s CEO & president Dayna Quanbeck, who joined the Modern Retail Podcast this week.

Quanbeck said the company’s current challenge is to “not be distracted” by all the growth and to practice patience to avoid expanding too soon. It’s a trap that other DTC footwear brands have fallen into over the past decade. As such, Rothy’s is testing physical retail concepts while balancing them with a sustainable footprint. 

This week’s podcast episode digs into:

These days, it is borderline expected that brands will use artificial intelligence in at least some capacity as part of their marketing. But they also have to tread carefully; otherwise, consumers may slam them with “AI slop” allegations.

As a result, more companies are creating playbooks for how they approach these tools in consumer-facing campaigns. Some, like Coca-Cola, have doubled down on using AI-generated ads despite initial backlash. On the other end of the spectrum, there’s REI, which pulled an AI-generated Facebook ad after consumer backlash, saying the use of AI does not align with the company’s sustainability mission. 

This episode takes a behind-the-scenes look at one brand’s approach to using generative AI in its marketing creatives. Boll & Branch, known for its premium bedding, bath and home essentials, largely sells through its DTC website and stores. The brand has been gradually using AI tools to create imagery and campaign copy for its marketing channels. This week, Kristen Deyko, chief creative officer of Boll & Branch and the person leading the brand’s use of AI tools for marketing, joins the Modern Retail Podcast to discuss the playbook.

This week’s podcast episode digs into:

Fragrance continues to dominate the beauty sector in 2026, but it's increasingly showing up as a differentiator in other sectors like personal care and household essentials.
This week on the Modern Retail Podcast, special projects editor Melissa Daniels speaks with Diana Melencio, general partner at XRC Brand Capital Fund, about the ways companies are using fragrance to set themselves apart.
“On the shelves of Target and Walmart in the traditional laundry and household cleaning aisles, you're going to start seeing more premium products that have that differentiated scent architecture," Melencio said.
Melencio, who is actively looking to invest in the space, has looked at the growth of fragrance and highlights how companies like genderless fragrance company DedCool and sanitizer brand Touchland are commanding elevated prices and prime retail spots in places like Sephora. At the same time, legacy companies like Unilever are ramping up their fragrance opportunities while trying to ensure that they're not alienating price-conscious consumers.
XRC's research shows that fragrance grew 15% in mass and 5% in prestige in 2025, which outpaces every other beauty segment. Melencio and Daniels discuss the ins and outs of why fragrance has become so popular and how brands across categories are looking to capitalize on the trend.
Their conversation gets into:

In an era where a brand's reputation is tethered to the relentless cycles of social media, silence is no longer a defensive strategy for brands and can even become a liability.

In this episode of the Modern Retail Podcast, senior reporter Gabi Barkho is joined by crisis PR consultant Sam Gauchier to break down why the old-school public relations tactic of trying to sweep a major scandal under the rug is increasingly failing major brands.

The latest example came this week, when Target quickly scrambled to do damage control after one of its children’s Halloween costumes was called out for its depiction of blackface. Neutrogena is also facing backlash in the wake of former ambassador Hayden Panettiere’s death, with many scrutinizing the brand’s 2015 decision to sever ties with Panettiere after she discussed her postpartum depression experience. The criticism continued even after Neutrogena issued an apology.
This week's podcast episode digs into:

This year, back-to-college spending is estimated to cross $100 billion for the first time, according to data from the National Retail Federation. About $14 billion of that, or about $194 per shopper, is in dorm and apartment furnishings.

It’s the second-highest category after electronics, and some data suggests it's growing: Research from CTV ad platform MNTN last year shows that advertisers in dorm-adjacent categories saw average revenue grow 73.65 year over year during the peak purchase window in July.

One of the companies at the center of these trends is Urban Outfitters, which has made a concerted effort to grow its furnishings business in recent years. The company's head of merchandising for non-apparel, Karen Booker, joined special projects editor Melissa Daniels on the Modern Retail Podcast this week to dive into how the company has evolved in this space.

For many founder-led brands, the transition from a scrappy, bootstrapped startup to a major retail player is the ultimate test of sustainable growth. For some, that means taking on more debt or venture capital; for others, it means bringing on private equity investors to shoulder the costs.

This week, senior reporter Gabi Barkho is joined by Andrea Faulkner Williams, co-founder and president of baby care brand Tubby Todd, to discuss her strategic decisions behind that evolution. After launching in 2014 and spending years building the brand through a DTC community-driven approach, Tubby Todd sold a majority stake to private equity firm NexPhase Capital in 2022. Since then, the co-founders have remained in leadership roles and continue to grow the brand in retail, with a Target launch earlier this year.

This episode of the Modern Retail Podcast pulls back the curtain on why Tubby Todd’s founders chose that specific path, how the infusion of capital has fundamentally altered their operational strategy and how the partnership helped scale from DTC to mass retail.

In this episode, Williams discusses:

Once Upon a Farm is on a growth trajectory that is powered in large part by a new look in the baby aisle.

The brand, founded in 2015, offers organic, cold-pressed baby food and children's snacks. It went public in February after spending the past several years building up a unique wholesale strategy that places branded coolers in baby food aisles. The company ended 2025 with more than 3,400 coolers in grocery stores across the U.S. and is looking to surpass more than 5,000 by the end of 2026.

Overall, the company saw net sales hit $85.4 million in the second quarter of 2026, an increase of 42.3% from the prior year, according to its second-quarter earnings released Friday.

But the cooler strategy is a major part of the growth story, per chief marketing officer Katie Marston. She joined special projects editor Melissa Daniels on the Modern Retail Podcast this week to discuss the strategy and how the brand convinced retailers like Target, Walmart and Kroger to place branded coolers in their baby aisles. The result is a way for Once Upon a Farm to shake up a category long dominated by shelf-stable products.

“If we are going to create systemic change in children's nutrition, if we are going to shape the future of food, you have to place big bets, and you have to stick with them," Marston said.