Let’s give a standing ovation for… Ovation! 😉 All puns aside, Zack Oates and his start-up company have made great strides in the realm of restaurants and the guest experience through their development of a simple and frictionless 2 question survey. Ovation allows restaurants to easily resolve guest concerns in real-time, get more 5-star reviews, and discover insights to improve & drive revenue, making it the #1 guest feedback company in the United States. Zack’s passion for restaurants and love for meeting people have helped craft his success story. Zack being a podcast host himself lends itself to an entertaining and banter-filled episode alongside Lee. Together, they cover the origin story of Ovation, consumer research on guest feedback, a book Zack wrote on dating, and much more. You can explore more on Ovation by visiting: https://ovationup.com/

1:24 – Meet Zack
3:42 – The 2 Question Survey
6:38 – Simple & Frictionless
10:54 – A Humble Brag
13:57 – The Importance of Feeling Important
17:38 – Dating Never Works Until It Does
20:11 – Restaurants & Delivery
24:50 – Restored Faith in Humanity
27:40 – Lee’s Lightning Round

DIY assembly furniture, Swedish meatballs, enviable showrooms, & ball pits in Småland… sound familiar? Yes, we are talking about the iconic Home Furnishing store, IKEA. And to make you adore them even more we spoke with Seana Strawn, Head of Home Furnishing Identity & Retail Design, on IKEA‘s quest towards a sustainable planet. Seana comes with 23 years of experience in the home furnishing industry, and she shares her passion for how the brand is embracing climate change as an opportunity and big responsibility. One of the ways IKEA is taking action is through their Circularity Hubs designed for refurbished items only. Listen to the episode to learn more about IKEA’s sustainability efforts, customer-centric practices, and their 5 principles of home furnishing identity.

1:20 – Meet Seana
2:47 – A Back Story on IKEA
5:04 – Test & Learn Approach
7:50 – It’s About the People
10:19 – IKEA’s Target Customer
11:14 – Let’s Talk Sustainability
16:19 – A New Circularity Hub
22:57 – What’s Next?
24:41 – Big vs. Small IKEA Stores
27:08 – Home Furnishing Identity
28:20 – The Personal Side of Seana

Specialty Retail is at a crossroads and a new brand is paving the way for innovation. Jamie Schisler, Chief Comfort Officer of comfort clothing brand – UpWest, is welcomed on to WDCast to discuss the brand’s business model, growth plan, and a new approach to resale retail. The brand’s business model was set up for success from the beginning, with what Jamie refers to as having “all legs of the table.” Unknowingly, this prepared the brand for the soon approaching pandemic and the DTC online store began opening physical stores as COVID restrictions loosened, meeting the consumers where they were according to online sales. Alternatively, the brand’s promise of comfort anticipated consumers’ needs in a time it was craved the most. Learn more about how UpWest is manifesting comfort for consumers and its other creative ventures.

1:34 – Meet the Specialty Retail Veteran
3:44 – Starting a New Brand
6:49 – From FOMO to JOMO
9:32 – A Brand Focused on Wellness
11:00 – From Online to In-store
13:36 – The Growth Plan
16:59 – SoHo + Scrap NYC
19:11 – Solving the Circularity Problem
23:15 – What About Malls?
28:03 – Lee’s Lightning Round

Do you ever really think about where the products you consume come from? For example, what does it actually take to source, make, and package the tub of butter you pulled from your fridge this morning? Have you thought about the farm, the farmers, the soil, or the agricultural practices that went into that single tub of butter? Probably not. Enter WDCast guest, Julie DiNatale. Julie is the Commercial and Strategic Partnerships Leader for Truterra, the sustainability business of Land O’Lakes, Inc., one of America’s largest farmer-owned cooperatives. Truterra collaborates with forward-thinking farmers, value chain companies, conservation organizations, and ag retailers to help better deliver the future of on-farm sustainability. In this episode, Julie and Lee Peterson, EVP Thought Leadership at WD Partners, dive into obstacles farmers are facing, what Truterra is doing to support on-farm sustainability, and what it’s like to work with the USDA.

2:33 – Land O’ Lakes is More Than Just Butter
3:53 – 3 Obstacles for Farmers
6:50 – Process, People, Education
10:42 – What Are Cover Crops?
13:00 – Revolutionizing Practices
16:20 – Being Part of a Cooperative
19:59 – The Sustainability Movement
23:26 – Producing Crops Becomes Natural
25:22 – Working With the USDA
31:11– Julie’s Hobbies

Gen Z'ers have picked up on a shopping "trend" that is paving a new way of shopping for generations to come: shopping used/vintage/resale goods. Why shop resale? We looked to an expert for some answers. Anna is a Gen Z'er in New York City that has shopped used products for most her life – including furniture, clothing, household items, etc. Anna shares her story on how she entered the world of resale and why introducing used sections in stores may be beneficial for retailers in industries across the board. There is plenty of opportunity for retailers both online and in-store to expand their markets by tuning into the latest trends.

2:03 – Meet the Gen Z Shopper
3:22 – Resale Store vs. Buying New
5:26 – Trending Now: Vintage
7:57 – Why Shop Used?
10:35 – Tiktok's Influence
11:50 – C2C Resale
15:17 – In-Store or Online?
18:06 – It's Just the Beginning

Brian has a unique career background, building his foundation in the retail sector before diving deep into the world of healthcare at Banner Health. His foundation offers a fresh perspective on the retail consumer side of the industry. Brian and Dan enthusiastically discuss new and unexpected retailers that are entering the healthcare market and how this can change the game for the patient experience including what services can be offered, how the services are consumed, how they can integrate with their current products/services, and how retailers can benefit by expanding into new markets. Brian is confident that this is the most exciting time to be in the healthcare retail space as the near future promises great innovation.

0:57 – Brian's Role at Banner Health
1:45 – An Untraditional Path to Healthcare
3:36 – Retail as an Advantage
5:46 – The Triple AIM
7:47 – Transitioning Away From "Patient"
10:11 – Big News for Amazon!
12:43 – Are Big Retailers a Threat?
14:47 – A New Type of Urgent Care
18:23 – Dollar General as a Healthcare Provider
24:40 – "Rightsizing" Business
27:16 – Looking Into the Crystal Ball

With sustainability so top of mind these days, we wanted to turn to some real experts on the topic. We’re not talking about ‘plastic pants made from water bottles’ kind of sustainability, but real meaningful change that corporations (and their design/AEC firm partners😉) are making to drive down energy use, drive up customer and associate satisfaction, and ultimately make our world a better place to live in. Join Lee Peterson as he chats with three of WD’s very own, boots on the ground, innovators that scale, sustainability evangelists – Brian Bucher (Sr. Director), Kari Engen (Sr. Manager, Mechanical Engineering), Mike Magee (Sr. Director, Architecture & Engineering). The team shares why sustainability is so important in what they do and some of their favorite projects and brands that are making a real difference on the topic.

2:33 – Kari’s Passion for Sustainability
4:22 – Mike’s Passion for Sustainability
5:54 – Brian’s Passion for Sustainability
7:05 – Defining Sustainable Design (Brian)
10:43 – Squeezing Juice Out of the Energy Efficient Orange (Kari)
13:51 – Save Money, Live Better (Mike)
16:37 – Who is Nailing Sustainability (all)
22:03 – Fun Facts About Our Panel (all)

The Fur-ocious Future of the Shopper
QR codes and NFC tags, DTC products in CPG, VR and AR…there are plentiful acronyms to navigate when it comes to talk of modern technology in the consumer experience. Lucky for us Shopper Innovation and Experience expert, Kenny Endermuhle, helps us break these terms down and gets us excited about what the future of the pet shopper’s experience holds. Lee and Kenny’s enthusiasm around the amount of innovation that is happening now between the consumer and retailers is contagious. By leveraging VR, retailers can develop a unique and stimulating in-store experience for any shopper through personalization, immersion, and streamlining the customer journey. Nestlé Purina is one of many companies that are exemplifying this right on their store shelves!

2:05 – From Sports to CPG
5:27 – A Day in the Life of Kenny
7:59 – Testing & Learning With VR
10:09 – A Note to the VR Doubters
12:02 – Building a Virtual Environment
14:09 – QR Codes vs. NFC Tags
17:13 – Direct to Consumer Goods
22:57 – Relationship With Physical Stores
27:33 – The Consumer Drives Innovation
28:33 – What Brand Is Doing It Right?
32:00 – Immersive Experience at the Shelf
33:33 – Lee’s Lightning Round

This week’s podcast sounds a little different (literally!) as we invited on voiceover talent, Jodi Krangle, to discuss her journey into finding her voice and using it to help build an identity for the brands she works with. For some brands, their vocal identity is equally important to their visual identity (think commercials). Jodi’s role is more about acting than it is about the sound of her voice itself because her voice is dependent on the messaging that the client needs communicated to its audience. Listen in to hear how she stepped foot into such an interesting career along with some fun stories from her time in the studio. Interested in hearing samples of her work? Visit www.voiceoversandvocals.com

1:40 – Meet the Voice Behind the Talent
7:09 – A Background in Music
8:40 – Sound as Branding
10:14 – To Pitch or Not to Pitch
13:53 – Stories on the Job
21:10 – Big Stars & Influencers
27:10 – Did I Hear You On…?
28:47 – Jodi’s Album
31:07 – 5 Year Plan
34:03 – Lee’s Lightning Round
35:57 – How to Connect With Jodi

Clayton Mitchell (Mitch) has a passion for leadership, much attributed to his years spent in the US Navy as he was able to look up to the great leaders surrounding him. He learned that it takes 3 major elements to being a leader: vision, communication, and character. These skills come to play in navigating conflict—a type of conversation that is often failed to be mentioned when it comes to discussing the healthcare industry. Health + Wellness expert at WD, Dan Stanek, points out that discussions surrounding healthcare tend to be collegial. In this episode, Dan & Mitch open up the conversation to critical, and often overlooked topics in the industry including its changing footprint, rethinking its structure, and how other industries can help inform it.

0:59 – A Background that Starts in Aerospace
3:22 – What is Health Assurance?
5:45 – Where Healthcare is Most Broken
8:47 – Changing Footprints
12:02 – Jefferson Health’s Mission
15:55 – The 3 Elements to Leadership
20:40 – Changing the Pace of the Industry
22:50 – Looking into the Crystal Ball