WWD Voices

Erin Parsons chats with Noor Lobad, beauty news editor at WWD, about her journey as a makeup artist and cosmetics collector, and what's next. 

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Blake Lively, founder of Blake Brown, sits down with Jenny Fine, editor-in-chief of Beauty Inc and executive editor, beauty at WWD, to discuss her haircare brand.

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In the latest “Savage Fashion” podcast episode, WWD’s chief content officer Jim Fallon and style director Alex Badia sat down with Kris Van Assche, who was in Manhattan for the Basic.Space design fair.

"When I left Berluti, after like a 20 something years of a rollercoaster of nonstop working, I never really had the time to sit and think about what else I would possibly do," Van Assche said. "But then when all that stops, I got bored so fast... I didn't necessarily needed a new fashion adventure right away, but I did feel like what I missed immediately was the human interaction."

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With news headlines shouting doom and gloom in every direction, is the National Retail Federation’s record-breaking $1 trillion holiday forecast wishful thinking? Or something more nuanced?

“The consumer is sentimentally weak, but fundamentally sound,” explained Mark Mathews, chief economist and executive director of research for the NRF in a special podcast episode for Retail Rx with Ian Fredericks, chief executive officer of Hilco Global Capital Solutions and executive director of Hilco’s Consumer and Retail platform. That’s important because the consumer is powering our economy more than ever before. Today, 68 percent of GDP is driven by consumer spending—the largest percentage in the past 15 years.

“While lower-income households are definitely struggling, what we have seen over the course of the year is that all households have protected their spending on loved ones,” said Mathews. “Mother's Day, Father's Day, Valentine's Day, Back to School, Halloween… we've had at or near record levels of spend across all of those events.”

Essentially, it’s the nature of spending that has changed, and to safeguard that spending, many have pulled back in other areas like recreation or travel. Consumers have also shifted to more promotional spending that squeeze margins.

“The retailer is constrained because prices are rising, so while retailers will offer sales that are important to consumers, we may not see the breadth of sales that we’ve seen before,” Mathews said.  

The NRF has been analyzing data and advising retailers for over a century. The November/December season represents roughly 20 percent of the year’s retail sales for many retailers.

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At WWD’s recent Apparel & Retail CEO Summit, Jamie Elden, chief executive officer, Listrak, sat with Amanda Smith, chief executive officer, Fairchild Media Group, to dive into the current retail landscape—including pricing, supply chain resilience, and AI adoption—with a look ahead to what will define successful fashion retail leaders in 2026.

This Listrak-sponsored session, titled “Fashion Retail Past, Present & Future - Insights from 2025,” focused on analyzing the past year’s retail performance, highlighting key trends, surprises and benchmarking

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Where should retail go in the next 10 years? Wherever the customers go.

In a VIP breakfast discussion at WWD's recent Apparel & Retail CEO Summit, industry leaders from commercial real estate company CBRE and investment management firm Nuveen delved into the intersection of retail real estate investments, consumer trends and shifting demographic dynamics.

Laura Barr, Americas retail leader, CBRE, explored with Katie Grissom, global head of retail at Nuveen, how retail real estate is evolving to meet the demands of a fast-changing market, and the major headwinds impacting the industry.

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The holiday season is make or break time for retailers, as the last two months of the year can account for more than 20 percent of annual sales for many businesses. But this season is expected to be like none other, as 2025 marks the first year with agentic AI rewriting the retail playbook, from marketing to customer support.

In this podcast for Retail Rx, David Dorf, global head of retail solutions at Amazon Web Services (AWS) chats with Ian Fredericks, chief executive officer of Hilco Global Capital Solutions and executive director of Hilco Global’s retail and consumer platform. They explore the many ways agentic AI is being used to help retailers seize this next chapter, and whether retailers should have a chief AI officer.

 “When we talk about agentic AI, it's really based on the word agency, so we’re giving the [large learning model] autonomous ability to go out and act on our behalf,” said Dorf, explaining that there’s a “litmus test” he uses to see if it’s really an agent. One, can it reason? Two, does it have access to tools – like a weather site – that can help it make a decision? And three, is it autonomous?

Answer engines with AI summaries are another growth area. “Around 75 percent of people have said that they have used an answer engine to start their shopping journey before,” said Dorf. “We’re going to see more of that. Walmart said has about 20 percent of their referral traffic is coming from these answer engines; people asking it a generic question and ending up at the Walmart site. So this pretty impactful.”

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SJ Denim turned 10 this year, and after a decade reporting on the business of denim, one thing is clear: trends might be constantly looking to the past, but innovations and sustainability attitudes are all about the future.

In this episode, Sourcing Journal executive editor and denim expert Angela Velasquez chats with Lauren Parker, director of Fairchild Studio, about the latest issue of SJ Denim and the industry at large. With the Kingpins denim show in Amsterdam fresh in her mind, Velasquez also offered forward-looking trend and business insights on the future of denim.

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Author and CEO coach Kevin Lawrence works with executives around the world on achieving corporate success while also maintaining personal growth. In his earlier book, “Your Oxygen Mask First: 17 Habits to

His newest book, “The Four Forces of Growth” turns to corporate wellbeing and outlines four areas CEOs must prioritize to maintain the business’ upward trajectory.

In this Retail Rx podcast for WWD Voices, Lawrence chats with Patrick J. Murphy, executive director, geopolitical advisors at Hilco Global, about why if companies aren’t oriented for growth, they’re inevitably headed in another direction.

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Anthropologie launched its bridal line on Valentine’s Day in 2011 and has been tying the knot ever since. On its website last year, Anthropologie’s weddings category saw over 75 million product views (a double-digit increase over the previous year), and on-site wedding search traffic also increased by double digits. As the definition of what constitutes “bridal fashion” exponentially expands, so has Anthropologie’s offerings.  

“The Gen Z bride in particular is making sure she's documenting every single phase, from the engagement photo all the way through planning the wedding and attending her appointments, and she wants a different

Today, Anthropologie Weddings offers an omnichannel experience with personalized styling services both in-store and online, fashion for all wedding guests plus accessories, décor and gifts.

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