The clash of geopolitical, economic, and technological forces has grown from a murmur to an annoying clamor as tensions ratchet up. A paradigm shift from an era of globalization into splintered, regional fiefdoms, broadly characterized by the East, led by China and the West, and dominated by the U.S., is changing how we view markets and ourselves. While the macro impacts of this change are significant, the question for retailers and brands is how and where will the clash impact our industry. Motherland Meddling Let’s start with how …
Retail Tech Opens a New Chapter
As the vernal equinox flips the calendar to Spring, festivals and innovation summits have emerged from hibernation. At the South by Southwest festival in Austin Texas, retail was downgraded from previous headliner presentations to a minor topic, but it did reinforce the mega-themes of climate change and climate-related technologies. To its credit, BoF grabbed the retail-tech baton that SXSW fumbled. The BoF Professional Fashion Tech Summit, held at the New York Times Center in Manhattan, avoided any mention of sustainability, instead exploring …
After the Crash, NFTs Are Repurposed for Retail
NFTs have sprinted through the hype cycle, from frenzied enthusiasm to disillusionment in less than 24 months. Signals are hinting that they may have reached the ultimate stage of the cycle: productivity. The crypto winter chilled a large cohort of investors previously emboldened by a steady upward march in digital asset valuations. Bored Apes, secured by FTX-stored tokens sailed from their virtual yacht club to oblivion, as the celebrity-backed craze ran aground while the speculative NFT market plunged by 97 percent between January and …
Take Notice: Smart Systems Are Accelerating
Speculation surrounding the future of retail continues unabated. But a stroll through the Innovation Lab 2023 at the NRF Big Show revealed the bets that startups have placed on retail’s future priorities and pain points, offering tech-based systems and services to either exploit or solve them. The startups offer a glimpse into the innovation process. It operates on a continuum, where what starts as a murmur, evolves into a fad, and eventually becomes a business. Or the opposite where 90 percent of startups fail. This year’s crop demonstrated …
Uniqlo and Avery Dennison Innovate with RFID
The spatial footprint of companies touting computer vision and just-walk-out-the-door technology on the Expo floor at the NRF Big Show 2023 was large. AI is the talk of the show as retail’s latest technology trend. It dominates the conversation, even as it is not well understood, or worse, misunderstood. Just look at the obsession with ChatGPT and you get a taste of the industry’s love affair with the latest, buzzy fad. Talk is one thing, implementation totally something else. In a deeper examination, the hard reality of building these …
Missed Signals
Most of us went to sleep on November 8, 2022, expecting to wake up to a new political landscape. Some were dreading the morning and some couldn’t wait, but as the sun rose, I would argue that all of us were surprised. But really? Consider our behavioral changes in recent years; we have jettisoned our landlines, block calls from unknown sources and ignore unwanted texts. So many of our habits have changed in fundamental ways and it is increasingly obvious that the polling methodologies on which all political predictions are made are archaic. …
A Marketing Paradigm Shift
While the metaverse has been waving its avatar hands, garnering the attention of Chief Marketing Officers now lined up in starting blocks, the starter pistol in the metaverse marketing race won’t echo with any scale for years. Exploration and testing in the domain are prudent, but they should not distract attention from the paradigm shift that is already unfolding. Artificial Intelligence has entered a new phase that will change many things, but the focus of this screed is how it will affect the marketing of brands, and retailing. The New …
Is the Time Right for a North American Supply Chain?
Powerful forces are weighing on existing supply chains. We needn’t look far to notice the effects that shipping delays, rising costs, geopolitical headwinds, climate instability, and the need for secure access to goods have inflicted on our industry. Rather than moaning or gnashing our teeth, we should view these systemic disruptions as an opportunity to create change. While we excel at avoiding disruption and uncertainty, when backed against the wall, we innovate. Experts Converge In a session at the Milken Institute Global Summit 2022, …
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