Let’s take a pause. Have you been keeping track of the tech news? We’re entering a new phase of our obsession with technology and its influence. This is not an essay on turning a blind eye to the power of technology nor a rejection of its synergistic role in improving the human condition. But rather, this is a voice for the skeptics that are monitoring our steps and missteps. What does it have to do with retail? It has everything to do with how everyone is navigating a brave new world that has no unified playbook – and that includes leadership, …
Opinion
What Do Zuckerberg, Musk and SBF (Who?) Have in Common?
Zuck, Musk and SBF: What do these entrepreneurs have in common? A large dose of hubris, ultimately soaring to failure. And they are not alone. However, they are arguably the best well-known, anti-hero poster children of the moment, largely due to their dizzying ability to shed billions of dollars in value and thousands of shareholders and employees literally overnight. By the way SBF is the moniker for Sam Bankma-Fried, headline making founder of FTX, a crypto exchange he started in 2019 that soared to a value of $32 billion by January of 2022, …
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Retail Could Have Been a Game Changer at CGI
Some use the moniker ‘Davos-on-Hudson’ to describe the Clinton Global Initiative – better known colloquially as ‘CGI’ by global movers and shakers. But no matter what name it goes by, historically, the annual gathering during UN Week in September has arguably been one of the hottest invites to come by on planet earth. Where else besides Davos can you rub elbows with U2’s Bono, heads of state, and the CEO of Unilever – all within the confines of a few thousand square feet in Midtown Manhattan? CGI Field Report This year I was fortunate to …
Dress Codes Are Back, But Consumer Response Is Mixed
Retail operates like a pendulum. For years, the fashion pendulum has been swinging towards the hyper-casual. I wrote about the alleged “death of athleisure” as a false alarm nearly a decade ago. Not to be that smartest guy in the room, but my prediction was accurate that athleisure is here to stay. Today, so-casual-its-hilarious companies like Crocs are collaborating with the likes of luxury brands Stella McCartney and Balenciaga. The pandemic exacerbated this trend, with manufacturers unleashing a surge of jewelry and dresses built for the …
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Learning from Collusion: The Gen Z Darling Brand
Want to see a brand that embodies every single facet of the next-gen purchasing ethos? Look no further than Collusion, the most successful brand in ASOS’ catalog. Collusion came onto the market with a bang in 2018, launching with six diverse, body and gender-positive collaborators. A new batch of creatives come on board each season to help design the clothing and promote Collusion as a whole. The brand is currently sold exclusively on ASOS, joining ASOS’ own private label line, ASOS Design, and over 850 other brands on the fashion …
A Closer Look at Retail & Labor in Inflationary Times
As the former owner and CEO of Murray’s Cheese and a veteran supermarket executive, I feel compelled to weigh in on the current economy with some insights from the past. Having experienced the best and worst of times, I am only mildly optimistic about the future. That said, the headlines grow increasingly dim: inflation, recession, global stagflation, even “greedflation.” On the one hand, job openings are near record highs at 11.4 million in April alone. On the other hand, 6.5 million jobs were added in the last year. Record numbers of …
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Walmart and Target: Canaries in the Coal Mine?
If Walmart and Target are canaries in the retail coal mine, maybe there’s a third canary in the economic coal mine named Elon Musk who recently said we are already in a recession. Think what you will about Mr. Musk and his eccentric and stratospheric imagination … maybe he’s right. My friend Richard Baum, Managing Partner of Consumer Growth Partners, reminded me that “It's pretty common knowledge that by the time the government officially declares that we are in a recession, the country is usually on its way out of it. Not real genius on Elon …
Sephora and Kohl’s: Mismatched?
The groundbreaking Sephora and JC Penney collaboration has ended. And then just as quickly, Kohl’s tripled down on their in-store Sephoras, with plans to expand from 200 to 600 stores by the end of 2022 with an additional 250 stores in 2023. This will bring the total number of Kohl’s locations with in-store Sephoras up to a whopping 850 by the end of next year, eclipsing the number of Sephoras that were ever inside JC Penney, which peaked at around 650 stores in its heyday. An while we’re on that subject, Sephora stores in JCP looked like they …