00:00:11 Anne
The Omni Talk Fast five is brought to you by the A&M Consumer and Retail Group. The A&M Consumer and Retail Group is a management consulting firm that tackles the most complex challenges and advances its clients, people and communities for their maximum potential. CRG brings the experience, tools and operator like pragmatism to help retailers and consumer products companies be on the right side of disruption and miracle the catalyst of commerce. Over. 450 retailers are now opening new revenue streams with marketplaces, Drop Ship and Retail Media and succeeding with Miracle, you can unlock more products, more partners and more profits without the heavy lifting. What’s holding you back? Visit miracle.com to learn more. That’s MIRAK, l.com and Symbi. Symbi powers the most retail banners in the world with today’s only multimodal platform for in store intelligence. See how Albertsons, BJ Spartan, Nash and Wakefern win with aiandautomation@symbirobotics.com and Imfios Imfios. They unite warehousing, transportation, and order management into a seamless, adaptable network. Infios helps you stay ahead from promise to delivery and every step in between. To learn more, visit infios.com and Clear Demand. Pricing shouldn’t be guesswork. Clear demands. AI power, pricing data, and optimization solutions help retailers stay competitive while protecting margins. Smarter pricing, stronger profits. Clear Demand makes it happen. Learnmore@cleardemand.com/omni dot finally Ocampo Capital Ocampo Capital is a venture capital firm founded by Retail. Executives with the. Aim of helping early stage consumer businesses succeed through investment and operational support. Learn more at Ocampo Capital.com.
00:01:58 Anne
Hello, you are listening to Omni Talk’s Retail Fast 5 brings the top 10% of all podcasts globally and currently the only retail podcast ranked in the top 100 of all business podcasts on Apple Podcasts. The Retail Fast 5 is the podcast that we hope makes you feel a little smarter, but most importantly a little happier each week too. And the Fast 5 is just one of the many great podcasts you can find from our Omni Talk Retail podcast network, alongside our Retail Daily Minute, which brings you a curated selection of the most important retail headlines every morning, and our Retail Technology Spotlight series, which goes deep each week on the latest retail technology trends. It’s May 14th, 2029. It’s gonna be.
00:02:36 Chris
May.
00:02:37 Anne
It’s Are we gonna sing that for every May headline? It’s gonna be May May.
00:02:42 Chris
I think we have to. It’s such a great, it’s such a great meme. It’s such a great everything now at this point and.
00:02:48 Anne
I’m one of your hosts, Anne Mezenga.
00:02:50 Chris
And I’m Chris Walton.
00:02:51 Anne
And we’re here once again to discuss all the top headlines from the past week of May making waves in the world of Omni channel retailing and coming to you live this week from the World Retail Congress in sunny, beautiful, warm London. Chris, what’s been the best part of London for you so far? And more importantly, did you get your pint of John Smith Smith or John?
00:03:15 Chris
Smith. Yes, Smith.
00:03:16 Anne
Yes, plural.
00:03:17 Chris
Smith Yes. Well, Smith No, John, that’s how you would say John Smith’s. But yes, it’s a yeah, John Smith’s beer. I did. And and I got to tell you, shout out to my my pundit brother from another mother across the Atlantic, Ben Miller, for hooking me up yesterday. Took me to took me to a divey bar in off the Houston station in London and got me a pint of John Smiths and I I have not had that much fun in a long time. I had such a blast last night sitting outside with Tim. The weather was beautiful, like you said, drinking a few pints and it was just like it was so incredible. So thanks to Ben for hooking that up for for me and him. And then we met up with you for dinner and.
00:04:01 Anne
This is a.
00:04:02 Chris
Great night. I, I, I enjoyed it. I, you know, I love London. London is my absolute, one of my happy places in the world. So yeah, couldn’t be, couldn’t be happier. And what is off to a great start?
00:04:12 Anne
It’s so beautiful here, like I was playing. I packed all my rain gear, Chris, I got waterproof shoes. And I just, I mean, I think I’m going to do that every time from now on so that it’s beautiful when I land in London. Yeah, right, Right. Why not?
00:04:26 Chris
Yeah, and the, and the, the conference is really nice too. We’re at the Hilton Park Lane, which is, is nice too, and right across from Hyde Park. So yeah, it’s a, it’s a, it’s a, it’s a unique time in London, a very special time to be here given just the amount of sunlight shining through my window right now.
00:04:42 Anne
Yes. And we’ve had our, we’ve only done one day of coverage so far upon recording of this podcast and we’ve had some tremendous interviews already, the CEO of JD Sports.
00:04:53 Chris
And my personal favourite interview too, Anne, was Scott Price, who came back for a second year in a row. Thank you. CEO of the DFI retail group. Yeah, who he dropped some. He dropped some really interesting tidbits. I encourage everyone to listen to that interview. I just, we just posted it live last night on YouTube and it’ll come out on the podcast channel earlier. It probably came out earlier this morning for those listening on the podcast. And he had some really interesting things, things to say about AI and the evolution of profit in the grocery space particularly. So yeah, it’s been a great day and we’ve got a great lineup coming your way again.
00:05:25 Anne
That’s right. OK. Well, Chris, let’s get to the headlines from this week.
00:05:30 Chris
All right, and this meets Fast 5. We’ve got news on Amazon’s debut of its robot Vulcan. Live long and prosper and.
00:05:38 Anne
I needed you to explain that to me, but like for the audience to have some contacts. Chris just he’s holding up the this like he’s splitting his fingers. I don’t even know.
00:05:47 Chris
Do you really not know what the Vulcan symbol?
00:05:49 Anne
No, I don’t know. The Vulcan I know. Oh my God, Dan Phan is like rolling over right now. He’s dying. That I don’t know that.
00:05:56 Chris
But so you just lost half the audience and probably half the audience is like empathising with you. 2 that they don’t know. But it’s yeah, it’s a Star Trek reference, which, OK. Not surprisingly, that’s what Amazon named their latest tech app from sci-fi Dorky thing which I’ll I’ll have a rant about later on. But anyway, we’ve got that. We’ve got Primarch’s in store repair classes ASOS offering next day delivery through in post lockers LTK bringing the bachelor to life on its social commerce shopping platform and AWS is Justin Swaggler AKAS he likes to call himself Jay Swag stops by to talk about all the technologies pouring what he calls a quote store renaissance. Yes, but we begin today with big news out of Instacart and.
00:06:37 Anne
Yeah, shocking news for a lot of us. I think headline number one, Instacart CEO is stepping down. According to Retail Dive, Instacart announced Wednesday that CEO and Chair Fiji Simo will be departing in the coming months from the company to become the CEO of Open AI Applications. Simo will continue her duties at Instacart’s helm and work closely to appoint her successor, who the company board expects will be an existing member of Instacart’s management team for the announcement. Simo joined Instacart as CEO in 2021 and LED the company through multiple acquisitions and an expansion into new new in store technology like smart cards and digital shelf tags. Chris, what struck you most when you heard the news about Fiji’s departure here?
00:07:25 Chris
Yeah, about the Instacart CEO’s departure. Wow. A number of things, Anne, I would say, you know, in no particular order to just, like off the top of my head first, you know, I didn’t know she’d been there for years. I looked, you know, I was surprised by that. It didn’t feel like she had been there that long. I don’t know if you felt the same way. Yeah. And that kind of brings me to my second point, which is, you know, the secondarily like I, I still question if Instacart’s in a better place than when she took over. I know that that’s how they’re spinning it in the media. Yeah, it’s just kind of the gut feeling that I have because, you know, I don’t know, I’ve never been bought in on the operating system for stores, maybe for the regional grocers, I guess. But there’s a lot of competition in that space too. And comparatively, I still think DoorDash is value proposition is, is much stronger in the landscape as we’ve talked about in the show a lot. So so I just I just kind of question that, but I think the biggest takeaway for me coming out of the move, and this to me is the most interesting point is she essentially saying e-commerce is so yesterday and and she’s saying I’m jumping feet first into everything AI. And that’s a point that’s really telling and that I think all of us need to come to terms with that. You have someone who is smart enough to be at meta, you know, on the upswing, then went to Instacart kind of, you know, quote unquote transform them all. The transformation is, you know, debatable and is now jumping into the AI pool. So I I think you just have to just take that into account.
00:08:51 Anne
Yeah, I mean, I I was not surprised at all given her background. No, I mean, I think this makes total sense. Like the longevity if if I if I were her and looking at where the longevity is in in a career, I mean, open AI is, is the spot. Like there’s, there’s no turning down that job. And I do think though that I, I disagree a little bit on where Instacart is. I really do think that she helped Instacart get into a trusted position. And there’s probably still much more under the covers because so many of the people that we really respect as innovators in the industry are partnering up with Instacart to do this store operations and to do some of the other things that they’re taking into place. And also, I think, you know, we interviewed David McIntosh, the chief connected stores officer back at grocery shop and he was really impressive too. And and so as I’m thinking about the future of where Instacart’s going, he would be top of my list for next CEO I think because I think that’s where the most growth potential, especially when you start to think about retail media and connected stores and how Insta carts really going to have to position themselves for future success. But I’m curious who, if you have anybody, you would like rise to the top of that organisation?
00:10:08 Chris
I, I don’t, I don’t. And the other part about the, the announcement to me is, you know, she’s, she’s, she’s kind of a software leader in background versus an operations leader too. And I wonder, you know, what they’re gonna look for in their net in the, in the whoever takes the helm of the job, because there is a lot of operations that go into running your part and particularly as you try to become the store operating platform in the future. So now I’d be speaking out of turn if I tried to even even submit a name for who who could best lead that job?
00:10:35 Anne
Just go, David McIntosh, I think you’re a great guy. I was impressed by you and I hope that you get the next role should you want to accept that job.
00:10:43 Chris
Yeah, yeah, it sounds like, I think they got somebody lined up internally on me. Excited to see what it is. All right, headline #2 Amazon unveiled its first warehouse robot with the sense of touch, AKA Vulcan, according to Geek Wire. Because who else could or should bring you a story like this? The robot uses force sensors, Force sensors and AI to handle an organised inventory with human like precision or Jedi like precision. If you like the use of the word force sensor, Vulcan is already running in on fulfilment centres in Spokane, WA and Hamburg, Germany, with future deployments planned across Europe and the US. The robot mimics human touch to handle items in warehouse bins using a specialised tool with force feedback sensors to sense contact and pressure. Amazon describes the mechanism on the end of the arm as quote a ruler stuck onto a hair straightener. End Quote, and it’s worth checking out in the video folks. From the source article in Geek Wire. One part pushes items around to make space while paddle like arms gently grip and insert new items using tiny conveyor belts. Another of the robot’s arms also uses a camera and a suction cup to identify, target and extract items without grabbing anything extra. And this You get the lucky roll of the dice today my friend, because this is the A&M put you on the spot question. Take me to your leader is what’s coming through my mind. And there’s been a lot of noise about Vulcan on social media. Do you think that all the hullabaloo is warranted #1 and #2 where does the application of this technology begin and end in your mind? Oh.
00:12:23 Anne
My gosh, there are so many nerd references in this that I don’t even know where.
00:12:28 Chris
I went all in on nerd today.
00:12:30 Anne
Well first of all I have to say I love the description that it’s a hair straightener holding a ruler. Not what I thought of. And I’m also surprised that the nerds know what a hair straightener is. That seems very off brand. Do you know what a hair straightener?
00:12:44 Chris
Is, let me ask you this, who came up with that description? Was it a dude or a woman? Like, it was probably a dude. It was 100% a dude, right? Like a hair straightener with a ruler? I think so, yeah.
00:12:54 Anne
I would think the opposite. Do you know what a hair straightener looks like? Like do you think the average man knows what a hair straightener looks like?
00:13:00 Chris
Yeah, Yeah. Is it actually a hair straightener? Yeah, I guess it is a hair straightener too versus a curler, right. Yes, this.
00:13:07 Anne
Is what I’m talking about this is I don’t know that’s why I’m like maybe maybe it’s somebody else anyway, that’s that’s beside the point but I just love that description because I thought that’s not does not sound like it’s coming from Amazon. It’s very like something for the common person to understand, but.
00:13:24 Chris
They very PR, very PR teased.
00:13:27 Anne
So to speak, yes. But what I do, I do think is interesting and why I do think that the hullabaloo is warranted is, is really kind of coming into the fore a little bit more even since we got here to World Retail Congress. And I think that that’s because we’re hearing a lot of talk about investing in automation because it’s one of the things that can help operations run more efficiently. And that’s something that retailers have control over in a very uncertain time when it comes to supply chain, economic activity and disruption and all these things. So I do like that Amazon is pushing further to figure out how we can optimise all of our, our, our warehouse operations so that we can utilise our human workforce in a way that makes the most sense and that will be most advantageous to our business going forward. So that’s, I, I do think that this is really cool in that regard. And if they can continue to, you know, make sure, I mean, it’s, it’s really fascinating. I encourage people to watch the video because it’s showing it knows how hard to squeeze a products. You’re reducing damages, you have control over that and those are things that you really have to train people on to do to make sure how to do this the correct way. So if you can standardise this, I think that with with automation, I think that’s the the way to go here. But but are you all in on Vulcan? I can’t even make the sign, Chris.
00:14:53 Chris
Yeah, not everyone can do that. Yes, not everyone can do the V Yeah, I mean, the other point too, I just make is like, you know, it’s it’s it’s something that humans just traditionally do better than a robot, you know, regardless of treating like it’s just we have the dexterity and the the ability to do this in a way robots can. So it’s been something that people have been trying to crack the code on for a while. But you know, I, I do want to go on a little bit of a rant here on like, why are these names so dorky? Like, why can’t we ever name things that why do they always always have to name things after sci-fi things? Like why can’t we name things after characters from like Charlotte’s Web or Anne of Green Gables? And like, why does it have to always be like Vulcan or, you know, Jedi or so you know, I I just anyway, but but net are.
00:15:31 Anne
You surprised? I mean, I’m not surprised. How many Big Bang theories have you watched? I know.
00:15:36 Chris
I just get so tired of it too same with all the tech company names like Pentrobe and Inatrobe and all that kind of stuff. You know it’s the same it’s the same realm, but but net net, I think it’s big news because like you know like we just talked about it expand it expands the range of items that can be picked mechanically yes, but it does it in a warehouse. That’s the point I would make on on the second part of NM’s question, which is where does this begin? And then because for the record, after last weeks headlines, we got a lot of commentary on social media from what I would call some trolls so to speak about in store robots taking workers jobs for restocking. And that is not going to happen anytime soon. Like for that to happen, a lot of things need to come together. And this whole concept is just just taking shape in what is 2 warehouses that Amazon runs throughout the world. Yeah. So I mean for that for us to get to that eventuality of this hitting in store reshocking and shelves process shelving processes, you know, I’m thinking we’re at least 20 years out on that at best. Maybe somebody knows better than I do money. Yeah. I think we’re, I think before we see that at scale across the industry at least I.
00:16:43 Anne
Think oh at scale across the industry.
00:16:44 Chris
Yeah, I mean, like it’s going to be a long time, at least 10, you know, you got to go 10 to 20 years on that. I mean, so you know, so you know, but it works. You you have to get scale in the warehouse first because that’s where the operation is more repetitive and repeatable. It’s done the same way every time. Stocking a shelf is anything but. That’s why I’m taking the long, the Longview of this, you know, in terms of the full impact of the industry. But I think in warehousing it’s it’s probably due to come here, you know, fairly soon. You know, should Amazon and others like we’ve seen try to do this in the past get get traction with it?
00:17:15 Anne
Well, I’ll take the under, Chris. I’ll take take the under. Yeah, and we’ll see.
00:17:19 Chris
Oh, you’re betting today, huh? I’m betting on today. You’re betting on Vulcan, but you’re you’re, you’re ready to bet on.
00:17:24 Anne
There’s no I I just I follow my intuition and today I’m taking the under Chris. So I, you can’t just bet when you get are put on on the spot. You have to, you have to let the bet find you. And this one, I’m taking the under. All right, let’s go to headline #3. Primark has unveiled its first US in store repair classes, according to chain storage. On Thursday, the global value fashion retailer launched its Love It for Longer repair workshop at its Staten Island store. Customers that sign up for the free class will learn simple mending and upcycling techniques that range from fixing hems to adding buttons or pockets. All participants will receive a complimentary sewing kit, repair booklet, and reusable tote bag. Primark officially introduced Lovett Longer Classes in 2022. Currently, the company hosts nearly 400 free sessions in its stores across the UK, Ireland, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Spain and France. Chris, do you think that Primark’s in store repair classes push all the right buttons or do you think this is just a silly marketing gimmick?
00:18:29 Chris
Oh, wow. You know, I until you read this story out loud, I didn’t even pick up the double entendre of love it for longer. Yeah, I just think that’s hilarious. But but anyway, it’s to that point, it’s it’s definitely a marketing gimmick, but it’s actually one, it’s actually one. I I actually kind of like it a lot because, you know, we’ve talked about like yoga classes and other activities that I’ve railed on on past shows. But but, you know, as shown by the 400 classes that the article referenced that they’ve done, they’ve pretty much done with this concept throughout Europe. This, again, this event is easily repeatable and simple to execute. I think it’s pretty straightforward. And so for those that are interested in it, I think it also probably drives traffic to the store in that day Now, and I mean, here’s the point. I know you’re thinking this in your head too, but is Primark talking out of both sides of its mouth on sustainability? Yeah, 100 percent, 100%, let’s call, call it what it is. What? At the same time, the items are inexpensive, which people need, like people need access to affordable clothing. And so having ways to repair them or augment them could be valuable to a certain segment of their customer base. So net, net, I like this. It’s Omni channel and design. It brings traffic in the store. I don’t have any complaints about it whatsoever.
00:19:43 Anne
Oh my God. Well, I agree. Well, I’ll start with where I agree with you. Yes, I love the marketing move and getting Primark credit for sustainability. Well done. Yes, you’re doing that. I love that they’re creating their own content for people so that you don’t have to be in a store. There’s all these YouTube videos and tutorials that they’re also putting online. So I think that’s good for them from a brand perspective and definitely drives traffic and gets their name out there. But putting it in the stores, especially in the USI think will be more work and effort than it’s worth for the stores teams. I don’t think this is any. I don’t think this is any different than doing a yoga class. I think it’s the same. It’s the same effort for that team to clear the space, make sure that they have somebody check people in. And I really think that when you talk about the Primark product, a $5 T-shirt is not something I’m, I’m investing time to fix. I will just buy another $5 T-shirt. So if I were Primark, I think I would do the opposite. I would focus more on like a clothing recycling programme with some sort of incentive to your point, because people do need affordable clothing. But I think I would focus on like, we’re going to recycle these clothes, bring your bag in and get a $5, you know, coupon or some sort of incentive for people to participate in this. Because even though there’s 400 of these classes that they’ve done across a multitude of cities all over Europe, like we don’t know if there’s two people per class and they’re just like box checked or if anybody comes to these class. I just, I could see this from a retailer like a Macy’s or Nordstrom where it does make sense to invest in like upgrading or repairing product that’s of a little bit higher value. But there’s no way in how I’m doing a a repair class on a $5 T-shirt that my kid rips a hole in just.
00:21:30 Chris
Yeah, your, well your point about too is like how does this play in America versus Europe, which is the for sure context?
00:21:36 Anne
In Staten Island, of all places. Like, yeah.
00:21:38 Chris
Sorry, Staten Island. Yeah, Yeah. Wow. Shots fired. Staten Island. Yeah, Wow. But, but yeah. But no, it’s a great point. And, you know, it’s actually, you know, the, the, the, the differences between the American and European consumer We’re going to touch on in the next headline too. But before we do that, we’ve got to bring Justin from AWS on today’s show. Joining us now for five disciple minutes is Justin Swaggler. Justin is the worldwide head of physical retail for AWS. Justin, let’s start with this. I imagine I I know the answer to this question based on your title, but given the rise of e-commerce and digital shopping habits, do physical stores still matter?
00:22:22 Justin
The unequivocal answer is yes. Physical stores still matter for all retailers across all segments and geographies. What we’re seeing is at least 80%, if not more of retail sales are happening physical stores. But what we’re seeing is kind of a store renaissance. You know, during the days of the pandemic, retailers had focused so much on the investments and new technologies for digital mobile shopping, but now they’re re looking at their physical stores and how do I unify the journey from online into the physical world and creating that connected holistic experience for their consumers as well as investing in optimising their operations and workforce efficiency. Overall, retailers are really looking at how do I deliver that efficient shopping experience and provide the digital tools and capabilities to improve the operations.
00:23:16 Anne
What technologies are the ones that retailers need to be focused on than for their stores to succeed?
00:23:23 Justin
Yeah, there’s there’s a lot of different approaches and and the way that we’re working with customers and as we think about it is kind of three key strategies or pillars. So first is around edge, you know, retails and stores, they may have hundreds or thousands of distributed physical locations, but in order to deploy new technologies, they need to balance what do I do in the cloud versus what do I do in edge hardware servers. And so being able to have a more modern edge versus cloud strategy helps provide the right infrastructure and those capabilities to deploy those new services. Second, we’re starting to also see more advancements in areas like computer vision and IoT or other advanced workloads in stores. So being able to understand consumer behaviour with existing cameras in store to understand where do they go, what areas of the store are they looking at and what do they end up transacting from there. And then unifying those data and capabilities in order to really get that enhanced overall operational and consumer view within the physical stores.
00:24:26 Anne
So Justin, what would your advice be then to make sure that retailers are consistently reinventing the customer experience, but then also balancing that with optimising operational cost and efficiency?
00:24:38 Justin
Yeah. So a lot of it is starting to look at the connective tissue, right. I hear from a lot of members, I have all these in store technologies, how do I stitch them together, right? And really to be able to advance and to provide that efficiency and experience, you got to really be a start to connect and unify those data sources and then start to bring in some of the AI and agentic capabilities from there to connect those sources. And that’s where really the future of of stores is going to go is, you know, as events get triggered, whether it’s the cameras are inventory or checkup lines, how do I automate the workflow to provide that great experience or to ensure my staff are doing the right tasks and the right work when they need to do it at that right time?
00:25:24 Chris
Got Justin. I wasn’t expecting the authentic AI drop there, but I’m I’m always open to hear more about it. So, so let’s get you out here on this then. So if you take a longer term vision, what do retailers need to take action on now to drive more value for their customers in the future?
00:25:40 Justin
Yeah. So once you kind of set up the edge and you bring in some of those advanced kind of applications and workloads, you stitch that together. And I believe we’re going to be creating agentic stores where it’s going to be a lot of automation and orchestration of key events and workloads that need to happen. Now this is not, you know, to say it’s impacting staffing levels in stores, but it’s helping to drive high value interactions and work for workforce and stores that lead to better experience. So I’m sure you’ve been to like AQSR restaurant and the ice cream machine is out or you go to the store and that inventory is off the shelf. Typically it’s very manual for it to be addressed. Once you unify that data and you start to bring in agent to capabilities, I can now automate that. So if an equipment’s broken, get that ticket to address it. If there’s items out of the stock, let’s reorder the inventory automatically. Let’s get the task assigned to get the workforce to restock it. Let’s remove it from any mobile ordering for pick up in store, etcetera. So those are the types of things we need to think about for retailers to be able to deploy those types of capabilities in five, 10-15 years down the line. Jeez.
00:26:50 Chris
Chelsea, you just blew my mind. Oh, my God, thank you so much. Thanks Justin. OK headline #4 ASOS is offering next day delivery to in post lockers. According to Internet Retailing, shoppers will be able to select in post lockers at checkout as their primary out of home delivery option, giving them greater speed, flexibility and convenience. The service is available for all ASOS customers with ASOS Premier customers receiving free delivery. David Flavill, Director of Delivery Solutions of ASOS had this to say. Quote. We know that customers come to ASOS for the latest fashion when they want it. Adding in post extensive network of over 16,000 lockers and parcel shops to our offering with the next day delivery gives customers even more choice and convenience in how they get the fashion they love. End Quote. And could you ever see US fashion customers ordering pickup going back to what we talked about before, out of home lockers, out of out of home lockers, that’s a.
00:27:48 Anne
100%.
00:27:49 Chris
Way to say that you do.
00:27:50 Anne
100%, I think this is the win all around. I think especially I mean, I order a lot of things online and I think when you, you look at the, the, I think movement we’ve seen towards in store pickup for people, I mean that is has grown tremendously over the course of the last couple years, especially since the pandemic. And I think that this is the smartest way that ASOS and online retailer can get product to their customers and can get me to go to ASOS when I might have other options to go to. Because before it was everybody’s seven days or three days, three to four days or three to five days. But it costs a lot of money and now you can get a low cost product the next day. And ASOS can put all those deliveries into the lockers. They’re not delivering this one to one. They’re doing all these deliveries into one locker. We’re seeing like people in and retailers and partners in in Europe and across a lot of the European countries who are working with people like Cleveron to do this with not just retailer to consumer drop off, but we’re also seeing them use these for peer-to-peer exchanges, which I think could be even more interesting and get more utilisation of the lockers. So I love this. I think it’s a very smart way for ASOS to be able to offer something like this without totally bogging them down with the cost of, of instant delivery. But you’re, I don’t know, you’re not giving me like go forward vibes on this.
00:29:25 Chris
Chris, I’m, I’m gonna slow my roll on this one a little bit compared to Yeah, what did I mean? I think it, I think it’s a great idea for Europe. I mean, I think the model are I mean, the, IT seems like the model’s already tested for the most part in Europe, you know, in terms of the different countries we’ve talked about and covered in the history on this show. But in the USI feel like, I feel like there’s some different dynamics here. I think, yeah, you know, one like for next day service, like, I don’t know if I’ve got a clothing emergency, I’m probably just going to go into the store and I’ll like pick up. And then I think also the, the, the population density dynamics in the United States are quite different than they are in Europe too. So that makes this whole locker utilisation and where do you place the lockers thing a little bit of a different, different battle. I could see it taking, I could see it becoming something that we do as a norm. But like everything in Europe, I feel like we’re at least 10 years away from it. So, you know, if you and I are talking about it now with a sources, you know, out of home lockers, we’re not going to be seen in the US until 2035, which is kind of sad and depressing when I say that out loud. But it’s it’s probably true given the amount of coverage and what we’ve seen in the trends on things like this in the show throughout the years. I mean, there’s still things we were talking about that, you know, are just now coming to the forefront. So sure. I don’t know that that’s that’s my take. It’s like one of those things like, yeah, I wish we could be like this, but I just don’t know that the US consumer will ever be that way.
00:30:44 Anne
Yeah. I mean, I, I do I, I totally see your point. I do think though, with ASOS, that is a lower cost online only fashion forward like retailer being able to get this next day is another option. Like I don’t want to go to Walmart or settle for a T-shirt there. Like to the idea that you can get this fashion to you, which I think the competitors are a Timu or a Xian or some of these other things where you’re waiting weeks for product. Like the idea that you can get it next day, I think is really smart. But but I but I can understand the US. We’re just man, we’re just slow rolling with some things. We’d like stuff to come to us.
00:31:27 Chris
I’d rather spend $3 on a gallon of gas to go driving through.
00:31:30 Anne
Myself. That’s right. All right, let’s go to headline #5. LTK is partnering with the Bachelor franchise to launch a social commerce experience, according to an LTK press release. The official Bachelor Nation, which Chris, you are a part of, I became a part of with Golden Bachelor. The LTK channel is now available and introducing a new way for fans to engage with their favourite reality TV franchise. The new channel allows fans to shop fashion, beauty and home products that cast have worn and used through the LTK Consumer app. So for background, for those of you who are not familiar with LTK, they claim they drive more than $5 billion in sales annually and reach 40 million monthly shoppers across its platform, and that nearly 40% of US adult, Gen Z and Millennial women use LTK today. So, Chris, you’re claiming that you were once a devout Bachelor fan, but could you ever see shopping Bachelor wares via LTK? Ever, ever have you ever shopped LTK?
00:32:37 Chris
No, I hadn’t, and this is kind of blown my radar screen. You were much more familiar with this than I would. And that volume is pretty insane if that’s the amount of volume they’re pushing through it. And yes, I I’m I’m I was a huge bachelor fan. Now I’m probably a lapse Bachelor fan and my good did.
00:32:53 Anne
Golden get you back on.
00:32:55 Chris
No, it didn’t. I need to give it another whirl, though. I need to get back on the Bachelor bandwagon because those were great years in my life actually, you know, got the community going. You know, I got into it with like Ben Zacharias, a good friend of ours. Like she and I always talk about it. But but anyway, yeah, I, I, I love this show. So, you know, but when I think about this story, I think the way I’d sum this up is I just think it’s new age product placement, but with two big differences strategically. Yeah, one is attribution. You know, the second one is possibly traffic, right? But product, that’s the second. That’s a big if, is the traffic that you’re gonna get from this. But so product placement’s been around forever. Like, you know, I think of the Snapple Seinfeld where he opens the fridge and he’s like, do you want a Snapple? You know, it’s like, come on. And the content studios have been trying to attribute product placement in all sorts of ways. You’ve had like shoppable video coming to the fore where you’ve had QR codes on screen, all of which just kind of leave something to be desired. So this is this is better than that in my opinion, right? I’m not going to go shop for to answer your card. I’m not going to go shop for Bachelor stuff because that’s just not what I’m interested in. But I think they’re probably potentially are people that would. But the big question then becomes traffic. How much traffic will this partnership bring to the Bachelor franchise via the LTK platform? But at the end of the day, I think it’s a good experiment because the volume that’s accrued through the platform is all added for the Bachelor and it gives them a way to conglomerate all their affiliate revenue in. And here’s the other part in one easy way, all in one place, like any item that they want to put through this platform, they can probably easy at easily attribute or I’m guessing that’s what they’re trying to do. And so that’s going to make it a much more easier proposition for them to reach consumers. But the question is, will the consumers come? Right? It’s the if you build it, will they come, you know, conundrum and I don’t know, but if they got that much traffic.
00:34:49 Anne
Yeah.
00:34:50 Chris
No. And Bachelor fans are pretty rabid, like right? I don’t know, it seems like a good idea. This could be this could be something in the long run. Like it makes me think about, huh, does this become a new shopping platform in general, especially with that type of revenue already?
00:35:03 Anne
Yeah. I mean, I think it’s such a no brainer experiment, Chris, because you know, you, you think about the benefit here that’s different than product placement in shows is that the Bachelor doesn’t have to negotiate with any of the brands for these contracts. They just let the money funnel in. They’re getting the it’s an entirely new revenue.
00:35:21 Chris
They just have to have approval for the affiliate links.
00:35:23 Anne
Right. No, not even they just got to set them up. No, you can just go like the the way that these work is like, you know, at once you have a, once you’re signed up for LTK or you’re one of their people, you get access to their catalogue. You get access to the catalogue. So all you do is drop in a link. There’s no bounds. They can go back to the very first bachelor season. And if that pair of heels that The Bachelorette is wearing are still available, you can take that. So there’s endless amount of revenue to get here and you know.
00:35:54 Chris
I can get Juan Pablo’s soccer shorts and.
00:35:57 Anne
If they still.
00:35:57 Chris
Exist. Now we’re talking.
00:35:59 Anne
Can yes you can so for me I think it just makes sense it’s one one way for them to further the engagement with their fans to make products shoppable, to not have to deal with any brand negotiations to just let the revenue come in as people are are buying things they only get money when people buy things so it’s it there’s really no harm in this and I think you know the the shopping experience, the LTK like user experience is pretty straightforward. The only thing that I am wondering here, like I think this makes sense right now. There’s no harm in trying it. But will as as search continues to evolve and as people are using tools like Google Lens already to do this on any show that they want, like will, will that continue to be a pattern of behaviour that people go to? Will they go to the LTK app or will they just, you know, pull their phones out, take a picture of whatever they see on the show and then they’re they’re going to Google to buy it. But.
00:36:59 Chris
Why not? Well, LTK could still be in a good position in that strategy too that you’re talking about. Like if they’re the ones that have the great search data that pops up on Google and then you end up on LTK, that’s also a win win there too. So, yeah, it, yeah, it’s it’s it’s something to watch for sure. It’s really interesting.
00:37:14 Anne
Yeah. All right, Chris, let’s go to the lightning round. You get the first question here.
00:37:18 Chris
OK.
00:37:19 Anne
This is a very apropos question. There is a hilarious debate on TikTok right now. I highly encourage people to check it out, asking who would win in a battle, 100 Brits or 100 Americans? Wow. I want to know, yes, I want to know if you were recruiting the American Dream Team for this effort, which States and cities would you recruit from in the US?
00:37:42 Chris
Oh man, oh, that’s such a great question and that the answer to this is easy. I’m going 100% all in on Boston.
00:37:48 Anne
Oh my gosh.
00:37:49 Chris
They did it once, they could do it again, you know, and the, the massos will come out and force to defend, to defend our nation 100%. I’m going all in on Boston. No, New York. There’s just busted massos.
00:38:03 Anne
The threads are so great. You have to read these like people are like going back to the Brits and the Brits are like, oh, we’ll get some people from Newcastle and all these places and then they’re like 1 answer. Yeah, one of the answers was, but in the US we have Florida man. So we will win no matter what. Like he’ll wrestle a Gator to the death. Not scared. Like it’s amazing. Go down this rabbit hole. Highly wish.
00:38:28 Chris
It. Oh, yeah, That’s so good. Such a good question. All right, The Paper, Peacock’s new Office offshoot, will debut in September. I’m curious, Anne, where does The Office rank in your pantheon of great sitcoms?
00:38:40 Anne
Top 3 for sure.
00:38:42 Chris
I mean, I’ve never seen an episode. You haven’t. I’ve seen the British Office. I’ve never seen an American Office episode. I need to watch it. Yeah, it’s, but it’s in your top three.
00:38:51 Anne
For sure. It’s just, it was so good and at the time it was like, it’s like friends, like it was just it, it provided that moment of laughter that you like you knew you’re going to be laughing at something. And I love a show like that where you can, you know, you’re going to get a smile out of it.
00:39:10 Chris
Wow, Top three? Yeah.
00:39:11 Anne
I’ll check it out. What are your top 3AW?
00:39:14 Chris
Man, I mean Seinfeld and Cheers are definitely.
00:39:18 Anne
Running for one.
00:39:18 Chris
And two, I’d have to think about what 3 is, and I wanted to spend more time on that than being put on the spot because you know how important pop cultural sitcom.
00:39:26 Anne
Television in my life, I know. How dare I ask such a question? OK, I’m going to ask you another question. Mars Pet Care today announced that they are collaborating with the mental health company Calm on a collection of content that’s meant to help pet lovers think about their bond with their pets as a way to improve their own well-being. What moment with sweet little Ginsburg makes you most happy or calm, Chris?
00:39:53 Chris
Man, that’s easy. Like I love when Ginsburg, like I’ll be sitting watching TV. I mean, everyone ever feel like every dog owner has this story, But she’ll come and she’ll put her head on my lap and then she rolls over and opens her belly to me and just puts her arms like straight out like Superman.
00:40:05 Anne
Ginsburg is a burner doodle for everyone who’s just a Bernie.
00:40:08 Chris
Doodle, yes, Bernie Doodle. And she just has me stroke her belly for like an hour. She just doesn’t let me stop. That’s the downside of it. Like my arm gets really tired after a time and and she’s a very needy dog though. She just doesn’t let me, just doesn’t let me go. But.
00:40:23 Anne
But it calls you.
00:40:24 Chris
But hey, yeah, it calls me and I, yeah, I guess I’m, I’m, I, I give her what she needs. And all right, last one. It is rumoured that the final season of Stranger Things, Yes, and the final season of Stranger Things her debut as soon as October 10th, a little bit later than the typical summer release. What are you excited to learn in this show’s final run?
00:40:46 Anne
Chris I feel terrible. I can’t even remember what happened at the end of last season. Like I need to recap but if I remember barely something with the redhead girl was going on right? Like.
00:40:59 Chris
Yeah. Didn’t she like almost die or was like in a coma or something? I don’t.
00:41:02 Anne
Know she was like possessed or something, but like, I don’t know there like I think there was something there that I wanted to find out still so but I’m ready for that show to be over. I know that might not be a popular opinion, but.
00:41:16 Chris
I think I kind of am too. Like if they, if they held it out a little much longer, I think I’d be like, OK, come on, let’s get this going. Yeah.
00:41:22 Anne
I mean, Millie Bobby Brown doesn’t even look the same anymore. Have you seen pictures of her recently? I’m like, how are you playing a?
00:41:28 Chris
Lot. She’s like 40 now, right? Yeah, right. But yeah, no, I think the other thing I want to I want to see a steamy scene between David Harbour and Winona Ryder too. That’s what I want from this episode. I want them to get it on. That’s what I want because.
00:41:41 Anne
Oh yeah, he was in the Russian prison or something, right? Yeah. And they got back together.
00:41:46 Chris
Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Something like that. Yeah, Yeah. But yeah, I want to. I want to see them. I want to see, I want to see that. I want to see what.
00:41:52 Anne
Happens. I want.
00:41:53 Chris
To see them come together and OK, whatever their two names are in the show, I don’t remember. All right, happy birthday today to Tim Roth, George Lucas, and to the woman who wore the hell out of Anne’s. Going to love this. Multiple pants suits.
00:42:05 Anne
And just suits. They’re just suits. They’re just suits.
00:42:08 Chris
And Veronica Guerin, always stunning. Cate Blanchett. And remember, if you can only read or listen to 1 retail blog in the business, make it Omni Talk. The only retail media outlet run by two former executives from the current top ten US retailer. Our Fast My Podcast is the quickest, fastest rundown of all the week’s top news in our daily newsletter, The Retail Daily Minute. It tells you all you need to know each day to stay on top of your game as a retail executive and also regularly feature special content that is exclusive to us and that Ann and I take a lot of pride in doing just for you. Thanks as always for listening in. Please remember to like and give us a review wherever you have to listen to your podcasts or on YouTube. You can follow us today by simply going to youtube.com/omni Talk Retail. And if you’re interested, you can follow our coverage from the World Retail Congress all week long by going to the conference live stream playlist on the aforementioned Omni Talk YouTube channel. So until next week on Behalf.
00:42:58 Justin
Of all of us.
00:42:58 Chris
At Omni Talk, be careful out there.
Omni Talk® is the retail blog for retailers, written by retailers. Chris Walton and Anne Mezzenga founded Omni Talk® in 2017 and have quickly turned it into one of the fastest growing blogs in retail.