00:00:08 Chris Walton
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00:01:59 Anne
Are listening to the OmniTalk Retail Fast Five ranked in the top 10% of all podcasts globally. Currently the only retail podcast ranked in the top 100 of all business podcasts on Apple Podcasts. The Retail Fast Five is the podcast that we hope makes you feel a little smarter, but most importantly, a little happier each week too. Today is February 11, 2026. I’m one of your hosts, Anne Mezzenga.
00:02:21 Chris Walton
And I’m Chris Walton.
00:02:23 Anne
And we are here once again to bring you all the top retail headlines making waves in the world of omnichannel retailing. This week, Chris, we have a very special edition of the Fast Five. We get to be joined by Shop Talk’s head of content and insights for the US Joe Laszlo. Joe is fresh off of Shop Talk Lux, which I’m dying to hear all about and will share with us a little bit about what we can expect this year at Shop Talk Springs. So, Joe, welcome back to Omnitalk.
00:02:56 Joe
No, thank you so much for having me back. I am always psyched to talk with you guys. It makes my brain work a little faster and try to keep up with you.
00:03:04 Anne
Well, we’re super excited to have you. You make our brains work faster too. So effort. Well, Joe, if you don’t mind, before we jump into the headlines, maybe give the audience who might be meeting you might be meeting Shop Talk for the first time, just a quick bit about what you oversee in your role at Shop Talk and then what we can expect. Give us the headlines for Shop Talk 2026. The 10th anniversary, the 10th Shop Talkiversary.
00:03:32 Joe
Yeah. So I’m head of content at Shop Talk, which means I look after the agenda and speakers and the content narrative for our shows primarily in the US Although I help our Europe based team with the two shows that we do abroad these days. So Shop Talk is an events company. We put on a series of conferences around the world all on the future of retail and consumer brands. How technology is changing the way people connect with brands, the way they shop, the way they buy and their expectations. Weeks ago, as you pointed out, we did our first ever luxury focused show in Abu Dhabi, which was super fun.
And in about five weeks from now, we will be in Las Vegas for Shop Talk Spring. The theme of the show this year is Retail in the age of AI Trying to be comprehensive and grounded in our view of how artificial intelligence and especially generative and agentic AI are changing the ways that again, people connect with brands, the ways that corporate workers do their jobs, the way that frontline workers, people who help customers, are also leveraging AI to become better at what they do. But I guess I’d say it’s really important to note that while AI is right there in the title of Shop Doc this year, it’s not the only thing that’s going on as far as retail transformation goes. And so we’re also programming quite a bit about keeping retail human in the age of AI too.
00:04:51 Chris Walton
Nice, Joe. I can’t believe it’s been 10 years. That’s crazy when you say that out loud. What comes to mind for you? What’s the first thing that pops into your head? 10 years of shop Talk. That’s pretty wild.
00:05:02 Joe
Yeah. So I was, I was not on the team when Shop Talk 2016 happened. But I was certainly around from 2018 onwards, so early enough, you know, the founders of Shop Talk saw this opportunity to create an event that was about retail innovation without, you know, either a legacy of just being for the bricks and mortar world, or, you know, just being about E comm or disruptive upstart D2C brands. And really kind of regardless of where the innovation was coming from, kind of be a place where everybody who was challenged by, but also excited by all the change that technology was bringing to the industry could get together and have a conversation that didn’t just reflect to the future of the industry, but helped shape it. So, I don’t know, in 2016, I remember opening remarks or read opening remarks that kind of talked about this unprecedented pace of change.
And I don’t know, I think back to 2016, we probably all think, you know, if only we could go back. Things were so much slower and easier than relative to today. So I think they were certainly ahead of their time in terms of being aware that the pace of change was only going to accelerate. I was just looking at the agenda from 2016. You know, there were things on it like, wow, AR and VR that haven’t quite come to pass, autonomous delivery that we’re still working on. And there was indeed a lot about AI, which it was more around, like, data analytics and machine learning back in 2016 than it was about things that we talk to, like they’re people. But. But AI has been with us for a while now and just continues to be one of those factors driving change.
00:06:34 Chris Walton
Yeah, well, I. I know for me personally, Joe, I mean, that’s one thing I love about Shop Talk and one thing I love about our relationship with you too is, is you guys take a very personalised approach to the content that you try to create to this show. Like, you’ve put a lot of thought and effort into it. I mean, you’re always bouncing ideas off of me. I mean, I can remember six months ago having a conversation with you about a thread or a theme that you were thinking about pursuing for the show. And so. So, yeah, so we love that relationship and we’re excited to put you to the test this week too, Joe. So are you ready?
00:07:02 Joe
I’m. I am ready. Do my best.
00:07:06 Chris Walton
All right. I’m sure you’ll do very, very well. All right, in this week’s Fast Five, we’ve got news on target. Cutting 500 jobs while quote, unquote, investing in store level customer experiences. Anthropic taking shots at OpenAI with a Super bowl ad campaign promising Cloud will remain ad free as Albertson’s testing cart tracking technology to measure retail media effectiveness and Spotify making a surprising move into physical books. But we begin today with some major, major, major leadership news out of Cincinnati.
00:07:37 Anne
And yeah, this was kind of a shocker. We have headline number one, which is that Kroger has named former Walmart executive Greg Foreign as its new CEO, effective immediately. According to CNBC, Forin led Walmart US for six years years until 2019, where he oversaw a turnaround of the company’s largest division, accelerated digital capabilities, introduced ordering online and online pickup and delivered positive comparable sales growth for 20 consecutive quarters. Foreign replaces interim CEO Ron Sargent, who stepped in after former CEO Rodney McMullen resigned in March 2025 following an investigation into his personal conduct that violated the company’s ethics policy. Most recently, Foreign served as CEO of Air New Zealand for five years where he led an end to end digital transformation and guided the airline through the pandemic while managing union negotiations and supply chain crises. Joe, what intrigues you most about Kroger’s new CEO pick?
00:08:42 Joe
Yeah, I think it’s so interesting to see a company like Kroger pick somebody who is about as outsider as you can get while still having a lot of relevant experience. I think it kind of speaks to Kroger wanting to make some changes and bring somebody in who’s not going to be afraid to make some changes. I guess if I had to pick one thing though, it’s interesting, you know, during, during, during Ferran’s time at Walmart, he really thought a lot about how Walmart stores tied to the online experience and kind of making E commerce work for Walmart. And I think that expertise you’re given that Kroger has already been talking about making its E commerce business profitable by the end of the year. I think maybe that’s the thing that’s most intriguing to me is like, what’s he going to bring to the table that’s going to help them achieve that goal, right?
00:09:33 Anne
Yeah, Joe. I kind of feel like I’m in the same vein or thinking in the same vein as you are. He seems like a good person, especially with some of the initiatives that Kroger has been talking about on the side storefront too, like bigger boxes, having more general merchandise inside there. Like on paper, Greg seems like the right kind of person to kind of take Kroger into a position now of, you know, just kind of laying a good foundation and getting stable and trying to, you know, focus the right teams and the right people on the initiatives that they have coming forward with them to really be competitive with a Walmart out there. My questions are too, and Chris, I’m curious to get your take on that is, you know, can he, he take his team, he has a leg legacy executive team that’s been at Kroger for a long time around him and can they really start to plan then for the future and is he kind of a long term CEO for Kroger or is this more of like another interim position who will stabilise things and then get it ready for the next one? Chris, what are your thoughts on that?
00:10:37 Chris Walton
Yeah, I think that’s a really insightful point. You know, I think, you know, I find, you know, to answer the question too at the top, like, I think this is an intriguing announcement for a number of reasons. First, his background is Pedigrees, Woolworths Australia, Walmart. I mean, you know, on paper the guys, the guy, the guy meets all cheques, all the boxes, right? And I mean he, you know, he seems like a merchant through it, through the way he approaches store visits and everything. You know, he’s coming from Walmart, Kroger’s biggest competitor. So that has to mean something. You know, having that intelligence in the CEO suite has got to be, you know, very valuable. I do think though, with all that said, I think he’s getting a little too much credit in the media for the digital turnaround at Walmart.
I mean, if I’m not mistaken, he had, he was the one under his tenure where they had two apps, one for gm, one for grocery, that didn’t get changed till much after he left. So I’m curious like how much that of that is real. But I think going back to your question now, I think, I think your point’s right because I did, I actually looked up. He doesn’t have a LinkedIn profile, which I don’t know if you two, if you to uncover that in preparation for today’s headlines too. But so I went on Wikipedia, the source of all knowledge and it turns out he’s 65. Like that is, that is an interesting age to hire a CEO. Which tells me, you know, this is probably just at best a stopgap for a few years and that they really need to fortify the ranks underneath him very, very quickly for this to work in the long run. Because, you know, I hate to say it but it is a factor when you, when you look at these things.
00:12:06 Anne
Yeah, it definitely, I think plays to. He’s got the Wisdom and the experience from his, his years of experience at Walmart, Wilbur’s, as you mentioned, even here in New Zealand. I think really thinking about how loyalty comes into play in these next few years as, as a regional grocer and getting people into the store. So yeah, I think it makes a lot of sense to tap him for right now, but I think it’s a great point. Will this be a long term thing for Kroger? We’ll have to wait and see.
00:12:35 Chris Walton
All right, headline number two. Target is cutting about 500 rolls at distribution centres and regional offices while simultaneously investing more money into frontline store staffing to improve customer experience. According to CNBC, again, Target is eliminating around 100 positions at the store district level and about 400 across its supply chain site while redirecting those resources to add more hours for frontline store employees. The big box retailer said it’s making changes to the way it runs in overseas stores to improve the customer experience, a top goal of new CEO Michael Fidelke, who took over on February 1. Target is reducing the number of store districts to streamline operations and putting money toward additional labour hours and new guest experience training for every team member at every store. Joe, I’m curious, how meaningful do you think Target’s announcement to invest more in store staffing actually is?
00:13:30 Joe
Well, I certainly think it’s addressing the thing that comes up the most when people critique Target’s current performance, guest experience. What’s, what’s causing the most problems with people who used to love Target but maybe don’t shop there as often anymore or, you know, kind of used to go to Target because they wanted to and now kind of only go when they need to. I think improving that frontline experience, just having more bodies in stores because that’s a thing that robots can’t do yet, can only help. But I think the, the proof is certainly going to be in the execution of that. So I think, I think, I guess I would say they’re, they’re saying the right thing, but we’re going to have to see how that manifests. It’s also not the kind of thing you can change overnight, especially not with a store fleet as big as theirs is. And so, so it’s going to be a, a big gap between kind of, kind of saying the right thing now and having it come to reality, you know, three months from now, probably at the soonest.
00:14:26 Chris Walton
So Joe, if I read between the lines. So you’re a little sceptical of the impact of this announcement? A little bit. There’s a Little scepticism that you’re viewing.
00:14:33 Joe
This announcement with, I guess, I guess a little bit. And also like kind of there needs to be some expectation setting just around like it’s not going to be an overnight. Suddenly the shelves will be stocked with everything that people want to buy and it’ll be a big back to the Target in store experience that we were all used to say five years ago. I think they’re going to need to temper expectations about just how fast they can execute on what they’re talking about.
00:14:57 Chris Walton
Today, especially amongst the leadership changes they just announced too. They’ve got a lot of things to sort out internally now as well. Yeah, I mean I’ll go a little heavier handed on this. I don’t think this is going to surprise anybody, but I think it’s backed up by the math. So I think it’s smoke and mirrors as a PR announcement and it’s smoke and mirrors from the master of PR smoke and mirrors, which is Target. Like I said, you do the math on this. The article states very clearly that the average pay rate starts, starts at $15 an hour. So annually that’s $31,000 a year. The average position eliminated. On the high side, on the high side is $200,000 per year.
So that’s basically an additional six and a half people for each eliminated position, which equates to best case an additional 3,225 workers, which is less than one extra one and a half workers per store across the entire fleet. To say nothing of the added expense that comes from initiatives when you start saying things like we’re going to increase employee training as well in addition to having to replace the work from the workers who’ve left. So these investments, to me, they don’t, on the core, they don’t amount to anything when you step back and you do the numbers. Unless they’re also putting more money behind training and store efforts. But the articles didn’t really hint to that. They said it was all coming through the layoffs.
00:16:17 Joe
So.
00:16:17 Chris Walton
And I don’t know what’s your take here? Do you agree with me? Do you disagree with me? Are you more on Joe’s side or maybe Joe agrees with me now too. I don’t know. But where, where do you come down?
00:16:27 Anne
Look, I think the most important thing about this is Target. What Joe said Target is acknowledging the state of their stores in the statement. So I think that’s not PR smoke and mirrors, that’s just calling it and saying we see it now. This, that, that it gives me Hope that we’ll start to hear from Michael Fidelke some of the other things that are plaguing Target right now and that he’s going to address them. However, I think Joe, and you bring up very good points. We, the customers are going to expect to see some changes.
So they’re, you’re putting something like this out there. So within a few months, customers are going to expect to see that stores look better, that they’re getting better support within their store, their Target stores, on their Target runs. And so I think it’s really up to Target to, to prove it themselves. They’ll, they’ve, they’ve put it out there, they’ve set a goal publicly and now we’ll see if they can, if they can make good on it. But I think, you know, you also bring up some good points when you were doing the math. Like, I think there’s also stuff going on behind the scenes that we are not privy to that is like, what, what does this mean then? Does a, does a DTL now have a bigger territory that they have to look after?
What does that mean for their role and making sure that there’s consistency across all of these things that are being done to change what the store experience is like. Like, there’s a lot of open questions there and what this is actually going to look like. But Target said it and now I think all we can do is wait and see. Do they pay, pay or make good on this promise? And is this the first hopefully, of many things that we see Target outwardly acknowledge and then make good with?
00:18:03 Chris Walton
Yeah, and as a former district manager, I can tell you, yes, that’s going to be the case. Like, that’s, that’s how this works. They’re going to have more territory to cover. It’s going to be more travel expenses too, that have to be, you know, accounted for. So, Joe, any last word on this one?
00:18:16 Joe
No, I, I think I agree with you both that, you know, if, if this is, if this is it, if, you know, here’s, here’s the plan, like, we fire these 500 people and everything will be golden in our stores. Like, clearly that, that doesn’t seem possible to me. And as the shop talk guy, I’ll always probably be more diplomatic than you guys could be about it. But, but, but, so, so I guess my, my optimistic view is, is like, and like this is, this is the first step and there will be more steps announced in, in coming weeks and then, you know, hopefully again, shoppers will start to see execution, you know, in, in the next six, eight weeks, few months.
00:18:53 Chris Walton
Yeah, Joe. I think everybody’s more diplomatic about things that I am. That’s probably the rule of this show.
00:18:59 Anne
All right, let’s go to headline number three. Anthropic spent millions on super bowl commercials pledging that its cloud AI chatbot will remain completely ad free, taking direct shots at rival OpenAI’s decision to introduce ads to chat GPT. According to multiple news outlets, Anthropic aired a 60 second pregame and a 30 second in game ad featuring the tagline ads are coming to AI but not to Claude. With 30 second slots averaging $8 million at the Super Bowl. Wow. The company says its business model is, quote, straightforward, end quote, generating revenue through enterprise contracts and paid subscriptions rather than advertising.
And the personal nature of conversations with Claude would make ads feel, quote, incongruous, end quote, and in many cases, inappropriate. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman quickly, quickly hit back, calling Anthropic ads funny but dishonest and taking a swipe at their business model, saying Anthropic serves an expensive product to rich people despite Quads also offering free access. In one commercial, a person asked for advice about communicating with their mother. And the AI smoothly transitions from helpful guidance to an ad for a, quote, mature dating site that connects sensitive cubs with roaring cougars. End quote. All right, Chris, we’ll go to you first on this one.
00:20:22 Chris Walton
Oh, okay.
00:20:23 Anne
Is Anthropics concerned about its Chatbots answers being influenced by third party product placements? As big of a concern or opportunity as Anthropic is advertising it to be.
00:20:35 Chris Walton
Oh, wow. Yeah. God, I can’t wait to get Joe’s opinion on this too, because he’s probably much closer to this in terms of prepping the content for shop talk next month. But, you know, I, I, I don’t think so. I think they’re kind of, I think they’re trying to make something out of this more than it is. I mean, I think you just look at the evidence. You see, you see how free with advertising, streaming sites are coming into play, how Netflix and Amazon have both added ad, you know, options to their portfolio.
So it’s existed in Google forever and no one cares. I mean, it’s a nice sound bite, but to me, the economics went out at the end. You know, that’s just, people are going to gravitate towards that. People gravitate towards free and, you know, if you got to exchange something and, you know, give something in exchange for that, fine, you know, whatever. And so I think, I think there’s enough data points out there to say like this is kind of a hard pill to swallow for me but if I’m anthropic, the nice thing about it is I can always change my mind and go back. And the good thing is, the good thing is I think anthropic in the mind of the end consumer is probably a second tier consideration relative to ChatGPT because everyone always says Chachi BT they.
00:21:38 Anne
Don’T say it’s for rich people, Chris. It’s right, it’s AI for rich people. So yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:21:43 Chris Walton
I actually, I actually prefer Claude to ChatGPT and so, so I think for that reason it’s a very good marketing play to drive awareness of what they are and who they are regardless of how this plays out in the long run. That’s my take.
00:21:57 Joe
I thought it was a super clever ad and it’s funny, it’s. Right One of at least two ads during the super bowl that were promoting AI by talking about how bad it is. Right. The Chris Hemsworth Alexa ad about all the ways Alexa could you to promote Alexa was also really interesting to me. So like here’s, you know, you should be chatting, getting advice from, from a chatbot and then midway through it suddenly like starts throwing in paid, paid promotions to you is sort of a weird way. Even if you’re kind of as Claude like saying this is what the other guys are doing, not us, it’s still kind of for somebody who’s not played with those things very much anymore. Not necessarily the best way to entice somebody to give it a try.
00:22:33 Anne
Yeah, no, I agree. I mean, I think, I actually wonder if this couldn’t be more beneficial for Claude when they do and I think they will decide to add and add like a free, a better freemium version where they are using the fact that they do have more of a connection like Claude is more of like a support system like you use it for, not the quick hit answers like ChatGPT. I think this is what a lot of users are utilising for writing for intimate questions they could, that could actually set them up for a more personalised offering if they can get it right. If it’s not saying, you know, here go cheque out these Cougar ads or whatever it is when you’re trying to get advice about how to talk to your mom.
But what I do think that there is an opportunity there for Anthropic down the road to say look, we’re adding ads but it’s still going to be a premium experience. It’s Getting awareness out there to more people who don’t know about cloud already who’ve used ChatGPT and maybe are looking for something additional. But I, I just, I cannot imagine a world where we have a free like where it’s just completely no ads across any of this. It’s just, it’s a search tool and I think that we’re always going to eventually default to here’s the paid version, here’s and, and hopefully a better personalised paid version for people.
00:23:56 Joe
Yeah, I mean it reminds me of the early days of the search engine wars too, right? I mean when Google first introduced like paid ads and we’re very thoughtful about the blue box and like, like the ad, you’ll always be able ads and you know, depending on which search engine you choose, like the other ones were kind of like oh that’s, that’s the end. And it certainly wasn’t the end for, for Google back when they did it. I think, I think it just comes down to disclosure and keeping the, the promoted sponsored content very separate from the, the organic.
Although, you know, there’s, there’s this bigger question right now about like what is influencing the answers that all of the chatbots are giving. I mean there’s this whole industry growing up around AEO and geo and there’s certainly going to be a workshop session at Shop Talk Spring about like how companies are trying to, you know, maybe not by paying the chatbots directly but through smart content creation and curation like nudge and influence the answers that ChatGPT, Claude and all the others are giving. So it’s a very interesting moment as far as like how do you get on the good side of those guys because, or those things because they are becoming more and more influential.
00:25:02 Chris Walton
It was one hell of a commercial though. One hell of a commercial. Like I got to give them credit, that was a great commercial but it’s good, it’s good to know that I think unanimously we’re all kind of like, yeah, this feels like kind of a ginned up marketing ploy at best. All right, headline number four. Albertsons is expanding a pilot programme that uses tracking devices on shopping carts and in baskets to measure how long customers dwell in front of in store retail media displays. All right, we’re back into the store. According to Grocery Dive, Albertsons is currently testing the technology in an 80 store pilot and plans to expand to about 800 stores this year.
Liz Roach, VP of media and measurement at Albertsons said on a recent podcast that the initiative is driven by brands desire to collect more Data find ways for more incremental purchases and pinpoint cross merchandising opportunities. The carts use beacon technology to anonymously detect when carts are in proximity to in store displays, helping understand overall engagement patterns and dwell time. All sensor data is aggregated and not tied to the individuals with no personal or device level identifiers collected. Wow, we’ve got a beacon storey. I thought we were done with beacons. Question for you and let’s go back to you, Ann. Does Albertson’s new cart tracker say more about where in store media is going or where in store retail media is now?
00:26:21 Anne
I would have to say where it is now. I was shocked actually that the screens, they put Albertson’s launch, all these screens in store and there’s I, I was like there’s no camera or like nothing monitoring dwell time in front of the. The screens like that shocked me. There’s so much out there and available. So that, that’s. That surprised me and I think shows that yes, we are still very early in determining what is going to be successful when it comes to in store media. And you know, I don’t think we’re far off from getting to this higher level of fidelity because of some of the technologies that, you know, people you and I have talked to, Chris, I’m sure people that will be showing up at Shop Talk, Joe, but, but Liz Roach is smart and I think alongside the Albertsons team, Liz was smart to deploy this pilot to get that additional data point. You know, Liz saw we only have the screens in.
We can see a lift in point of sale data. But let’s get that additional point data point for the brands who are advertising on these screens to really show in addition to, you know, increase in sales of your product, we’re also seeing that people were in front of. Even if it’s a beacon, this is like an easy thing to just slap onto a regular cart. No major technology infrastructure changes. So I think, I think this is very, you can see Liz’s leadership really, really coming into play here. When they’re saying look, we got it, we got to keep catching up. However that might be low fidelity solution, we’re gonna, we’re gonna do this and start to get to proving out the investment in the next wave of in store media and next wave of in store technology that’s really gonna move the needle.
00:27:57 Chris Walton
Yeah, that’s a good point. I’m gonna go to. I want to give Joe the last word on this one because you know, he’s been probably drowning in retail media preparing for Shop talk here. But yeah, no, I agree with, I agree with you. And like, you know, I think it, you know, it says a lot to me more about where things are now, you know, because, and we’ve said this on the show many, many times, like we’ve, we’ve, I’ve, I personally have been very hesitant to sign off on all the digital screen investments that are going into the store because cracking the code on this is really hard.
And Liz Roach, to her credit, she said in the article, quote, dwell time likely equates to an incremental sale, but we actually need to test those models, end quote, to make sure that that is the case. Which is an awesome admission that, that that’s the theory at best right now. But they don’t actually know whether the impact is real. That’s really great for someone to actually come out and say that. It’s so transparent and candid. And also the other point about this too that is important is we’re not even attributing the sale to the individual level through this technology. We’re attributing it at upper funnels. So there is still a long way to go. But Joe, what do you think? I know you’re chopping at the bit to get in here.
00:29:04 Joe
Yeah, no, I love this topic. I mean I think on several different levels, like I, it so speaks to the disconnect between like the digital world and digital style measurement. What, what brands are used to be able to get as far as like kind of kind of outcome metrics from advertising that they do online to the real world, which is always, always, always been a lot messier and hard to measure whether you’re talking about out of home or even old school television advertising, much, much less like print. So I think it’s kind of interesting to see this low fidelity, low tech, low expense way of starting to get some, some very privacy friendly metrics, which I love.
And it’s very smart that Albertsons is kind of really playing up the fact that this is very, very friendly to the shopper. Not, not kind of grabbing people’s genders or other demographic data, just knowing a cart went by this ad and stopped for, or by this screen and stopped at this time for this long like it’s better than nothing. It’s probably not what a digital buyer is going to want as far as sophisticated metrics but, but maybe it’s a good enough compromise at least, at least for a start as they start building up that, that basis of data that kind of tracks, you know, kind of correlations between dwell time and, and sales increases or dwell time and maybe kind of upper funnel metrics if they do like survey based research to try to get those. So, so better than nothing. I, I’ve always a fan, somebody at Shop Lux of all places kind of said when you, when it comes to evaluating technologies, don’t buy the Ferrari if the Toyota is good enough and this is definitely a Toyota style technology and maybe it’s good enough it’s marketers and see if, see if it works.
00:30:43 Anne
Yep. It’s reliable, it’s tested and true. It’s definitely the Toyota of solutions. Yes. All right, let’s go to headline number five. Spotify is partnering with Bookshop.org to start selling physical books to premium subscribers in the U.S. and UK starting this spring, expanding beyond its audiobook offering, which it launched in 2022. According to the Wall Street Journal, Spotify will allow premium subscribers to buy hardcovers and paperback through its app, with bookshop.org setting retail prices, holding inventory and fulfilling sales, while Spotify receives an undisclosed affiliate fee. The offering will compete directly with Amazon.com, the country’s largest online bookseller, whose business units include Audible, the dominant audiobook service. Spotify is also introducing page Match, one of my favourite features, enabling users to sync their audiobooks with physical books by scanning a page from the printed book with their phone, then finding that exact spot in the audiobook edition. All right, I want to know, are you buying or selling? Buying hardcover books via Spotify.
00:31:50 Joe
I’m buying. I think it doesn’t do Spotify any harm. It’s like a few incremental book sales. Like everybody with an audience these days is either trying to kind of sell the audience’s attention or sell stuff to that audience. Why not books? The first thing I thought was actually, well, why, why isn’t Spotify selling CDs? But it turns out if you go to an artist page on Spotify, individual artists can set up merch stores, including selling CDs. So, so in a marketplace kind of way. They do already do that if they’ve got any kind of audience sentiment data from their, their audiobook audience. It says even a small percentage of those folks like to get a hardcover book if they really liked the audiobook, why not? I, I think it’s, it’s only upside for them and, and it’s kind of clever and it’s caught our attention. So it’s doing what it’s supposed to.
00:32:35 Anne
Yeah. We have people that know about bookshop.org who never knew about that company before. So it’s certainly good for them too. But yeah, Joe, I think you bring up a really good point. I mean, I think about, I think it’s Spotify recognising that their listeners are multi stream listeners. They’re multi channel audiences. And I, I do this all the time. Like where I’ll get a book, an audiobook and the hard copy. Because it depends on different points in my day. Like if I’m driving to a meeting or to pick up kids, I want to listen to the audiobook and then to have to figure out on my, either on my phone or in my hardcover book. Like I want to have that different experience where I’m actually reading it. And I think this, this is a great way low risk, no all upside for both bookshop.org and Spotify to grow an audience that they didn’t have before and provide them more opportunities to listen and more flexibility, especially with that Page Match app. But Chris, will, I love Page Match.
00:33:36 Joe
I mean, it feels like that that was probably the only real investment was like some developer had to spend a half hour or a day like figuring out how to make that work. But I love that idea for, for people like you that are kind of omni platform book readers, it feels like it’s going to be such a boon to their lives.
00:33:53 Anne
Yeah, I love it. Okay, Chris, I know how you feel about audiobooks, so I’m curious to get your thoughts on whether or not you think this is a good strategic move here for Spotify. Are you buying or selling?
00:34:04 Chris Walton
Yeah, I know I tried really hard to come up with a contrarian angle for this and I just can’t. I think you guys said it. It’s a good move for Spotify. You know, my question for you, Joe, though, is, I mean, ann is clearly 10,000 people, as we say on this show, so, so they’re meeting a need for Ann and people like her. But Joe, do you exhibit that characteristic of buying an audiobook and a physical book and reading. Reading both simultaneously throughout the course of finishing said book?
00:34:32 Joe
I am not an audiobook guy, although I’m guilty of buying like an ebook to like read on my phone or my, my iPad. And yeah, the actual physical paper book as well. Again, it’s almost like the paper book is oftentimes like a souvenir. If I really like the ebook, I can put it on my shelf and display it there. But yeah, but there, there have definitely been times when I’ve gone back and forth between an e book and the same physical book and, and then it’s like really matching bookmarks and whatnot. So, so even if it’s not an audiobook, I do kind of do what I, I do that behaviour in a way.
00:35:05 Anne
Yeah. You don’t want to carry the giant book in your bag like this. The ebook is make sense then the audiobook makes sense then maybe you want to read it before bed because you’re no screens. I mean I think there’s, there’s so much opportunity.
00:35:18 Joe
It’s happening with video already. Right, like, like clever like video services will let you watch part of a show on your tablet and then when you’re back in front of your TV you’re, you’re Amazon Fire or your, your Apple TV or whatever kind of picks up exactly where you left the show off on the other device. So why, why can’t we do that with books? We should.
00:35:38 Anne
I love, I love our campaign to, to save, to save the multi channel readers lives. Joe. All right, well let’s go to the lightning round. Joe, you get this first question. According to the Financial Times, despite a slowdown in luxury goods, the world’s luxury hotel market is booming and they’ve been able to increase prices as a result. Joe, what’s the nicest hotel that you’ve ever stayed in?
00:36:06 Joe
Well, I’m very tempted to lie and say it was the Emirates palace in Abu Dhabi where we had Shop Top Lux two weeks ago but did not put us up there. They put us up at another five star hotel across the street that was much cheaper but not quite as nice as the Emirates Palace Abu Dhabi. So nicest hotel actually when I was, was very young, in the early 2000s, the company I worked for put on a conference at the Amstel Hotel in Amsterdam, which was my first trip to continental Europe in my life. The first time I’d ever stayed at like a hotel that fancy. It is literally a palace from the 1860s on the Amstel river in Amsterdam. You imagine me like this 20 something kid off an overnight flight, like groggy and I get there and like they’re like, oh sir, we do not have a room for you but have a cappuccino in our solarium. And, and it was the first time in my life I’d ever been treated quite that nice and it’s been the benchmark ever since.
00:36:58 Chris Walton
That sounds like the way to go. I mean I don’t think anyone’s ever said the word solarium to me directly, Joe, so I think, I think you’re winning.
00:37:06 Joe
I didn’t know where it was. I was like oh, yeah, yeah.
00:37:09 Chris Walton
I’d be like, wait, what’s a solarium?
00:37:11 Anne
An aquarium? What? Yeah.
00:37:14 Chris Walton
All right, this next one, I’m very proud of. This next question. Joe, US downhiller Lindsey Vaughn suffered a complicated tibia fracture at the Olympics on Sunday. That was a terrible crash. The tibia excluded, however, what is your favourite bone in the human body?
00:37:31 Joe
My favourite bone is the hyoid bone. It’s spelled H Y O I D. Not many people know about it. It’s a little, like, crescent shaped bone in your throat that, like, your tongue and your larynx kind of all depend on it being there and intact so that you can talk and swallow and speak and whatnot. And fun fact, it is the only bone that is not connected to any other bone. It just is in there floating by itself, making our throats do what they do. So. And I appreciate that because I talk a lot.
00:37:58 Chris Walton
Oh, my God. Did you just know this off the top of your head, like?
00:38:01 Joe
I did a little research when you previewed the questions to me.
00:38:05 Chris Walton
Oh, my God. Oh, my God. That’s crazy. Wow. Good to know, Joe, what’s it called?
00:38:10 Joe
Hyoid. H Y, O I D. The hyoid spelled it.
00:38:15 Anne
Even spelled it for us. Okay, thanks, Joe. The more, you know, go with the.
00:38:19 Chris Walton
Humorous, but no, he went with the highway.
00:38:22 Joe
So, you know, you’d ask what the funniest boat in the body is. I suppose I would have, but yeah.
00:38:26 Anne
Oh, my gosh. I’m going to save us from these jokes. All right, question number three. Brits are expected to spend 2.38 billion pounds this year on Valentine’s Day, up 7% from last year, according to a study by parcel Hero. Joe, what is the best Valentine gift you’ve ever given or received? Received.
00:38:50 Joe
Received. Not an especially romantic gift, but a first edition of Frank Herbert’s Dune, which is one of my favourite books of all time. And it was just really thoughtful that somebody sought out, you know, kind of one of the first copies that came off the printing presses back in the 1960s and. And gifted it to me about, like 15 or 20 years ago, but I still remember it.
00:39:11 Anne
Oh, my gosh, that’s so special. Very thoughtful gift.
00:39:14 Chris Walton
And, Joe, do you have a digital copy of that book, too?
00:39:19 Joe
No, I have several physical copies of it, including that one which just sits on the shelf because I’m not going to, like, touch that one, but I have a readable copy.
00:39:27 Chris Walton
Yeah, the classics have a different place. All right, last one. McDonald’s is offering a few customers a special Valentine’s Day meal this year. Chicken McNuggets and caviar. Joe, where do you come down on caviar? First and second, would you eat McNugget.
00:39:43 Joe
Caviar Caviar, in my opinion, is overrated. If it wasn’t really associated with rich people and super expensive, nobody would bother with it. My first thought when McNugget Caviar came up, I mean, okay, sorry, I didn’t realise that would be, like, controversial. Please disagree with me if you’re a caviar aficionado.
00:40:01 Chris Walton
No, I love caviar, though, but that’s crazy. Wow. Okay, nice. You’re not a big fan. All right.
00:40:06 Joe
Just like little. Little black, salty, briny things. Like, I feel like there’s other ways to get that flavour that don’t cost thousands and thousands of dollars and involve killing sturgeon. And then McNugget caviar. When, like, I first saw that phrase, I was like, is that just chicken eggs? Like, is it? But it’s not, right? It’s.
00:40:24 Chris Walton
It’s a little chicken nuggets and a side of caviar. Yeah. The media is calling it McNugget Caviar. Yeah.
00:40:31 Anne
It’s like the potato chip. You know, you have. You have the potato chip, the creme fraiche and the caviar on top, except instead of that chip, it’s going to be a chicken McNugget.
00:40:39 Joe
I. I guess. Why not? Why not?
00:40:43 Chris Walton
Why?
00:40:44 Joe
If somebody put it in front of me and it would be rude not to, I would certainly eat it, but I would not, like, hit reload a thousand times on the McNugget Caviar website in the hopes of getting one of the very small number of them they produced.
00:40:55 Chris Walton
And would you eat McNugget caviar? Would you eat caviar that you procured at McDonald’s 100, right?
00:41:01 Anne
Yeah, I would. I would say let’s do it.
00:41:04 Chris Walton
I mean, you and I are both Caviar fans.
00:41:05 Joe
Maybe McCaviar will become a thing. Maybe they’ll just sort of add it.
00:41:09 Anne
To the regular menu, not the dollar menu. That’s not. Unfortunately, that’s not probably going to happen. Or would you eat caviar, a chicken nugget caviar, dollar version? That is another question.
00:41:24 Joe
That sounds very dangerous.
00:41:25 Chris Walton
No. According to Joe, too many sturgeons would be harmed at the production of that item.
00:41:30 Joe
Maybe they find some other fish, salmon roe, I guess.
00:41:33 Chris Walton
I don’t know. All right, Ella. Today’s podcast was produced, of course, with the help and support of Ella Siriord, Ella, producer Ella, come on in here, tell us. Well, one, one. Would you eat caviar that was served at McDonald’s? And then to what headline won the week for you?
00:41:48 Ella
I have to say I’ve actually never had caviar, you guys.
00:41:52 Chris Walton
Okay, okay.
00:41:53 Ella
It’s my first time having caviar I would like on a chicken nugget.
00:41:56 Chris Walton
So yeah, probably not.
00:41:58 Ella
My favourite headline this week though is by far Spotify partnering with bookshop.org Yes, I think there is this massive crave in this digital world just to unplug. And to me Spotify already feels like this place where people go to immerse themselves in music, creativity, podcasts, audiobooks, all the things and where you just want to relax. So to me, partnering with books, of course, like it just feels like a natural lead in. And I completely agree with you guys that I’m buying it. Why not?
00:42:30 Chris Walton
So are you one of these multi book readers too? Like, do you have a hard copy, a digital copy and an audio copy? Like, are you, are you, are you exhibiting that behaviour, Ella?
00:42:40 Ella
No, not at all. But I also didn’t know you could page mark. I had no idea. This is my first time hearing of this. So maybe from now on I will be.
00:42:48 Chris Walton
We’ll see.
00:42:49 Joe
It only just occurred to me that I, I do also sometimes like a soundtrack to a book. Like if I’m reading a physical book, there are particular kinds of music that sometimes go really well with the book. And so maybe this is another Spotify opportunity as they start curating like the Spotify playlist for Dune, let’s say like, or, or whatever other book and then, and then you can, they can sell you the book and, and give you the playlist at the same time.
00:43:11 Anne
So C. Synergies, Synergies, Synergies. It’s all over, Joe. I love it.
00:43:16 Chris Walton
I think I, I think I must have ADHD or something because I can’t even imagine. I can’t one listen to an audiobook. I’ve talked about this with Anne before. Like I cannot listen to an audiobook. Like I just can’t focus on it and I can’t even listen to music while I read. Like that’s just the way I. The way I roll. So. Wow. Okay, I guess, yeah, I guess I’m a little different. And happy birthday today to Jennifer Aniston, Damian Lewis and to everyone’s favourite adolescent werewolf, Taylor Lautner. And remember, if you can only read or listen to one retail blog in the business, make it Omnitoc, the only retail media outlet run by two former executives from a current top 10 US retailer.
Our Fast Five podcast is the quickest, fastest rundown of all the week’s top news and our daily newsletter, the Retail Daily Minute, tells you all you need to know each day to stay on top of your game as a retail executive and also regularly features 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 leave us a review wherever you happen to listen to your podcast or on YouTube. Joe, shop talk’s a little over a month away if people are interested listening to this. Still want to register? What’s the best way for them to do that?
00:44:18 Joe
Absolutely. Shoptalk.com, our website, is probably the best place to go. Or spring.shoptalk.com if you want to go straight to all of the good details about the Spring show.
00:44:28 Chris Walton
Awesome. Awesome. Well, that concludes today’s show. You can follow us wherever you get your podcasts and you can also cheque out our content on YouTube.com omnitalkretail so until next week, on behalf of all of us here at omnitalk, on behalf of Ann, myself, producer Ella, as always, 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.