Stay in Touch
After acquiring Rockstar in March 2020, PepsiCo announced plans to double Rockstar’s sales worldwide over the next three years. In an interview with Modern Retail, PepsiCo’s CMO and svp of the energy category, Fabiola Torres, discussed Rockstar’s rebrand, as well as the brand’s forays into gaming.
Last year's crafting boom made Joann one of retail's biggest winners, helping it go public earlier this year. Now, the company wants to use its stores -- along with newfound e-commerce customers -- to keep that momentum going. Christopher DiTullio, the company chief customer officer, discussed Joann's retention plans with Modern Retail.
This week, Reebok is iterating upon its loyalty program with a weeklong, members-only virtual event with first access to product drops. Tom Burrow, Reebok’s vp of digital brand commerce, chatted with Modern Retail about evolving the sneaker drop model towards loyal customers, incorporating consumer data into production decisions and the role of athlete influencers in their loyalty offerings.
Gap is investing in its online fulfillment and customer service centers to prepare for the holiday season, and using automation as a stop-gap to a nationwide labor crunch. Modern Retail spoke with Gap's svp of global logistics, Kevin Kuntz, about how the company's investment in logistics have changed over the years.
This fall, Uniqlo is celebrating its 15th anniversary in the United States. The Japanese retailer opened its first U.S. store in New York City's Soho neighborhood and has since expanded across the country. Now, the company's brick and mortar strategy is shifting as it integrates its shoppable website and digital products.
The pandemic helped bring resale into the mainstream, with several platforms benefiting from the trend of young consumers buying and selling goods. One company that's experienced an influx in users, both young and outside the Gen Z demographic, is StockX. While the platform began as a go-to for rare, hard-to-find sneakers, StockX is working to diversify its partnerships and offerings to cater to a global audience.
The buy now, pay later (BNPL) category has benefitted from the ongoing e-commerce boom in the past few years. Now, players in the space -- which include Afterpay, Affirm and Klarna -- are looking for ways to stand out to both retail partners and consumers. Sezzle is one upstart that's looking to differentiate by courting young customers with offerings like rewards, flexible spending and a large selection of brand partners.
In the last five years especially, e-commerce business marketplace Flippa witnessed a huge market shift. Before, individual entrepreneurs buy small e-commerce businesses. And today, a flood of VC-backed aggregators like Thrasio make up a significant share of the big-ticket purchases on the platform. The company's CEO said that, from his vantage point, some of these companies are highly sophisticated, but others are “cashed-up, private equity masked as a FBA aggregator.”
Green home-cleaning brand Safely launched an in-store assortment at 750 Bed Bath & Beyond storefronts on Monday. Co-founder Emma Grede hopes the Bed Bath & Beyond partnership will help Safely to meet consumers where they are, and get the brand closer to a 50/50 mix between retailer and DTC sales.
Brick-and-mortar retail has transformed over the past decade, with less emphasis on in-store sales and more focus on customer experience. Todd Sachse, the founder of retail construction company Sachse Construction, explains how retailers are rethinking how they build out their physical footprint.
In the first quarter of 2021, online-only retailer Overstock’s revenue rose 94% year-over-year and active customers nearly doubled. In 2020, the retailers' full-year revenue rose 75%, to$ 2.5 billion. Overstock CEO Jonathan Johnson talked to Modern Retail about Overstock’s unique ability to navigate furniture supply chain issues, the company's expansion to Canada and the longevity of the patio furniture boom.
Thanks to consumers' changing tastes and eating habits, the plant-based trend has been growing for years. The success of brands like Oatly and Beyond Meat helped prove the trend's staying power. Seth Goldman, founder of Honest Tea and new plant-based jerky brand Eat the Change, explains why the pandemic helped further popularize the category.
While other footwear brands struggled in 2021, Hoka One One managed to grow sales. Hoka (which ended its fiscal year in March 2021) reported a full-year revenue increase of 62% to $571 million, outpacing performance footwear peers like Nike or Adidas. Now, the brand is continuing global expansion, partnering with fashion brands and driving sales on and offline.
After a record-year of sales for its merchants, Shopify is overhauling its merchant platform, dubbing it Online Store 2.0. In an interview, Vanessa Lee, Shopify’s director of product for storefronts, spoke to Modern Retail about the e-commerce company's updated storefront tools and how it hopes to give brands more room for customization.
After taking a stab at standalone cafes and boutiques, Godiva has pivoted to growing its CPG and e-commerce businesses. In the past year, the chocolate maker has closed all its North America shops and launched new partnerships with retailers, including Target and Walgreens. In an interview with Modern Retail, Godiva’s president of the Americas, Caroline Le Roch discussed how these changes are paying off.
Individual brands are copying the Amazon aggregator model and trying to scoop up their own marketplace sellers. The addition of CBD brand Grove underscores that interest in the Amazon aggregator business model is spreading -- but that doesn’t mean established companies are rushing to acquire marketplace products quite yet.
Read MoreAt the Modern Retail Summit, retail marketers will discuss everything from the Amazon effect to new infrastructure to the shift in the direct-to-consumer world.
Book Passes
