eTail West Briefing: Meta weaning, Sam’s Club’s growth mindset and other Day 1 highlights

As a business where customers pay to shop, Sam’s Club is laser-focused on getting feedback from its members, said Greg Pulsifer, svp of e-commerce. “If we don’t listen to our members, we don’t have a business,” he said in a conversation with Modern Retail’s senior reporter Melissa Daniels at eTail West. 

Pulsifer spoke about how the company drove 24% growth in e-commerce sales last quarter in part by increasing delivery from club stores to a customer’s doorstep. Sam’s Club also offers options like curbside pickup and allowing in-store shoppers to scan items from their phones as they shop for a faster checkout experience. “We are truly an omnichannel business,” Pulsifer said. 

One change Sam’s Club recently rolled out based on customer behavior involved updating hyperlinks for frequent search terms. “Cakes,” for example, was a top-three search because members were looking for how to order a custom cake. A hyperlink to that order page now pops up with other suggested search terms. Sam’s Club also recently made the decision to remove pricing information from some of its web displays, a decision that increased engagement and conversions as customers clicked to learn more about the product. 

Pulsifer, who spent more than two decades in e-commerce before joining Sam’s Club about a year ago, said e-commerce professionals who are working in omnichannel companies can lean on concrete customer feedback and data gleaned from A/B tests to help get buy-in on new strategies. He also said it’s important to use tangible examples — one common metaphor he uses at Sam’s Club is converting the volume of sales to football fields to give staff a visual. He also said that, as teams navigate economic downturns or tech disruptions like generative AI, it’s important to stay grounded in reality while also looking for growth opportunities. 

“Some of the best leaders I’ve worked with are great storytellers, and they’re also optimists,” he said. 

Overheard 

“Everyone’s trying to get away from Meta.” Many brands are looking for new ways to advertise and reach their customer in a way that doesn’t rely on the crapshoot of Meta targeting. Some brands mentioned seeing acquisition costs double or triple overnight. One attendee said he turned off his Meta ads while at the eTail conference so he didn’t have to monitor any potential swings. 

“No one’s afraid of the tiger anymore.” One C-suite executive in the mass retail space said that some brands may end up raising prices due to uncertainties around tariffs and other macroeconomic headwinds. In the past, brands may have been hesitant to do so at the risk of alienating the customer or having concerns about competing against larger brands or private labels. But this exec shared that that fear is evaporating as corporations lean into “shrinkflation” to grow their margins and evidence that consumers are still shopping at higher prices.

Quote of the Day 

“We’re definitely playing and experimenting and seeing what [sales channels] work for us and building that out. And that’s a fun place to be. We just launched an Amazon store in September, and that was about finding [a new] customer and expanding awareness that the brand does more than just event dressing. We now see so many of our day pieces [selling] on Amazon. And TikTok is something we’re looking at and [are potentially] building out our shop there, with influencers. The team is open to that experiment.” –Nicole Goldberg, director of e-commerce and digital marketing at Simkhai, on democratizing fashion