Retail Unwrapped - from The Robin Report Robin Lewis and Shelley E. Kohan

The state of AI in retail today can be as confusing as it is exciting. But it is a board mandate for retail, without question. The opportunity to drive higher productivity and profitability is massive, yet it’s still a technology that needs to be driven by a purpose. The first and most critical question:  What are you trying to solve for? 

Join Purva Gupta, Co-Founder and CEO of Lily, with Robin and Shelley as they deconstruct the common pitfalls of “tech vendor math” and reveal a new path forward for retailers and brands that focuses on the outcomes they want to achieve and how to measure progress and success. The bottom line? The pressure on executives and CFOs to be able to quantify and believe in the impact of AI enablement tools is greater than ever. 

They know they need to substantiate the results of those investments with legitimate, tangible sales and performance gains. In a world of technology proliferation and vendor claims that too often overpromises and underdelivers, executives now expect partners who can actually show the proof and deliver on those promises. Listen and learn.
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Recent failures of Matches, FarFetch, and Net-a-Porter has left Mythersea as the last luxe multi-brand standing. High spenders prefer to buy directly from brand companies like LVMH, Christian Dior, Gucci, and Hermès. And these luxe majors would rather sell directly to consumers than wholesale to a multi-branded ecommerce website. 

Join Robin and Shelley as they roll back the curtain on what’s going on with luxury ecomm.  What’s more, live streaming will be another nail in the coffin for these multi-brand ecomm sites along with the growing luxury resale market. 
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Consumers are speaking out. A class action lawsuit has been filed by two Hermès shoppers in Northern California who are fed up with sales tactics used by this luxury powerhouse. 

They allege that the French luxury brand violates federal and California antitrust laws when selling its iconic status-symbol Birkin and Kelly handbags. They claim Hermès has illegally forced customers to spend thousands of dollars on other products to gain access to buying a Birkin bag. 

Join Robin and Shelley with guests Michelle Mandelstein, an attorney and an adjunct instructor at Fashion Institute of Technology and Jeff Fisher, VP of retail for Blenders eyewear, as they hash out if the lawsuit has any merit and what impact this may have on the future of the luxury sector. 
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Don’t dismiss the power play of the growing community of content creators, recognized as the cultural leaders of the 21st century.  Proof? The creator economy market is expected to double to $480 billion by 2027. 

Join Julian Greene, Head of Creator Partnerships at Flagship along with Robin and Shelley in a candid conversation about how social media has unlocked a flood of content creators and the monetization of creator commerce. They also dispel common myths surrounding the burgeoning creator community as an industry. Any brand that has not dived head-first into this new content commerce opportunity will be at a severe disadvantage. 
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Here is a tale of four female CEOs with contrasting and compelling leadership styles. 

Take Mary Dillon, who led 288% revenue growth at Ulta but is now grappling with the past two years of slower growth at Footlocker. Contrast that with Fran Horowitz, CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch, who has overseen 16% growth in 2023 and a remarkable 10% CAGR since 2019 since 2017.  

Join Robin and Shelley as they delve into two leadership styles and strategic approaches to reveal how these two leaders envision success. Looking forward, Michelle Gass, CEO at Levi’s, and Artemis Patrick, CEO of Sephora North America, are poised for accelerated growth. Listen to the stories about these four remarkable women and how they are reinvigorating retail.
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Fashion ecomm has evolved from customers finding and visiting websites to seek out what they want, to search-enabled discovery, to today’s modern model of bringing fashion directly to you and replicating the excitement of impulse purchasing …online.  The art and science of the shopping experience have also been perfected with the help of influencers who are real and authentic.  

Join special guest Tarek Müller, star entrepreneurial founder of ABOUTYOU along with Robin and Shelley in a lively conversation about how to propel the online fashion experience into a business building success story. 

They will discuss how ABOUT YOU reached €5 billion in GTV* through influencer marketing and international expansion – and how the technology and expertise developed along the way now powers over 140 shops with the SCAYLE Commerce Engine.
For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.