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UK retail is entering a defining phase. Five Thing Friday UK · The Retail Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome back to another fabulous edition of Five
• 0:03
  things Friday UK and it wouldn't be fabulous with
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  my my wonderful Co host Simone. Hello.
• 0:21
  Hello, how are you? Yeah, good.
• 0:24
  Thank you. So for those who who don't know
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  me, I'm Alex. I run the retail podcast, plus
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  many other things that I'll talk about today.
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  I help retailers and people who sell to retailers maintain their
• 0:35
  relevance. Simone, what do you do?
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  Oh everything around rapid delivery.
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  NIF Co founder of NIFT which is often described as the delivery
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  for quality fashion. So working with lots of
• 0:48
  different retailers to help them to have localised and very fast
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  delivery. Fantastic.
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  Well, we're going to jump into it 5 things Friday.
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  First thing we have topical news, Russell and Bromley.
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  Russell and Bromley, yeah, this is definitely the obvious one
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  that I wanted to talk about, but it is or has snapped up Russell
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  and Bromley in a rescue deal and whilst it is exciting, I do
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  think it does say a lot about where the UK is right now.
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  You know, Russell and Bromley is 145 year old brand, real British
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  heritage all over the High Street.
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  So I think the fact that Russell and Bromley have ended up in a
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  free pack rescue deal, yeah, I find it quite sad.
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  But for next door, not really surprising.
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  You know, they've quietly become, maybe not quietly
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  actually, but they've become one of the smartest operators in
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  retail. Didn't surprise me at all.
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  Yeah, but I'll be intrigued to see what happens.
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  I think it will do incredibly well.
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  I'm more intrigued to see what happens with the physical side
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  of Bristol and Bromley. Yeah, I think I read they're
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  going to shut 30 stores and concessions and keep the brand.
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  I'm surprised at VC didn't go in and buy them.
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  Ultimately, the UK is going to end up with three mega
• 2:01
  retailers. You've got Frasers Group, you've
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  got Next and you've got JD Sports who own multiple brands.
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  Obviously you've got Zara. But in terms from a UK
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  perspective, this is sort of going down that line of mega
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  brand owners who who run who run the stores.
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  OK, moving on Swift fleet coming on to me.
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  I came across obviously Valentine's is what I don't
• 2:25
  celebrate Valentine's. So I'm not worried.
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  We have a a good solid relationship.
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  Valentine's is not our thing. So thoughtful of running a
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  really funny campaign. I never actually knew knew this
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  brand until I came across the Instagram video where basically
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  they've got quirky Mrs thoughtful.
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  Now, if she is Mrs thoughtful or she's a marketing campaign, but
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  I love that in terms of it's very quirky.
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  It feels like it's on message in terms of how they're relating to
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  this new generation and more more specifically, how they're
• 3:00
  making cards relevant, which is, you know, something from the old
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  world to a digital age. And I and I find it really
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  interesting that they've gone for the materialisation of, you
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  know, this as a thing and there and their cards all very cheeky
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  and quite rude, some would say, but they are cheeky.
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  And so they're not for everyone. But I just found it really
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  interesting that they're going for a physical manifestation of
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  the brand as we go through it. And, you know, coming up to
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  Valentine's Day, it's super interesting to watch.
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  Now moving back to you. I love that really great
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  campaign. But yeah, I wanted to just shine
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  a light on something that I was personally excited about this
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  week. And it's Nina Hopkins who was
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  the founder of of Jackie. I know know whether I'm saying
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  this right. So if there's anybody listening
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  and just like saying. It.
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  Jackie, Jackie, it's a brand that I love, but she has, after
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  the the success of Jackie, I think she stepped back in 2024.
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  She's just launched this new ready to wear label called
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  Sandy, which I love. Look at it, very cool.
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  Very you, I got to be honest. Me, yeah, I always love Jackie
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  as a brand. It's very cool and fun
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  alternatives to real fur. Very Scandi inspired.
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  Jackie is actually Danish for jacket.
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  Still don't know whether I'm saying it right but yeah I'm
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  just a sucker for Scandi design. Clean it's considered and it's
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  very good for tall people and I'm.
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  I think I didn't want to say that, but that's why I thought
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  when I saw this and I didn't, you know, having seen you in the
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  real world, OK, I get it. I get it.
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  So yeah, I really love this. If there's any tall women
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  listening in, check out D. But also as well, it's just a
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  nice reminder that, you know, she fashion careers aren't
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  linear. You know, she's built something
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  successful, she's stepped away, and then she's come back with a
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  fresh point of view and launched something else.
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  So. And yeah, I'm excited to see the
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  growth of Sandy We. We need, I mean, look, we just
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  said you're going to end up with these mega corporations owning
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  the High Street and everyone complaints at the High Street,
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  specifically in the UK was ended ended up looking the same,
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  right. You got your Starbucks, you got
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  your next, you got your, you know, M&S at one end and John
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  Lewis at the other end. And that's the UK High Street
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  with with, you know, other brands in there.
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  And so I think we just need to keep banging the drum for young,
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  small, whatever fresh retail talent that's coming in, right
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  to grow, you know, we need AI know farm Rio one of your
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  customers. But you almost think, how do you
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  get a farm Rio in every High Street exactly.
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  Something fresh? Yeah.
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  The same as everything else, yeah.
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  Or Aubrey. Right, Obin.
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  Sorry, Obin. OK, moving back to me.
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  So although I'm not going to go into this, I'm going to be
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  launching Keynote Lee imminently.
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  And Keynote Lee is Spotify for keynotes.
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  So NRF will be in here and it will be basically all of the
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  keynotes from a a different perspective.
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  But what I'm hoping to build throughout the year with the 13
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  conferences I'll be at, we'll be together at Shop Talk Lux.
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  Another shout out for Shop Talk Lux.
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  If you go in, get your tickets, you'll get to meet me and
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  Simone, but Simone will be on stage.
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  I'll just be a media partner there.
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  So please come say hello, but you will.
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  I'm building this human intelligence platform and the
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  reason being we haven't got there yet and this may be
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  nothing to do with retail, but we are going to have to fight
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  back against AI. AI ChatGPT.
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  I love. I couldn't do what I do without
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  it. But human intelligence, why we
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  go to conferences will die out if we don't sort of catalogue
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  grab and put everything in one place because the AI will come
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  along and just, you know, make it into fodder and it'll just
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  be, you know, insights. The where did that come from?
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  And So what keynote is about is basic as I keep going back to
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  the Spotify for human intelligence.
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  So that keynote, you know, from JD Sports CEO that you saw what
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  was the key takeaways and and almost, you know, we've seen Ted
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  X and we've seen Ted and how YouTube sort of congregate to
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  all of this. But again, it's really
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  problematic when you're going to search for insights specifically
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  within your industry. You get so much nonsense.
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  It's really nice to look at the human intelligence element of
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  this. And that's what I'll be
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  launching it. Well, it's in beta, so you'll be
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  able to sign up, get an account, get 3, three free credits, but
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  the contents not there. So we're just loading up the
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  content from NRF and then we'll see how that goes.
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  So on that bombshell. Very excited for that, for
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  someone like me who will go to a conference, take notes, we'll be
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  rushing, go to the next one. Like, do you really revisit
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  them? Like at the notes on my phone?
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  I just, yeah, I think that's really great.
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  I really do. And I think it's from a lot of
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  the people who can't get to come like we sort of skim over that
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  retail is a margin poor industry, right?
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  It's not as if they've got oodles of money that they can go
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  to 15 conferences are. Yeah.
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  And so, you know, maybe your executive leadership team go,
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  but the, the, the, the team, you know, beneath them can't go.
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  So how do you share insights with them?
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  And again, that's what I'm thinking about.
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  All of the years that I've been going to conferences, people are
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  like, oh, you know, I couldn't come fly out to New York, but my
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  my management team are there. Love to hear about what that
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  looks like. And there'll be some cool
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  features like, you know, voice text to voice, right?
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  So you'll be able to interact with their ask questions
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  hopefully. But anyway, on that bombshell, I
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  know that we're on a tight schedule.
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  Simone, thank you so much and I will see you on Monday.
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  I think in in flesh. Yes, you will see you in Abu
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  Dhabi. How exciting.
• 8:55
  Get get your TikTok podcaster of mine.
• 8:58
  I've got some ideas for how we can do some stuff together.
• 9:03
  Take care. Thank you.
• 9:04
  Bye.