Latest / The Retail Podcast / Five Things Friday: USA, UK, Europe & APAC — Culture, Commerce, and What Moves Next

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Five Things Friday: USA, UK, Europe & APAC — Culture, Commerce, and What Moves Next · The Retail Podcast

• 0:11
  Hello and welcome to a fabulous USA 5 Things Friday with my
• 0:17
  amazing Co host Jill Dvorak. Is that right?
• 0:22
  Right. You got it right.
• 0:23
  Yes, and the reason why I'm smiling.
• 0:25
  This is like such a phenomenal Co host to be sharing this
• 0:30
  virtual stage with. Jill is the SVP of content at
• 0:34
  NRF. I've been going to NRF for 15
• 0:36
  years. He's like me in your idols.
• 0:38
  So you're Stevie like. Quiet.
• 0:40
  Come on. Gross.
• 0:40
  Don't be. Sure you're.
• 0:43
  Listen, we're gonna. We're gonna.
• 0:44
  We're on a tight schedule. We're gonna try and keep it to
• 0:46
  15 minutes. You know the format.
• 0:49
  These are the five top things in the United States of America
• 0:53
  that we feel are quite interesting to have a, a
• 0:56
  conversation on. And to start off with, we're
• 0:59
  going to have a, a look. I think Glossier is like one of
• 1:03
  the leading beauty brands, right?
• 1:05
  Absolutely. I, I mean, it's certainly in the
• 1:08
  Gen Z category. It's just, you know, they came
• 1:12
  out with such a unique proposition years and years ago,
• 1:15
  and they've just, they've kept it up.
• 1:16
  They've still done really, really well.
• 1:18
  People. Yeah.
• 1:19
  Following. I, I know what we spoke about
• 1:21
  their, their CEO stepping down, but the, the news here is that
• 1:25
  obviously Glossier with their 1,000,000 TikTok followers,
• 1:30
  they've just launched the Glossier brand on TikTok shop.
• 1:35
  And, and this is really proving to me specifically in the USA,
• 1:39
  Gen Z's favourite place to go and buy beauty to go and
• 1:43
  discovery discover beauty. And you can see their own videos
• 1:47
  have got quite good traction. Anyway, they're sort of you can
• 1:50
  now buy it on TikTok shop in the US, which I think is again a
• 1:55
  sign of our time. So who would have thought you
• 1:58
  would have beauty on social media channel?
• 2:01
  I don't well, it's, you know, it's so interesting because you
• 2:04
  look and you see 1,000,000 followers like, well, what else
• 2:07
  do they need? They're doing great.
• 2:09
  Well, on TikTok, it's close to a billion users slash potential
• 2:13
  shoppers. So they've just, I can't even do
• 2:16
  that math. But 1,000,000 to 1 billion,
• 2:18
  they've exponentially outsized their audience now and they can,
• 2:23
  they just continue to kind of create this incredible content.
• 2:27
  It's a natural fit. All of their customers are also
• 2:30
  like very likely creators. So it's, it's a perfect fit and
• 2:33
  frankly, I, I would have thought they were on there already.
• 2:37
  So it's great to see that now they're joining to be on there
• 2:40
  and have it have another Ave for the people to check out and, you
• 2:44
  know, learn about them. And I'm hoping I'm, I'm doing
• 2:46
  the CEO justice. I'm pretty sure she said.
• 2:49
  We're, we're not a 10 or 12 year old brand.
• 2:52
  We're a, we're 100 year old brand that's 10 years into that
• 2:56
  journey, which I absolutely loved.
• 2:58
  You know, I love that. Isn't that the right way to look
• 3:00
  at it? Yeah.
• 3:02
  Emily, Emily Weiss was the founder then Kyle Leahy is the
• 3:05
  the current CEO that's moving out.
• 3:08
  And they both, I, I think they've been so true to kind of
• 3:11
  who their customer is that it's they seemed that they will stand
• 3:14
  the test of time. They weren't a blip that went
• 3:16
  away quickly. They've showed staying power, at
• 3:19
  least in this insane era of social media.
• 3:22
  So yeah, I think they're here to stick around.
• 3:25
  Which is the nice link into the next one Adidas seen to
• 3:29
  currently not be able to put a foot wrong and I'll and I'll say
• 3:33
  why because obviously athletes, some of their competitors Nike
• 3:37
  have been really struggling with sales and some people have
• 3:41
  argued it's because they went off peace.
• 3:43
  They decided to disrupt the market just be direct to market
• 3:47
  a director market brand. Then they went no, no, we're
• 3:49
  going to go with our partners. So they're bold and dabbled in
• 3:51
  both markets, but also what I think is a fantastic sign of the
• 3:57
  economy right now for brands is this sort of relationship with
• 4:02
  megastars. I mean, Samuel L Jackson is a
• 4:05
  mega * so is Missy Elliott. And they've come up as the part
• 4:09
  of the launch of the Superstar brand from Adidas.
• 4:12
  They've come up with this. Cool.
• 4:14
  I've got the notes on who actually did that.
• 4:15
  Who is it? Where is it?
• 4:16
  Let me tell you is. Glorilla, I think, is part of
• 4:20
  it. Oh man, where is that lost it.
• 4:23
  OK, I I thought I did it, but I don't.
• 4:26
  But the reason why this is interesting and I mentioned
• 4:28
  globally, obviously this is AUS campaign that's literally
• 4:31
  launched one day ago had 50,000 views in the UK right now Oasis
• 4:38
  are doing their comeback tour 30 year old band that's been sold
• 4:42
  out. But look at who what brand is at
• 4:44
  the heart of this and it's engagement.
• 4:47
  It's again Adidas and you know the the pop up store that's been
• 4:52
  opened in Manchester and London, Adidas all over the shop
• 4:55
  connecting with Rock'n'roll, which again is a complete
• 4:59
  different music sphere from Missy Elliott and acting sphere
• 5:03
  from Samuel L Jackson. But I think it's a master class
• 5:06
  in working with create content creators at a mega star level
• 5:11
  which. 100% I mean, it's just bringing the relevance and
• 5:15
  bringing the cool factor and you know, the the Juad Aviv, like
• 5:18
  people want to be part of something that's cool and
• 5:20
  relevant. Speaking of of cool, I got the
• 5:23
  chance to go to, you know, canned lions the the creative
• 5:27
  festival about out of three weeks ago.
• 5:30
  And it was really clear from kind of walking around there,
• 5:34
  the shift from giant, giant agencies running all creative
• 5:40
  and all brands kind of top of funnel to now being much more in
• 5:44
  the creator space, much more in the influencer.
• 5:48
  But even micro influencer space. There were a lot of influencers
• 5:51
  that had very specific niche. But.
• 5:54
  Fervent, fervent followers. So that was interesting to see.
• 5:57
  There's kind of a wave of revenue that's shifting and is
• 6:03
  there for the taking for brands and for influencers.
• 6:07
  So I think that goes along. We're like, do you need an
• 6:11
  agency to go direct to a celeb? Not really, but maybe to go to
• 6:15
  some of these smaller influencers.
• 6:17
  How are you finding them? It's just it's a unique new way
• 6:20
  of matching. I know you love everyone, so you
• 6:22
  you have to be really careful and like, but who was there any
• 6:25
  brand that sort of blew your mind in terms of their
• 6:27
  activations or any, anyone that did a really great job?
• 6:31
  It's a great question. All of them are amazing because.
• 6:34
  All of them. You're in, you're in the South
• 6:36
  of France. I will say Walmart Connect had a
• 6:38
  really great one. They had a lot of their partners
• 6:43
  there and you could kind of go and just.
• 6:45
  It. Was almost like what are those
• 6:47
  things called? Like a when speed dating, like
• 6:50
  you could just go up and be like, oh, here's NBC, here's
• 6:52
  this player, here's this player. And so yeah.
• 6:56
  And they had a lot of their partners there.
• 6:59
  So it was just it was a one stop shop to kind of meet a lot of
• 7:02
  those people. There were, I mean, YouTube,
• 7:05
  Salesforce, you know, MasterCard, the female quotient,
• 7:09
  a lot of them had these different brands that were
• 7:11
  speaking and just talking about any part of their marketing
• 7:15
  journey, mostly top of funnel brand awareness.
• 7:17
  But a lot of them realise you need the metrics obviously now
• 7:20
  and that people are there to talk about the metrics.
• 7:23
  So a lot we're talking about really what are the new KPIs
• 7:26
  that you look at and how do you measure them when everything is
• 7:30
  new and you're not even comping year over year anymore because
• 7:34
  there's brand new activations and things like that.
• 7:37
  So it was, it was fascinating and.
• 7:40
  We could do a whole. We should do a show from.
• 7:42
  There, we'll do that one. And I think, I mean, can we call
• 7:46
  them Marine? Obviously they are a retailer,
• 7:48
  but Oh no, what a transformation right underneath their CEO the
• 7:54
  last five years going into all these texts anyway, we we
• 7:57
  definitely need to the show just talking on research and data.
• 8:01
  It just happens the NRF have had some interesting recent
• 8:05
  research. Yeah, I mean, we every year, you
• 8:08
  know, we do back to school, that's a big, big shopping
• 8:11
  holiday. It's not just elementary and
• 8:13
  middle and high school. There's a lot with college and a
• 8:16
  lot leaving home for the first time.
• 8:18
  So you think about it, it's almost like you're you're
• 8:20
  rehousing people each year. So that's a really, really,
• 8:24
  really big holiday, probably second only to kind of the Q4
• 8:27
  holidays in December. So as of early July, where we
• 8:31
  are now, more than half of back to school and college shoppers
• 8:35
  have already started. So it's getting a little bit
• 8:38
  earlier and earlier each year. Some of that is because people
• 8:41
  are pulling forward shopping for a year of tariff pricing going
• 8:46
  into effect. Some of that is there are deals
• 8:51
  right now and there are big Amazon Prime deals.
• 8:54
  There are big Walmart deals. Walmart launched a very similar
• 8:57
  sale to Amazon Prime these same four days.
• 9:00
  There are a tonne of those sales kind of the Christmas in July
• 9:02
  that we can talk about. But right now, I mean, the
• 9:05
  research is showing how much people are pulling this forward,
• 9:10
  which is great to look at the numbers.
• 9:12
  What it could mean is that it will be a little lighter in
• 9:15
  August or September if everyone's pulling these
• 9:18
  forward. So something to think about ties
• 9:20
  in a lot with our chief economist, Jack Kleinhans.
• 9:23
  He's phenomenal, by the way, in the press.
• 9:25
  I've got to start floating over on Earth because this is going
• 9:27
  to become quite great for people.
• 9:32
  And you saw him? Yeah.
• 9:33
  I'm not paid, actually. And two years ago I turned up
• 9:36
  from Europe. Doom and gloom.
• 9:39
  The world is going to the and he stood up with the Deloitte.
• 9:41
  I can't remember whoever else was on stage with him.
• 9:44
  And he says numbers are really good.
• 9:45
  It's going to be the best year ever.
• 9:47
  We we're calling it that. It's going to be really good.
• 9:49
  That was, oh man, you know nothing next year.
• 9:51
  I said, you know what, I have to apologise because I actually
• 9:54
  when I did the review of it, I was like these Americans and
• 9:57
  their positivity about the economy, best year ever.
• 10:01
  But anyway, sorry, go ahead. Awesome.
• 10:03
  I will, I will make sure he knows that he was right.
• 10:05
  It is funny. We we always talk about should
• 10:08
  we go back and talk about how correct we were?
• 10:10
  But yeah, you know, I mean, it's, it's a huge, huge amount
• 10:13
  of money for a lot of these, you know, specialty electronics,
• 10:17
  clothing, department stores, shoes, all of that.
• 10:20
  So, you know, each family is expected to spend around.
• 10:25
  It's funny, I would I would ask us, and I would never say this
• 10:28
  much, but about a little over 1300.
• 10:31
  It's almost $1400 for each school year.
• 10:33
  So for this year, last year set a record of just over that.
• 10:37
  It was 1370 or 1367, I think for each family.
• 10:42
  So last year the forecast was around 94 billion in schools
• 10:47
  back to school shopping, not just school supplies.
• 10:50
  This year will be a little short of that.
• 10:52
  But again, if you look at the maybe some increase in prices
• 10:56
  due to tariffs, it will likely be right over.
• 10:59
  So usually we're within a one point margin error based on the
• 11:03
  back if. You're in the back to school
• 11:05
  market. It's a good year.
• 11:07
  It's a great it's a great year. So that's get your supplies now
• 11:10
  if you don't want them to sell out, that's that's one of the
• 11:13
  things that the stores are kind of toting.
• 11:14
  So it's a good, it's a Goodyear. Do you want to comment on this
• 11:17
  one or should we go straight forward to our final one?
• 11:20
  Yeah, let's go to our final one. But yeah, I mean I.
• 11:22
  Think you meant this sort of blends perfectly to what you
• 11:25
  were saying. Get those deals in.
• 11:27
  Get those deals so. We're not paid by Prime.
• 11:29
  You were telling me there's a warm up day as well.
• 11:31
  And there's another day as well, right?
• 11:33
  Yeah, yeah. I mean, at this point, all of
• 11:35
  them, I'm, I'm very serious customer at all of them.
• 11:38
  But it's interesting. And Prime Day has been going on
• 11:40
  now close to a decade. Going into it, there was a
• 11:43
  forecast that Prime Day alone was going to have just shy of
• 11:47
  $24 billion of sales in four days.
• 11:52
  Now the big change this year is that it's a four day holiday.
• 11:55
  It used to be a 2 day holiday here.
• 11:57
  So then what Walmart has done, you know?
• 11:59
  Obviously to. Try to get their share as well
• 12:02
  is they've launched a four day holiday.
• 12:05
  Same thing, prices very similar if not better if you're.
• 12:09
  Like from the 4th of July onwards.
• 12:10
  Exact same days. Yep, and it just so happens to
• 12:14
  also coincide with Nordstrom's biggest sale of the year.
• 12:17
  That always happens at this time of the year, the anniversary
• 12:20
  sale. Now Nordstrom doesn't sell quite
• 12:23
  the same SKU count, obviously Walmart and Amazon, but it's a
• 12:27
  lot of these same back to school items, the fall items, the trend
• 12:31
  items that you can get at a discount.
• 12:33
  So that's it's just a sale bonanza and I'm going to just be
• 12:38
  shopping again all night tonight.
• 12:40
  But I saw a few early results come in from Prime Day
• 12:44
  yesterday. More than half of the sales were
• 12:47
  mobile, which is really kind of what we expect most, most
• 12:51
  Americans have the app on their phone, but it was a little
• 12:54
  lighter than I think people were expecting.
• 12:58
  Now I, I'm imagining Walmart took a good amount of that share
• 13:02
  as well. But it will also be it's people
• 13:05
  are just getting back from a holiday weekend and you have
• 13:07
  four more days. So potentially the urgency of a
• 13:10
  2 day sale got spread out into four and we might see it kind of
• 13:13
  pick up as the sales end. But again, I mean, Amazon puts
• 13:17
  all of their own products on very, very deep discount and
• 13:20
  then walk across the other categories.
• 13:22
  It has a big red banner that you can tell if it's on Prime Day,
• 13:25
  you have to be a prime member to shop it.
• 13:27
  So it's it really kind of reinforces their whole value
• 13:30
  prop. Now with Walmart, you don't have
• 13:31
  to be a Walmart plus member to shop their deals.
• 13:34
  So that's a really interesting take.
• 13:36
  Walmart plus is incredibly popular, competes with Amazon
• 13:39
  Prime programme. However, you don't need to be a
• 13:42
  Walmart Plus member to get the everyday low price at Walmart.
• 13:46
  One of the things I know we've got 5 things and we're like on
• 13:49
  the last minute, but I need to pull Herbert here from Adweek.
• 13:52
  He and his commentary was interesting.
• 13:54
  He was saying that buy now, pay later is going to be a major
• 13:57
  factor in that Grove because a lot of shoppers leaning into buy
• 14:01
  now, pay later, which I thought was like, I thought people were
• 14:04
  coming away from it. But anyway.
• 14:05
  I did too. I mean, look, if they're bigger
• 14:08
  purchases, it makes total sense, right?
• 14:10
  You, you need some help kind of paying that overtime.
• 14:13
  But man, when I saw that buy now, pay later and a firm and
• 14:17
  all of those payment providers where you spread it out going on
• 14:20
  DoorDash and Uber Eats, I wanted to lose my mind.
• 14:23
  If you can't afford your Potbelly sandwich, you shouldn't
• 14:27
  pay for it. Like this is a red flag, like
• 14:31
  stop. So it makes sense for large
• 14:35
  purchases and there's a lot of electronics on sale.
• 14:38
  There's lots of homewares and furnitures and equipment on all
• 14:42
  of these websites. So that'll be a really
• 14:44
  interesting stat to see. We could look at that in the
• 14:46
  next week or two. That's brilliant, Jill.
• 14:49
  I want to be super respectful. We're at the top of our allotted
• 14:52
  time. Thank you so, so, so much for
• 14:55
  for joining us. Great way to start the day.
• 14:58
  It's a tonne of excitement and we love, love keeping pulse and
• 15:02
  thank you for having me. My pleasure, until next time.
• 15:16
  Hello and welcome back to another fabulous edition of Five
• 15:19
  Things Friday UK edition and privileged enough to be joined
• 15:24
  by my Co host Simone Olloman. Simone, why don't we?
• 15:28
  For those who may have not tuned in last week, where were you?
• 15:31
  Give a quick one minute on. It could be long because I
• 15:34
  remember watching you do your one minute ago.
• 15:37
  Well, there's my 32nd pitch and I was like no, no, no, no, take
• 15:40
  your time, as much time as you need.
• 15:42
  Take us through who you are and what you do.
• 15:45
  I mean, don't say take my time or we really will be here.
• 15:48
  All day all. Right.
• 15:49
  Hello everybody, I'm Simone the Co founder and CEO of need it
• 15:53
  for tonight, also known as NEFT. I always say the easiest way to
• 15:56
  describe NEFT is literally like. Delivery, but for quality
• 16:00
  fashion. So we work with lots of
• 16:03
  incredible brands and stores in London to facilitate 90 minutes
• 16:08
  and send their delivery to our platform.
• 16:10
  Whilst we are known for this, we do also have another product
• 16:14
  which is also AB to B plug in which plugs into retailers
• 16:18
  checkouts offering them 90 minutes and same day.
• 16:21
  Delivery. So oh wow.
• 16:23
  Lover of convenience which may be on the.
• 16:26
  You aggregate. So just just to be clear, you
• 16:28
  aggregate network for delivery there.
• 16:31
  You take that problem away for retailers.
• 16:33
  Exactly that, yeah. So we.
• 16:36
  Is it limited by region We. No, we have a Korean network in
• 16:41
  most major cities in the UK. Yeah, and we're currently
• 16:45
  expanding to most MIT, most UK major cities as well.
• 16:49
  Oh, fantastic. OK.
• 16:50
  And it's so it's beyond fashion. So I mean, you know, if I'm in
• 16:54
  the, I don't know, I'm make greeting cards or, or in that
• 17:00
  world, it doesn't the product doesn't matter.
• 17:02
  Yeah, exactly. That.
• 17:03
  It's. It's really fun.
• 17:05
  You know, we work with smaller independents and you know, a lot
• 17:09
  of it is to try and help smaller independents and it might be for
• 17:12
  a tool business or gift business.
• 17:15
  And it's to really to help them to provide that Amazon ask
• 17:20
  experience to their customers with no extra OPS or cost added
• 17:24
  to the retailer. So it's a complete mix.
• 17:26
  It can be big sporting businesses to fashion businesses
• 17:31
  to, maybe an electronics business as well.
• 17:34
  OK, cool. So why don't we go to?
• 17:38
  Why don't you kick us off with the first thing this week?
• 17:40
  Would love to something that's been on my mind.
• 17:44
  You know, event season is in full swing and brands are really
• 17:48
  capitalising on it and I think the ones that are really winning
• 17:52
  and they're certainly catching my eye.
• 17:54
  We know we've had Glastonbury recently where we had Free
• 17:57
  People and Sephora, they had a beautiful pop up there.
• 18:01
  I mean, honestly, Free People was just dominating my Instagram
• 18:05
  with influencers, beautiful outfits.
• 18:09
  There was just so much buzz generated from it.
• 18:11
  And he gave me formal. It gave me formal for the
• 18:14
  outfit, even major. Formal for not being a
• 18:16
  Glastonbury as well, which I was.
• 18:19
  We've also had Wimbledon this week where we've had Odd Muse
• 18:22
  and Flannels. They have done some kind of
• 18:24
  influencer event to launch a certain collection.
• 18:27
  Again, super smart, dominating my feed.
• 18:30
  It was also D Louise, which is a lovely jewellery brand.
• 18:34
  He was the actual founder was outside of Wimbledon.
• 18:39
  I think she just launched this beautiful tennis bracelet and
• 18:42
  actually handing out obviously super fitting with Wimbledon,
• 18:46
  but she was actually handing out some free ones as well.
• 18:49
  And then if. She tell when we were there.
• 18:52
  Oh, was she? Oh, I didn't.
• 18:54
  Know she was the one I think about.
• 18:55
  She was one of the closing talks where she's going through a
• 18:58
  story. I found the.
• 19:00
  Story. Just really beautiful brand.
• 19:02
  She's really nailed it. But yeah, then we also saw it
• 19:07
  was a few weeks back we had Beyoncé in London during the
• 19:10
  tour. Again, something I wish I was
• 19:13
  that there was all of this talk about Cowboy Carter.
• 19:16
  It was in every magazine. All different retailers were
• 19:19
  trying to push out what's Cowboy Carter related 1 Brand took it
• 19:24
  that step further and it was never fully dressed.
• 19:26
  And to show off that collection, they brought this incredible
• 19:32
  looking. Squad.
• 19:34
  Of influences concept, they're all dancing, singing, oh wow, in
• 19:40
  the collection. And I was just like, that is
• 19:44
  smart. You know, I was there looking
• 19:46
  online at what everybody was wearing.
• 19:48
  Again, it's meeting the customer where they are.
• 19:51
  And I think the brands that are doing this are realising that,
• 19:56
  you know, it's not seasonal anymore.
• 19:57
  It's it's really, it's situational and brands are
• 20:01
  really moving fast to tap into these different moments.
• 20:04
  Governments and they're moving at culture's pace.
• 20:07
  It's not just reacting to what's.
• 20:09
  It's them basically reacting to what's trending this week.
• 20:12
  You know, it's not just about spring, summer, it's about
• 20:15
  Glastonbury. It's what are people wearing at
• 20:17
  Sabrina Carpenter? Yeah, well, it's like.
• 20:21
  Raincoats. From what I saw, raincoats and
• 20:25
  umbrellas. True.
• 20:26
  True. True.
• 20:27
  Well, just for me, it's so much more human and engaging.
• 20:31
  It's meeting the consumer where they are.
• 20:33
  It just does a really brilliant job at promoting.
• 20:35
  Products and creating. For.
• 20:37
  So that, yeah, I think, I think, I think that's a beautiful point
• 20:40
  on the signals that retailers need to listen to and the
• 20:44
  cultural signals and how are they doing that effectively.
• 20:48
  And I think a lot of them are farming it out to agencies.
• 20:51
  They're not doing that themselves and the data that
• 20:53
  exists in their business and their customer profiles, unless
• 20:57
  they're lucky to have, like you, a founder who knows her segment
• 21:02
  because she is from that segment, right?
• 21:05
  Obviously the, the logistics part is a bit different, but
• 21:08
  unless you've got some sort of cultural LED signal mechanism,
• 21:13
  you're, you're down to an agency telling you, hey, customary's
• 21:16
  coming up. Do you want to do something?
• 21:18
  Wimbledon. But Wimbledon I, I think same
• 21:20
  with Formula One. All of these sort of classic old
• 21:24
  world, yeah, walking events seem to be really rejuvenating
• 21:30
  themselves for a new generation. Which leads me to I'll, I don't
• 21:34
  know which way to go now. There's something I want your
• 21:37
  opinion on. And then there's Adidas and what
• 21:40
  they're doing. Which one should we do next?
• 21:42
  Which one do you want to do next?
• 21:44
  Oh, I'm intrigued what you want my opinion on?
• 21:46
  So let's go. All right, let's go for that.
• 21:48
  And obviously my favourite platform, TikTok.
• 21:53
  Is the messy, cool girl finally back?
• 21:54
  We've spent years smoothing out every edge, from beige colour
• 21:57
  palettes to skin care's personality.
• 21:59
  The ideal was polished and optimised.
• 22:02
  But lately, that aesthetic is starting to unravel.
• 22:04
  And it's not just a vibe. On platforms like Particle, the
• 22:07
  data tracks the mood shift in real time.
• 22:08
  Tobacco products are up 843%, rolling trays 569%.
• 22:13
  Alcoholic beverages up nearly 1000% in the past 12 months.
• 22:16
  This isn't just aesthetic fatigue, it's cultural
• 22:18
  realignment. Coaches climbing.
• 22:20
  Gunny is trending upwards. The row soften.
• 22:22
  Suddenly having a beer in cowboy boots feels more aspirational
• 22:25
  than green juice in Pilatus. It's less about optimization,
• 22:27
  more about character, pleasure and mood.
• 22:30
  Day to night dressing is trending and imperfect beauty is
• 22:32
  back. People are drinking again,
• 22:33
  dancing again, wearing the dress, not checking the weather,
• 22:36
  ordering dessert, swapping routines for romance, singing
• 22:38
  more with us beige. From clean to captivating.
• 22:41
  If you're building a brand or marketing one, this isn't noise.
• 22:43
  It's a shift in culture and taste and how people want to
• 22:46
  feel. The clean girl era, It's fading.
• 22:48
  What's next is messier, bolder, and honestly a lot more fun
• 22:51
  after years of minimal and quite luxury there.
• 22:53
  You go. The reason why I put that, I
• 22:56
  thought you're the other, the younger generations of
• 22:59
  millennials, Gen Z, Alpha. Well, alphas, they can't drink
• 23:04
  anyway. But booze and fags are out
• 23:07
  because, you know, we're doing Pilates, darling, and we're
• 23:09
  drinking our green juices. Yeah, but what?
• 23:12
  What she's saying is sorry, that trend is now on a decline and
• 23:18
  that and it's interesting, right?
• 23:19
  Listen to what your first sort of top of mind was.
• 23:21
  Was Beyoncé, Sabrina Carr, all of these festivals and like that
• 23:26
  messy look rather than that, I don't know, What's your view?
• 23:31
  It's hard because I still really think, particularly with Gen
• 23:35
  Z's, I still think we're in our clean girl era.
• 23:38
  Yeah. I really do.
• 23:40
  But you're right. I mean, I'm a millennial.
• 23:45
  I'm not Gen Z. I mean, I've me personally and
• 23:49
  definitely a crossover of both love to have a wine, love a
• 23:52
  festival, but I do also like maybe I like to pretend I'm in
• 23:57
  my green girl era. I don't think the.
• 24:00
  I don't think it's fading, particularly with Gen ZI still
• 24:05
  really think. We're still in this health.
• 24:08
  Era I I do and I can't see that going.
• 24:12
  I feel like I'm sounding contradictory from what I've
• 24:14
  just chatted about. You're right about how.
• 24:17
  But I think as well a lot. Of people you know, A lot of
• 24:19
  events I go to when I go to a lot, maybe too many.
• 24:23
  A lot of people aren't drinking at these events.
• 24:25
  Yeah, yeah. Look, the, the whole, the, the
• 24:27
  sales on Alco pops and non alcoholic, whatever spirits,
• 24:32
  wine, beer, you name it, it's just through the roof.
• 24:36
  The sales every year and year. But what I'm what I'm curious
• 24:40
  about and what maybe it's a trend that we'll watch about are
• 24:45
  things turning? Because I remember Diageo who
• 24:48
  owned most of the alcohol in the world, alcohol, but alcoholic
• 24:53
  brands in the world, they were saying how each generation
• 24:57
  rebels against the other generation.
• 24:59
  So if I was a beer drinker or a spirits drinker, my son or
• 25:03
  daughter will be a wine drinker because they don't want to be
• 25:06
  like their parents, right. But what what this is
• 25:09
  interesting. Is this like a mid generational
• 25:11
  shift from healthy aesthetic to non output?
• 25:15
  We'll we'll see. Anyway, I don't want to label
• 25:17
  too much and I just wanted your view on it.
• 25:19
  It's. Interesting.
• 25:19
  We want to watch and appreciate. I have not given a straight
• 25:22
  answer to that, but that's. OK.
• 25:25
  Is it? I don't know because I fit in
• 25:27
  both of them right now and I don't know if one aesthetic is
• 25:31
  going to win over the other. If I was going to guess, I think
• 25:33
  it'd still be the healthy girl era, the clean era.
• 25:37
  You hope for my old say, yeah, that's what you're saying.
• 25:41
  That's what I read into is like, I hope it's going to stay like
• 25:44
  that because the ball tree and you know, off the rails is on
• 25:48
  the other side and that looks quite messy.
• 25:51
  But anyway, OK, let's go point number three thing #3 over to
• 25:55
  you. OK, so I have to admit this is
• 25:58
  one of my favourite topics and it is the topic of convenience
• 26:01
  and rapid delivery because who wants to wait five days for a
• 26:05
  delivery? Not me.
• 26:07
  I think those days are over. Of course I am biassed with
• 26:11
  NIFT, but this is the topic. That I love.
• 26:13
  So this week we've seen Amazon and Gokov joining forces to
• 26:18
  launch 15 minute grocery delivery across city.
• 26:21
  Wow. OK.
• 26:22
  Yeah, wild. And I think again, it's showing
• 26:26
  the the real shift in things like, you know, same day
• 26:29
  delivery isn't the new perk, but instead it's becoming a best
• 26:32
  line. And Amazon really set that bar
• 26:35
  even from the Prime from their next day delivery before.
• 26:38
  I think everybody now not only once, but expects that kind of
• 26:42
  Amazon esque experience. And you know, this to me, it's
• 26:45
  not just about groceries. It really is about customer
• 26:48
  psychology. I think people done waiting and
• 26:51
  Amazon are always one step ahead when it when it comes to things
• 26:54
  like this. But, yeah, I think it's
• 26:56
  interesting. And, you know, something that
• 26:58
  I'm talking about too much is that where we're seeing a demand
• 27:03
  for instant gratification across all verticals.
• 27:05
  You know, it's now not just groceries, it's fashion, it's
• 27:08
  gift, beauty, technology. Yeah.
• 27:12
  Entertainment, for example. Even when you watch something in
• 27:15
  the cinemas, you can watch it instantly on your TV.
• 27:19
  And, you know, this is the behavioural shift that retail is
• 27:24
  is finally catching up with as well.
• 27:26
  You know, I think retailers now trying not to think more about
• 27:31
  logistics and I think they're being forced to now think about
• 27:34
  lifestyle, particularly in cities, you know?
• 27:37
  Delivery should really match how people are.
• 27:40
  Living and you know, often when you're living in a city, you're
• 27:43
  your time poor and you're always in motion.
• 27:46
  So yeah, that was my topic of this week, which I found very
• 27:50
  interesting. I love the way that you frame
• 27:52
  that as in terms of its lifestyle, not logistics,
• 27:55
  because I think that's what people have doubled down on is
• 27:59
  squatting logistics out or trying to and then forgetting
• 28:02
  that it's part of lifestyle. Right.
• 28:05
  And, and it's a trend that when you look at the numbers across
• 28:08
  the world, it's only continue to grow.
• 28:10
  It's not shrinking, it's getting bigger.
• 28:12
  And I can't remember who bought delivery, but they were just
• 28:14
  bought outright by, by somebody. Is it DoorDash?
• 28:18
  They bought the yeah. And then in Spain, we've got
• 28:20
  Glovo that seem to be going from strength to strength.
• 28:23
  So there was a lot of consolidation, some, some
• 28:26
  retreated from certain markets, but there's definitely an
• 28:30
  appetite from a consumer perspective because we're all
• 28:32
  dopamine friends. We all need that sort of
• 28:34
  dopamine hit. And I mean, I don't mind saying
• 28:37
  I bought something off Aliexpress.
• 28:40
  Jesus Christ, two weeks, I think about 3 weeks worth of waiting
• 28:44
  and I was like, OK, how much do I really need a 8 GB something?
• 28:48
  But anyway, moving on swiftly. So going back to your first
• 28:52
  thing about brands, why? And this is cheating a little
• 28:56
  bit because on my 5 things Friday USA edition, I looked at
• 29:01
  it from the USA perspective, but this brand is crushing it in the
• 29:05
  UK as well. Hey, that's versus Nike.
• 29:09
  Now Nike has been suffering. They're called for relevance.
• 29:12
  They're just not engaged with the, the, the new era of
• 29:16
  shopper. They've missed the mark on so
• 29:18
  many points. And the new CEO has said we're
• 29:22
  going to double down. We're going to become more of an
• 29:24
  athletic, go back to our heritage, promote small sports
• 29:28
  stars, promote, you know, sporting in general.
• 29:31
  And they tried to beat the four minute mile last month, the
• 29:35
  first female runner to run underneath 4 minutes and she did
• 29:39
  it at 4 minutes and two seconds or something.
• 29:43
  So she's got really close. On the flip side, you've got
• 29:46
  Adidas working with Missy Elliott and Samuel L Jackson on
• 29:52
  this iconic sort of it's a basket.
• 29:55
  It started off as a basketball trainer, but or sneaker.
• 29:58
  And now it's of across all, you know, skate skaters use it.
• 30:03
  It's St wear and they've got these and I can't I I mean, it's
• 30:06
  got it here, but I don't know. I know, I know Missy Elliott,
• 30:09
  but they've reduced. They've sort of created this
• 30:12
  clean aesthetic looking video to launch the superstar brand with
• 30:18
  the seven influences that are cross generational.
• 30:23
  Yeah, gross category as well. And so obviously this is when I
• 30:29
  was doing my US edition, I was like, look at what you know, how
• 30:33
  different is this from Nike, right?
• 30:37
  How are they being relevant to modern generation?
• 30:42
  But then when you come to the UK and you know, this has been, you
• 30:46
  were talking about your feed. Obviously I've got a lot of old
• 30:48
  men in my feed. Everyone was mad for Oasis at
• 30:52
  Cardiff and you know, I, I love watching the Liam Gallagher sort
• 30:57
  of looky like he's or, you know, a whole persona that goes with
• 31:02
  this and it, these are the pop up stores, one in Manchester,
• 31:05
  one in London. But who's at the heart of this?
• 31:08
  What brand? Adidas, a 13 year old
• 31:12
  rock'n'roll band making their comeback.
• 31:15
  They're all over social media in the UK and Adidas is at the
• 31:20
  heart of it. So for me, what a fantastic
• 31:23
  example of cultural heritage and relevance in today's market to
• 31:30
  older generation, you know, Gen XS probably and this new
• 31:35
  generation. And I think, you know, this is a
• 31:37
  master class in brands staying relevant across category and
• 31:42
  generations. Yeah, no, I'm so.
• 31:45
  Such a nostalgia as well. Even people like Missy Elliott,
• 31:49
  just having her involved, obviously a waste.
• 31:51
  It just creates such nostalgia. Yeah, yeah.
• 31:56
  Very, very, very smart. Yeah, I think so and so well
• 32:00
  done. Adidas or Adidas I What would
• 32:03
  you say, Adidas or Adidas I? Actually say Adidas.
• 32:05
  So I was thinking when you say Adidas.
• 32:07
  So I was like, oh, I say Adidas. Yeah, I say Adidas, but I don't
• 32:11
  know if it's Adidas. Anyway, I'm not going to get
• 32:13
  into that. That could be an online
• 32:14
  controversy. The final one is if you are at a
• 32:18
  loose end at the weekend, get yourself down to the flagship
• 32:22
  New Balance store that. Love Flow.
• 32:26
  They do everything from shoe fitting to my favourite part
• 32:30
  which is the IV. Not these ones, the ones in
• 32:32
  blue, but basically these new ballots that have been made in
• 32:36
  the UK and I wish I could for the life of me remember where.
• 32:40
  It's a small cultural village, rural village somewhere in the
• 32:44
  UK that makes these New Balance made in England handmade shoes.
• 32:49
  So they're a little bit more pricier, but they're handmade
• 32:52
  and the only other place that you can get them is made in the
• 32:55
  US. So there's like these two iconic
• 32:57
  made in those countries. Yeah, to implement everything
• 33:01
  else. But you know, it's on 4 levels.
• 33:04
  It's really beautiful aesthetic, really modern, really engaging.
• 33:07
  And I think it's worth a visit for, you know, depending on what
• 33:11
  your fancy is. I, I think it's a really sort of
• 33:14
  lovely retail experience. Yeah.
• 33:17
  And that's it. So how are we doing for time?
• 33:20
  We're almost, we're almost kept to schedule.
• 33:22
  So, Simone, thank you so much. You.
• 33:25
  Anything planned for the week or weekend ahead?
• 33:28
  Relaxing. You're not off any concerts
• 33:30
  anywhere. I'm not sadly, although now I'm
• 33:34
  feeling like I want to be after. All you do, your drink.
• 33:37
  Sabrina Carpenter. Yeah.
• 33:39
  I'm sorry for the Sabrina Carpenter.
• 33:41
  I mean like I can imagine the like.
• 33:43
  People still like, we had a very good time, yeah.
• 33:48
  Although I don't like manchild, I think that's that's, that's
• 33:51
  again a topic for another day. All right, with that bombshell,
• 33:54
  thank you so much. Look forward to next week.
• 33:57
  Amazing. Bye, Alex.
• 34:10
  Hello and welcome to our fantastic first edition of five
• 34:15
  things Friday UK. And I'm privileged enough to
• 34:19
  have a wonderful Co host, special guest Co host, Simone
• 34:23
  Olloman, who I have seen talk on stage at 2 conferences and was
• 34:29
  but also privileged enough to share the stage with her at E
• 34:31
  tail. But when I saw when I saw Simone
• 34:34
  learn about need it for tonight, got that passion, the the the
• 34:39
  depth, the the intelligence, the intellectualism, I thought, Oh
• 34:43
  my God, what a fantastic and ideal Co host.
• 34:49
  And I think we'll have a completely different angle.
• 34:51
  This is going to be a little bit different from the normal, you
• 34:54
  know, looking just at tech. So Simone, why don't actually
• 34:57
  why don't we do this? Why don't you just give us a one
• 34:58
  minute headline on who you are, Obviously the Co founder running
• 35:02
  this wonderful new start up, but just give us give us an
• 35:05
  overview. Yeah, one minute pitch.
• 35:08
  Hello. Super excited to be here.
• 35:10
  I'm Simone. I'm the.
• 35:12
  Founder and CEO of Need It's Night, also known as NIFT.
• 35:16
  I always say the easiest way to describe NIFT is kind of like
• 35:20
  delivery but for quality fashion.
• 35:22
  So we've built a marketplace that partners with some
• 35:26
  incredible brands and boutiques in London to facilitate 90
• 35:30
  minute delivery. On the side of that, we do also
• 35:32
  have AB2B product that plugs into retailers checkouts
• 35:36
  enabling them to have 90 minutes and same day delivery as well.
• 35:40
  There's my 32nd pitch. I think you're the future Jeff
• 35:44
  Bezos, right? He started in books, ended up
• 35:48
  with this whole software. So I can see where you're going.
• 35:52
  Future Jeff Bezos. Would you would you get married
• 35:55
  in in Venice? No, no.
• 35:58
  No, that wedding was a little bit too big scale for me.
• 36:02
  Not mine anyway. OK.
• 36:04
  Alex. So on that bombshell, tell me
• 36:07
  some what are the five things? Sorry, what are the two things
• 36:10
  that are top fine? One which I was.
• 36:13
  Reading about today and it's actually been a topic this week
• 36:16
  within our team and just other retailers I'm speaking about was
• 36:20
  the topic of loyalties. Air Source have just launched a
• 36:23
  new loyalty scheme. This has come after banning
• 36:27
  quite a lot of UK shoppers after having too many returns.
• 36:31
  I think their loyalty scheme is free to join, but it's clearly
• 36:35
  designed to encourage progression like a status
• 36:40
  ladder, you know, like things like the air and the obvious
• 36:43
  points. That's what I was thinking is I
• 36:46
  think it's really interesting how schemes really evolving, you
• 36:50
  know, it's less about points and basic discounts and vouchers.
• 36:55
  I think now it really is a lot more about belonging and
• 36:59
  recognition and, and really about experience and community.
• 37:05
  Yeah, I think there's been a bit of an evolution of, of loyalty
• 37:09
  to almost lifestyle, you know, or it would be vouchers or it
• 37:14
  might even just be 10% off, or it might be refer a friend and
• 37:17
  you get, I don't know, £5 off. Where now it's more like it
• 37:23
  feels more like a membership. It's like exclusive perks.
• 37:27
  It's early access. It invites to events that not
• 37:32
  everybody has access to. Yeah, I think it's really
• 37:35
  interesting seeing the shift. I know Selfridges do it quite
• 37:38
  well, especially for that kind of younger millennial Gen Z
• 37:42
  audience, which is very much their audience.
• 37:46
  If they are angling it like this community and tiered access, I
• 37:51
  do think they will do very well at it.
• 37:53
  You know, it doesn't seem like it's just money off.
• 37:58
  I think they'll do well from it. I do.
• 38:00
  And I think the retailers that have done it that way, like
• 38:04
  Selfridges are not, is a slightly different audience.
• 38:06
  But. They create this like formal
• 38:10
  effect whereby you want to spend more because you earn access to
• 38:16
  these special things. And they're very good at
• 38:19
  creating the formal. I think it is really, it's the
• 38:21
  the psychology of being a part of something.
• 38:24
  Yeah, that, that is. Really.
• 38:27
  Key, I got you. OK, What's your, what's the
• 38:31
  second one? The second is scary topic.
• 38:39
  I find this a very sorry topic is agentic AIA lot of people
• 38:45
  talking more and more about the rise of agentic AI and you know
• 38:50
  if you like the the LVMH group for example piloting these AI.
• 38:55
  Agents. So it's obviously it's AI
• 38:58
  systems that can make decisions, take actions without needing
• 39:03
  human instructions, unlike things like ChatGPT, which is
• 39:06
  obviously prompted by a human. But yeah, there are a lot of
• 39:10
  retailers that are exploring this.
• 39:12
  I know the LVMH group piloting these AI agents and yeah, we're
• 39:19
  starting. To see this shift from I guess
• 39:23
  passive. AI to identity AI which is
• 39:29
  really interesting. What are your thoughts on it?
• 39:33
  Yeah. I'm curious.
• 39:33
  It's, do you look at it as a gentic AI as in like the
• 39:36
  business creating agents for workers within LVMH or for
• 39:43
  customers of LVMH? Which one do you think it is?
• 39:47
  I think it's. For what?
• 39:49
  Right because Because so Jetty PT It does have AI.
• 39:54
  Forget what it's called now articles, is it articles where
• 39:57
  it goes off and it can do things like imagine if I wanted to buy
• 40:00
  some flowers, it will go off and buy the flowers for me.
• 40:04
  So the agent exists and chatty PT can do that.
• 40:07
  I think like just look at Microsoft.
• 40:11
  They've announced another 10,000 redundancies today in the in
• 40:15
  their global tech workforce. And it's no doubt that they can
• 40:20
  see that so many of these roles in the past where you had
• 40:24
  humans. You'll be able to have agents,
• 40:27
  you know, whether it's call centres, that's that's one of
• 40:30
  the major ones where you're seeing a lot of AI in there.
• 40:33
  Merchandising. I've seen less because I think
• 40:36
  humans are still deciding what to buy and what not.
• 40:39
  Although you'll look at the data, right?
• 40:42
  Or you'll look at the dashboard or you'll look at whatever is
• 40:45
  telling you, whatever the colours are.
• 40:48
  Yeah, it's like Uber. I guess in the early days people
• 40:52
  were like, oh, I can just raise my hand and and call a taxi.
• 40:55
  Why would I open my phone, get an app, then call Uber and then
• 41:01
  all of a sudden it's like Uber becomes the word, right?
• 41:04
  Let's just get an Uber home, right?
• 41:06
  It's no longer let's go to the street and hunt down a taxi.
• 41:10
  And I think agentic AI is in that phase where it's sort of
• 41:13
  finding those use cases. Will I buy more flowers through
• 41:19
  AI agents? Customer service 100% people are
• 41:24
  now used to IT or customer enquiries.
• 41:26
  I mean, I can definitely. See from for a business like
• 41:29
  mine and for retail in general, you know, even things like
• 41:35
  deciding the order, the reordering of products before
• 41:39
  trends started or launching micro campaigns based upon the
• 41:45
  weather changing really instantly think when it comes
• 41:48
  things like that blows my mind slightly, I'll have to admit,
• 41:52
  But I think it could, I think that's where it could get really
• 41:55
  interesting is just how responsive and personal that it
• 41:59
  could get. But it does still feel risky to
• 42:02
  me. But maybe that's because it is
• 42:04
  still, it still feels very alien, But I guess it's also a
• 42:08
  big dependence on data as well. And if you know you're you've
• 42:13
  got poor data, then you're going to get poor.
• 42:15
  Absolutely. I mean, there's so many
• 42:17
  retailers out there with so much data.
• 42:20
  But again, that's where agents will be able to.
• 42:23
  If you have data sets on your, on your sales force, on your SAP
• 42:27
  systems, on your Shopify back end or whatever front end, the
• 42:32
  agent can go off and do so much. I actually interviewed the
• 42:35
  Shopify Chief Revenue Officer yesterday and he was saying,
• 42:41
  because I said to him, what's the one thing that people don't
• 42:43
  get about Shopify? And he said that AI that we've
• 42:47
  embedded into our back end will just keep growing and growing
• 42:51
  and growing and people are not, they don't get it.
• 42:54
  They're not understanding that this.
• 42:56
  I think it's off on anthropic clawed as as that model improves
• 43:01
  the Shopify I that's I think he may have just used that as an
• 43:05
  example. But anyway, that Shopify AI
• 43:07
  agent is just going to continue to become more and more powerful
• 43:11
  to empower business owners and merchandisers and category
• 43:16
  owners. And you know, I can only imagine
• 43:18
  how much data they have access to.
• 43:21
  So it's pretty incredible. He was a he was a really nice
• 43:24
  guy, really interesting. So listen, yeah, I don't know
• 43:28
  when we'll get it out there. We'll be out there next week or
• 43:30
  so. But anyway, I'll be I'm
• 43:32
  conscious of time. So I'm going to talk super fast.
• 43:35
  So just quickly moving on to my ones.
• 43:39
  Go here, right? So I've I've talked about this
• 43:43
  on other shows. Luxury needs to stand out.
• 43:47
  The only way that they can stand that specifically in places like
• 43:51
  London, Paris, Milan is through pop ups.
• 43:55
  So yes, they're curating and beautiful, creating new
• 43:58
  beautiful stores. This is new Muse flagship store
• 44:01
  in central London, but they are still going after unique pop up
• 44:07
  experiences because they understand that this new
• 44:10
  generation doesn't just want to transact culturally, it's a
• 44:14
  movement to feel. And so that feel comes from
• 44:17
  engagement at pop ups and one of the people that I love.
• 44:22
  And yeah, I was following this girl when she was, I don't know,
• 44:26
  underneath 1000 followers because I was looking for some
• 44:29
  things to, to actually talk about on the show.
• 44:33
  And she came up in Sani and on TikTok.
• 44:37
  She, I think she's on Insta as well.
• 44:39
  See you Sani. She's now got how many?
• 44:41
  Where's the number of followers? I'm sure it's about 60,000.
• 44:44
  It's almost 100,000 followers. But basically what she does, and
• 44:48
  I'm not going to play it, but you can, you can.
• 44:50
  As I go through, you can see these are all the pop up events
• 44:54
  in London today and the number of beauty fashion music
• 45:01
  collaborations that are just coming up time and time again is
• 45:05
  incredible. And I think this is we're just
• 45:07
  going to see more specifically in the UK.
• 45:11
  So you know my thing to retailers, if you're not
• 45:14
  curating community, if you're not curating community, if
• 45:19
  you're not creating these moments, then your competitors
• 45:23
  potentially may, you know, you talked about FOMO, it may move
• 45:27
  from FOMO to just they're not interacting with you, right,
• 45:30
  Because they're busy interacting with, with someone else.
• 45:34
  And again, in, you know, places like Shanghai where they have 22
• 45:38
  million customers, yeah, they know that it's not going to be
• 45:42
  tech that wins. It's going to be experience and
• 45:46
  connection and, and that sort of community that's going to drive
• 45:50
  that change. So I, I really love what Sani
• 45:53
  does as a, as a creator, but it also highlights this point of
• 45:58
  how many pop ups, retail pop ups are now appearing in London and,
• 46:03
  and what retailers can do to to do that.
• 46:05
  The second element that I'm going to talk about is this sort
• 46:09
  of battle in the athleisure world between bigger is better.
• 46:14
  Footlocker, I think last week opened their largest store in
• 46:18
  the Birmingham Bullring Shopping Centre.
• 46:22
  And obviously earlier in the month JD opened the UK's
• 46:26
  largest, not only, I'm sorry, the world's largest, JD Sports,
• 46:31
  which is 42,000 square feet, which in my mind I envisage like
• 46:35
  a department store, right? Yeah, but it's a department
• 46:38
  store for athleisure. And part of me says, hey, look,
• 46:42
  I understand this bigger is better because you feel that you
• 46:45
  can stock more, stock more products, have more categories,
• 46:49
  bring more people in. But how are you going to
• 46:52
  maintain relevance because you know, you're relying on Nike,
• 46:55
  Adidas and on for JD's in JD's case and footlocker's out how
• 47:02
  that has a massive partnership with Nike Footlocker sort of had
• 47:05
  a little jibe at JD saying, hey, look, we're not about big, we're
• 47:09
  about impactful. We believe we're going to, you
• 47:12
  know, do more activations in store that community led and
• 47:17
  getting those sort of hype beast type shoppers to come in.
• 47:21
  But I don't know if this signals maybe the top of the market and
• 47:26
  we're going to see athleisure as a category struggle going
• 47:31
  forward. I could be completely wrong, but
• 47:34
  I'm not saying so. I do believe sports, yoga,
• 47:37
  cycling, any type of sports, that's just going to keep
• 47:40
  growing, right? But that's.
• 47:42
  Technical sports, not athletic, generic, you know, loungewear,
• 47:48
  sportswear. And I think this and, and I, and
• 47:51
  I see it on Instagram or TikTok about aesthetics, right?
• 47:54
  You've got old money, new money. Who wants to sorry, old, yeah,
• 47:58
  who wants to look like old money?
• 48:01
  Old money is when they look vintage and classic.
• 48:04
  And new money is like when they're in track suits and
• 48:07
  expensive sneakers. And I think people have sort of
• 48:10
  got to the, to the peak of that. And yeah.
• 48:13
  And that's it. So they're my two things.
• 48:16
  And the final thing, because it's Five Things Friday, is if
• 48:19
  people are interested in what's going on in Asia, what's going
• 48:23
  on in the Middle East, what's going on in Europe or France,
• 48:27
  they're coming out as different Five Things Fridays.
• 48:30
  So we're going to have like a Friday radio station full of
• 48:34
  little news, news articles. But this is the one for all of
• 48:39
  those wonderful, beautiful people in the UK.
• 48:42
  And we're going to have some special guests.
• 48:44
  So I look forward to sharing that with you.
• 48:46
  Simone, any closing thoughts before we shut down for the
• 48:50
  weekend? Oh God.
• 48:52
  Well, first of all, thank you for having me.
• 48:54
  Can't wait. It's OK.
• 48:56
  You're like, what am I signed up for?
• 49:00
  After I've met, I've got a bit of Friday brain.
• 49:02
  It's getting to me. I'm not used to such weather in
• 49:07
  the UK. Super exciting.
• 49:09
  There is lots. Of very exciting things going on
• 49:12
  in retail lots of exciting technology and I'm excited to
• 49:16
  dive in further next time I. Mean I'd love to unpacked need
• 49:19
  it for tonight, right, your whole journey.
• 49:21
  What are you doing? How are you standing out because
• 49:23
  that whole sort of super convenience or hyper
• 49:26
  convenience, you know, getting it to customers?
• 49:29
  I'd love to sort of just understand the psychology, why
• 49:32
  you went for it. I know it's a personal story
• 49:34
  because it's something you shared on stage, but I love to
• 49:37
  share that with the audience as well.
• 49:40
  Yeah, I know, absolutely. And it's just an area that's
• 49:42
  really, really growing as well, that convenience and ultra fast
• 49:47
  delivery. Quick commerce, that was it.
• 49:50
  OK Simone, thank you so much. Have a lovely weekend and I look
• 49:53
  forward to speaking to you next week.
• 49:55
  Wonderful. Thank you, Alex.
• 49:57
  Have a great one. Welcome to a fabulous European
• 50:13
  edition of Five Things Friday, and I'm super, super, super
• 50:17
  privileged to be joined by Alex. So Alex and Alex.
• 50:20
  AA. Thank you for having me Alex.
• 50:23
  It's a pleasure to to be on the show. 6 years ago I joined
• 50:27
  Business France, so the French Trade Commission in London,
• 50:30
  where I shifted into retail technology.
• 50:33
  And since then I've been helping French companies, French retail
• 50:37
  tech companies to grow in the UK market.
• 50:40
  And I've also been working with British retailers, as you said,
• 50:44
  to identify the right technology solutions for them.
• 50:48
  That's fantastic. So listen, let's be respectful
• 50:51
  to your time because I don't know, you're super busy and jump
• 50:54
  straight into it. Yeah, so.
• 50:56
  Part of my the first thing I wanted to share is something
• 51:00
  that I find really interesting and that is really booming in
• 51:04
  France right now. It's the drive through grocery
• 51:07
  shopping models. So as we call it in French Le
• 51:10
  Drive. And the reason why I chose this
• 51:12
  topic is because it's not something I've really come
• 51:16
  across much in the UK. In France right now, it now
• 51:20
  makes up more than 10% of all grocery sales in the country.
• 51:25
  So that's huge, Yeah, when you think about it.
• 51:28
  And it started just as a side service to regular retailers,
• 51:32
  and it's now a central part of the experience for millions of
• 51:36
  people. And the model became especially
• 51:40
  popular, as you said, during the pandemic when people were
• 51:43
  avoiding the stalls. But what's really interesting is
• 51:46
  to see that the growth hasn't slowed down at all since then.
• 51:51
  And people love it because it's fast, it's easy and sometimes
• 51:55
  it's cheaper. And the retailers in France,
• 51:58
  they have noticed the demand for it and they are constantly
• 52:03
  improving the service. So we've seen longer opening
• 52:05
  hours, new collection options like pedestrian drives or
• 52:09
  lockers, and even fast delivery options have been added.
• 52:14
  So I think for retailers, it's a good way to meet the the needs
• 52:19
  of the different customers while also staying profitable and
• 52:24
  sometimes even more so than traditional online delivery.
• 52:29
  There's one name that really stand stands out in this space,
• 52:32
  it's Le Clair. So all of them do it, Le Clair,
• 52:36
  Carrefour and De Marche, they're all investing heavily.
• 52:40
  But Le Clair, they've been pioneers, one of the drive
• 52:44
  through model in France since the beginning and they have
• 52:47
  launched their first pilot back in 27 and they they are
• 52:52
  operating more than 700 full Dr throughs.
• 52:56
  It's more than 150 pedestrian drive called the Dr Pietu.
• 53:02
  And these ones are really popular, I would say in city
• 53:05
  centres where the space is limited, real estate can be very
• 53:10
  expensive. So instead of driving, customers
• 53:13
  can just walk in to pick up their online order.
• 53:18
  And I think France fully embraced the drive model and not
• 53:24
  only with cars, but on foot too. And I.
• 53:28
  Love it. Yeah, and it's really
• 53:31
  interesting to see what's happening.
• 53:33
  And with companies like Le Clair and Cafu are leading the way,
• 53:37
  it's clear that this approach is here to stay.
• 53:41
  Yeah, fantastic. The second one, we were going to
• 53:45
  go to ocean, right? Yes, Ocean.
• 53:48
  So OSHA, for those who may not know it is one of the largest
• 53:53
  supermarket chains in France with stores all over the
• 53:56
  country. And we wanted to discuss today
• 54:00
  the the new partnership between OSHA and OUA.
• 54:04
  So we saw, we saw some collaborations in the UK with
• 54:09
  retailers and Deliveroo or Uber. It's that this one feels a bit
• 54:14
  different. It makes me think about the way
• 54:17
  MNS works with Ocado, for example.
• 54:20
  Yeah, so OOLA isn't just a delivery platform, it's a full
• 54:25
  on grocery website. They have their own logistic
• 54:29
  network. So this deal is less about
• 54:32
  outsourcing delivery and more about fully integrating two
• 54:35
  different business models. And the reason why they have
• 54:39
  done this is because Ocean have closed down their own delivery
• 54:45
  service which was called Ocean Direct.
• 54:47
  Yeah. Due to operational issues and
• 54:51
  now they have decided to partner with like this is a fresh start
• 54:56
  mini commerce for them without having to rebuild everything
• 54:59
  from. Scratch a lot of grocers around
• 55:02
  the world have struggled with getting this platform right for
• 55:06
  delivery and then how delivery connects into e-commerce again 2
• 55:10
  you could probably do shows on e-commerce and delivery.
• 55:14
  So it's, it's super interesting to see how, I don't know if
• 55:18
  every country has its own model, but we're definitely seeing
• 55:21
  different partnerships across Europe to do that.
• 55:25
  And it brings me interestingly enough on to which is a Basque
• 55:29
  Country supermarket that's expanding across Spain right
• 55:34
  now. And their approach is very sort
• 55:37
  of old fashioned retail in the sense of investment in stores.
• 55:42
  Obviously they do e-commerce, but I just think that there is
• 55:46
  instead of a price war, which ALDI and Lidl have been sort of
• 55:50
  driving the charge for getting that cost market crossed down.
• 55:54
  BM is sort of investing in the format of the store and this
• 55:59
  from, if there are Americans watching this, they're very used
• 56:03
  to this. But in the, in the specifically
• 56:05
  in the UK and some of the other European retailers, the, the
• 56:09
  shelves, for example, are all really high, not at BM.
• 56:13
  The design principles here is that you can see every single
• 56:17
  point of the store from wherever you are, which provides a far
• 56:21
  more sort of exclusive upmarket feel to the experience.
• 56:27
  The the fresh fruit and some of the other departments are
• 56:31
  smaller, but again, this is a community store if you like,
• 56:36
  rather than a main superstore. BM Also another thing that
• 56:40
  they're investing in is the butcher and the the fishmonger.
• 56:44
  But anyway, so super interesting on what they're trying to do at
• 56:49
  a local level. And I think this trend is
• 56:53
  because I, I've worked with retailers in Hungary, in
• 56:57
  Estonia, and they're all trying to go for this sort of upmarket
• 57:00
  feel. But now it feels like there's
• 57:03
  got to be some consolidation. Something's going to move
• 57:05
  because you can't have this density of grosser.
• 57:08
  I don't think it's sustainable. But in, in, in the different
• 57:11
  regions, we're motoring through these.
• 57:14
  Back to you from Mango. Yeah, so now moving from grocery
• 57:19
  to fashion. So this one is about how fashion
• 57:24
  retailers are using AI to transform the online shopping
• 57:27
  experience. And 1 great example is the
• 57:31
  recent one with Mango, the Spanish fashion brand for which
• 57:35
  recently launched a their virtual stylist called Mongo
• 57:40
  Stylist. So now of course we have seen
• 57:43
  chat bots and recommendation tools for a while like ASOS or
• 57:48
  Sailondo giving style suggestions based on your
• 57:51
  purchases. But what Mongo is doing here is
• 57:54
  a bit different and the step further I would say.
• 57:57
  So the assistant isn't just reactive, it uses real time
• 58:01
  fashion trends and user inputs like your wish list, for
• 58:05
  example, to generate personalised outfit, outfit
• 58:09
  suggestions. And you can access, you can
• 58:13
  access it on their website on the app and through Instagram.
• 58:17
  So I actually tested it myself both on the app and Instagram.
• 58:22
  So first on the app, I didn't find it super intuitive at first
• 58:29
  because the assistant isn't immediately visible.
• 58:33
  So I was expecting to see something big on the home page
• 58:37
  saying Mongo stylist is here. I couldn't find it really easily
• 58:41
  so I gave it a try. And you actually have to scroll
• 58:44
  to Scroll down on the product page to the bottom of the page
• 58:49
  and click on the need help button to start the conversation
• 58:53
  with the stylist. And you end up seeing the
• 58:57
  conversation where it's written assistance.
• 58:59
  So it doesn't feel like you are entering the the stylist mode.
• 59:05
  But once I got into it, I have to say that the chat was really
• 59:09
  smooth and very satisfying. So for your reference, I asked
• 59:14
  for white comfortable trousers for the beach and it gave me
• 59:19
  pretty relevant options, trendy, comfortable, cheap and it gave
• 59:25
  me some, you know, products with links that I could click on and
• 59:29
  then check out. So I would say the experience
• 59:31
  once you are into it is, is very good.
• 59:34
  And then I tried the same thing on Instagram and the experience
• 59:38
  was a bit different there. So since it's not linked to your
• 59:42
  account, it doesn't have access to your shopping history or
• 59:46
  preferences. So the first thing it asked me
• 59:49
  was either to choose the country I'm from or to share my e-mail
• 59:54
  address to connect with my Mongo wishlist, for example.
• 59:58
  So it's really interesting to see.
• 1:00:00
  How mongo is using different entry points and how much the
• 1:00:04
  experience depends on the data they have access to?
• 1:00:09
  Yeah. So at the moment.
• 1:00:10
  Example of a gentic, you know an agent shopping for you.
• 1:00:15
  But I love this example because what you're highlighting here,
• 1:00:19
  how does a retailer take control of its own data on the shopping,
• 1:00:23
  on the path to purchase? And this is a beautiful example
• 1:00:26
  of that. I really, yeah, I'm impressed by
• 1:00:29
  Mango getting it out to market this quickly.
• 1:00:32
  Do do do you think you'll end up spending more money?
• 1:00:36
  I did definitely do you bought? 3 pairs of white trousers.
• 1:00:40
  Just one, yeah. He bought an accessory or
• 1:00:43
  something to go with it. I love to to test the new, you
• 1:00:46
  know, new trends and new technologies.
• 1:00:49
  Yeah, it's available in the UK and France.
• 1:00:52
  Would you, OK, here's a question.
• 1:00:53
  Would you go back to it or is it do you think it's a gimmick?
• 1:00:58
  I think, I think I would go back because I have to say, I mean
• 1:01:03
  it's very personal, but I don't shop as much as I used to
• 1:01:08
  before. I tend to go to charity shops
• 1:01:11
  and try and go on vintage and try to buy less new products.
• 1:01:18
  So when I end up on the website today or in the store, I don't
• 1:01:23
  know what's trending, I don't know what, what would be, you
• 1:01:29
  know, the best products to to buy this summer.
• 1:01:33
  So I find there, I find retailers, a holiday shop really
• 1:01:38
  useful for this. But if you're looking for a
• 1:01:41
  specific, for example, a wide comfortable trouser, if you're
• 1:01:45
  looking for something specific, it saves you time and you, you,
• 1:01:49
  you just go to the chat, you know you want something from
• 1:01:52
  Mango and there you have it. I love it, honestly really good.
• 1:01:58
  So it's really interesting. We'll finish on this one.
• 1:02:01
  I'm I'm going to be super fast because we're at the top of our
• 1:02:04
  allotted time. Tell me what you if you think
• 1:02:07
  this is true or not so. Like, after years of minimalism
• 1:02:13
  and quiet luxury, is the messy schoolgirl finally back?
• 1:02:16
  We spent years smoothing out every edge, from beige colour
• 1:02:19
  palettes to skin care's personality.
• 1:02:21
  The ideal was polished and optimised.
• 1:02:23
  But lately, that aesthetic is starting to unravel.
• 1:02:25
  And it's not just a vibe. On platforms like Particle, the
• 1:02:28
  data tracks the mood shift in real time.
• 1:02:30
  Tobacco products are up 843%, rolling trays 569%.
• 1:02:34
  Alcoholic beverages up nearly 1000% in the past 12 months.
• 1:02:37
  This isn't just aesthetic fatigue, it's cultural realigned
• 1:02:40
  coach is climbing. Granny is trending upwards a row
• 1:02:43
  softening. Suddenly having a beer in cowboy
• 1:02:45
  boots feels more aspirational than Granger's and Pilatus.
• 1:02:47
  It's less about optimization, more about character, pleasure
• 1:02:50
  and mood. Day to night dressing is
• 1:02:52
  trending and imperfect. Beauty is back.
• 1:02:54
  People are drinking again, dancing again, wearing the
• 1:02:56
  dress, not checking the weather, ordering dessert, swapping
• 1:02:59
  routines for romance, saying more with less beige.
• 1:03:01
  From clean to captivating. If you're building a brand or
• 1:03:03
  marketing one, this isn't noise. It's a shift in culture and
• 1:03:06
  taste and how people want to feel.
• 1:03:08
  The clean girl era, It's fading. What's next is messier, bolder,
• 1:03:11
  and honestly, a lot more fun. It's interesting because one of
• 1:03:15
  the major trends and giving is, you know, cigarettes and alcohol
• 1:03:19
  have been declining. But what the commentary here is,
• 1:03:23
  is that there's a messier trending aesthetic that
• 1:03:27
  retailers potentially need to be paying attention to or providing
• 1:03:31
  a space for because green, I don't know, green smoothies are
• 1:03:37
  not hitting it anymore. And people want to let their
• 1:03:40
  hair down, have more fun, go wild.
• 1:03:43
  And obviously we're in festival season.
• 1:03:45
  So you're seeing a lot of that across the whole of Europe in
• 1:03:48
  different festivals. I just wonder what your opinion
• 1:03:51
  is. Do you, do you, do you think
• 1:03:53
  that is a trend that's coming in or you think it's just not
• 1:03:55
  really people are still into their health?
• 1:03:58
  I think, I think it's, it is not a trend.
• 1:04:01
  I think it's real that there's people are realising that they
• 1:04:06
  need to make choices for themselves and not for the look
• 1:04:12
  of it or what others are going to think about it.
• 1:04:15
  So obviously on social media you see all these videos about
• 1:04:21
  Pilates, girls, smoothies and as you said, being healthy and
• 1:04:27
  which is, don't get me wrong, really important to stay healthy
• 1:04:30
  and, and be active. But life isn't just about that.
• 1:04:33
  It's also about, yeah, enjoying life and simple moments and
• 1:04:40
  being yourself. And there's a strong move, I
• 1:04:44
  would say, on social media about being yourself without makeup,
• 1:04:49
  with your own body shapes. And I think it's great because
• 1:04:55
  it used to put a lot of pressure on people and now we can see
• 1:04:59
  there's a trend about getting this pressure off being.
• 1:05:04
  Sierra, it's real, I guess. We're less interested in what
• 1:05:07
  things look like and how they really are.
• 1:05:10
  And real life is messy. And so maybe that's that's the
• 1:05:14
  aesthetic we're going. Alexandra, thank you so much for
• 1:05:17
  giving up the time for being with us for the for the for the
• 1:05:20
  show today. Hopefully you have a lovely
• 1:05:22
  weekend and I see you next week. Thank you so much, Alex.
• 1:05:25
  Thank you for having me. Well abiento, hello and welcome
• 1:05:40
  Welcome back to another fantastic edition of Five Things
• 1:05:44
  Friday 8 pack edition with my wonderful Co host Reef Quail and
• 1:05:49
  Laura Doonan. Hi, guys.
• 1:05:51
  Hello, Alex. How are you?
• 1:05:53
  Hello. Good.
• 1:05:54
  How are you both doing I've. I've actually for after after a
• 1:05:57
  month of the event being passed, almost a month past the event,
• 1:06:00
  I've finally succumbed to a cold.
• 1:06:02
  I've got a head cold. OK, it took it took three or
• 1:06:05
  four weeks, but I'm there now I'm I'm, I'm finally I have, you
• 1:06:10
  know, that was I've I've felt like a decompressed enough to
• 1:06:13
  have a shave. And and Laura, how are you
• 1:06:16
  doing? I'm good, I'm good.
• 1:06:18
  OK, So I'm going to start this week.
• 1:06:20
  So the one thing that is super interesting is this Middle East
• 1:06:25
  focus on luxury and how luxury sales defies the global slowdown
• 1:06:30
  in luxury. And so while stall while sales
• 1:06:34
  stall in places like China and the US, the Gulf region is still
• 1:06:38
  going ahead. Luxury spend rose 6% year on
• 1:06:41
  year in 2024, are reaching 12.8 billion and as the global market
• 1:06:47
  contracted by 2%, forecasts for the region have sales at 15
• 1:06:52
  billion by 2027. Which again, I, I sure
• 1:06:56
  understand why there's so much focus in, in the region, but
• 1:07:01
  more in, again, when you break that down and you look at malls
• 1:07:05
  and you heard me talk about malls or shopping centres as
• 1:07:09
  dopamine villages. Well, these are malls as
• 1:07:12
  cultural cornerstone and growth drivers, which sort of physical
• 1:07:16
  retail still remains dominant. Great news for all across the
• 1:07:20
  Gulf, with Saudi Arabia expected to see over 80% of fashion and
• 1:07:25
  luxury transactions happen in malls.
• 1:07:28
  By Saudi, Saudi's going completely crazy.
• 1:07:32
  It's a real There's a real transformation at me in the
• 1:07:34
  Middle East. It might be an appropriate time
• 1:07:37
  to drop a plug for the five things Friday made the Least
• 1:07:40
  edition that will be coming out as well.
• 1:07:43
  Fantastic. Well, there is a There's a lot
• 1:07:45
  of cool things happening up there.
• 1:07:47
  Yeah. So I've got a couple of people
• 1:07:48
  who are 1 based in Saudi, 1 based in Dubai and we're going
• 1:07:51
  to look at that anyway. I'm not going to talk about
• 1:07:54
  that, but that that will be coming.
• 1:07:56
  So when you look at Dubai Mall and the picture that you're
• 1:07:59
  looking at is the new extension to the Dubai Mall.
• 1:08:02
  It attracts in the standing 111 million visitors in 2024, which
• 1:08:09
  sort of capturing virtually all international tourists in the
• 1:08:12
  city. And it's a luxury mall expansion
• 1:08:16
  which is around 408 million dedicated to new high end retail
• 1:08:21
  spaces. So there is no stock.
• 1:08:22
  This is just continued growth. And I think the world's
• 1:08:26
  millionaires need somewhere to go above and beyond the South of
• 1:08:30
  France. When you look at when we zoom
• 1:08:32
  into Saudi Arabia, going back to what Reef was said, you see that
• 1:08:36
  in Riyadh. It's a sort of rapidly appearing
• 1:08:40
  as a luxury destination with landmark developments, again,
• 1:08:43
  physical developments, a solitaire, which we'll be
• 1:08:46
  launching this year and feature luxury brands and experiential
• 1:08:50
  retail And the Avenue Malls of Saudi, which is very similar to
• 1:08:55
  again, what you were heard me talking about the dope green
• 1:08:57
  villages, which is Westfield's up and coming entries in the
• 1:09:01
  Saudis ambitious retail future. And then all of these are sort
• 1:09:06
  of underpinned with VIP experiences that are sort of
• 1:09:10
  enticing the elite consumers who now expect specifically
• 1:09:15
  culturally, they expect privacy, they expect personalization.
• 1:09:19
  They want prestige as a standard, not as an option.
• 1:09:23
  So, you know, culturally they do, you know, female shoppers
• 1:09:27
  have to shop separately, but these, these things have always
• 1:09:31
  been like an added option. And now that's just expected as
• 1:09:35
  an as an, A standard for transformational experiences and
• 1:09:39
  even digital first brands like Onassis that have established
• 1:09:42
  VIP physical suites to match this type of demand.
• 1:09:46
  And you know, you would think, you know, all of this focus on
• 1:09:50
  physical. Does that mean tech is not
• 1:09:53
  happening? But they're still leaning into
• 1:09:55
  tech innovation with in the sort of in this new luxury paradigm,
• 1:09:59
  which looks at AI stylist, NFT based products, immersive
• 1:10:03
  digital experiences beyond the knob, you know, beyond what we
• 1:10:08
  see as sort of these sort one off marketing activations with
• 1:10:11
  55% of the MENA region, a population under the age 30
• 1:10:18
  luxury to the sort of find themselves having to integrate
• 1:10:22
  digital, sophisticated and cultural experiences.
• 1:10:26
  But sorry, having cultural sensitivity to main relevance
• 1:10:30
  and leadership. And so, you know, GG has
• 1:10:32
  transitioned from peripheral luxury market into a trend
• 1:10:36
  setting market. And I think we're just going to
• 1:10:38
  see that more and more over the next three or four years, which
• 1:10:42
  will sort of define how luxury brands such as LVMH approach
• 1:10:47
  personal immersive experiences, which I think they can sort of
• 1:10:51
  borrow and take to the world. So that's specifically on on on
• 1:10:56
  Dubai and the and the Mall of Dubai and its expansion.
• 1:11:00
  But another I'll just share this video with you, which is just
• 1:11:03
  mind blowing. Thanks to this is the Shanghai
• 1:11:07
  eye on YouTube. So you know, go get over to
• 1:11:10
  YouTube and watch their video, but I'll share it here with you.
• 1:11:14
  And this is Louis Vuitton's flagship store appearing in
• 1:11:18
  downtown Shanghai. And this is not a rendered, you
• 1:11:23
  know, CGI. This is the store.
• 1:11:25
  It is a luxury cruise line of Etsy meets a height structure.
• 1:11:31
  And you know, they interview these two local.
• 1:11:33
  This is a French guy who tourists who they just sort of,
• 1:11:36
  you know, he was pretty much mind blowing.
• 1:11:40
  And for those who are based in Europe, they may have been to
• 1:11:43
  chances lease. They may have seen the LVMH
• 1:11:46
  flagship store in Paris, which is the iconic Louis Vuitton
• 1:11:52
  suitcases stacked together, but this is just taking it to a
• 1:11:56
  complete different level. It's just incredible when you
• 1:11:59
  look at why they're doing that, the sort of top five strategic
• 1:12:02
  insights behind what's going on here.
• 1:12:06
  This is LVH experience over product, which is the sort of
• 1:12:10
  new luxury blueprint. LVH and it's sort of peers in
• 1:12:14
  the industry are prioritising creating emotional resonance
• 1:12:20
  between their experience over product.
• 1:12:22
  And I think again, I noticed this when I flew out to NRF,
• 1:12:27
  going through the airport where they're lending their names to
• 1:12:31
  sort of experiential things such as cafes, restaurant,
• 1:12:35
  restaurants, cultural engagement, merely overselling
• 1:12:39
  just product, right? That's by the new LVMH handbag
• 1:12:43
  or, or whatever luxury trainers. This is about having those
• 1:12:48
  engagement moments, the sort of strategic pivot address to
• 1:12:52
  consumers, deeper desire for fulfilment and emotional
• 1:12:55
  connection be beyond the that that product, which is still
• 1:12:59
  important. But China's luxury boom sort of
• 1:13:03
  has faltered. So there's prompted these
• 1:13:06
  strategic shifts. And when you look at how the
• 1:13:09
  sector shrank over the last three years, and I think it
• 1:13:13
  shrank 18% in 2023 and it's sort of stagnated in 2024-2025 that
• 1:13:21
  the property market limited that growth.
• 1:13:24
  They're not going to be opening thousands of more stores.
• 1:13:27
  They're going to be opening these massive flagship points
• 1:13:30
  and. On the Middle East, it's so
• 1:13:33
  interesting to watch and it actually makes me uncomfortable
• 1:13:37
  because what you see there that's it's really catered into
• 1:13:41
  this the, the mega elite, the Super wealthy.
• 1:13:46
  Like you can just imagine Jeff Bezos and his wife, after
• 1:13:50
  they've done that, they've done their Venice thing, they'll go
• 1:13:53
  there for their shopping trip. It's so extravagant, it's so
• 1:13:58
  excessive. And it actually starts to make
• 1:14:01
  that Shanghai experience look kind of more normal now.
• 1:14:04
  It's it's so interesting seeing this, this Popeye up and it
• 1:14:09
  really makes me think like Europe still as when I think
• 1:14:12
  about fashion is still, it's still there, but there's this
• 1:14:16
  different echo chamber coming out of this the Middle East.
• 1:14:20
  I've stayed in Dubai. I remember like that was years
• 1:14:22
  ago and what the seven start the Atlantis this well, all the
• 1:14:27
  shops in there. I remember going in and being
• 1:14:29
  like, I need to leave. Like this was, I didn't even
• 1:14:31
  know these brands and these price points existed.
• 1:14:34
  So it's I feel like it's always been there and now they're just
• 1:14:37
  putting it in the face and they're really making it their
• 1:14:40
  destination for that, that that elite crew.
• 1:14:44
  Yes, it's, it's really something else which I was thinking about
• 1:14:48
  as I feel like and the more the more common, the more normal
• 1:14:52
  brands and the the commoners out there, there's been a lot of
• 1:14:56
  like, you know the. Normal.
• 1:14:58
  Yeah, it was more normal or relatable.
• 1:15:01
  There's been a lot of these like let's do it for the gramme.
• 1:15:03
  Like activations pop up and we're moving in a bit of a
• 1:15:08
  they're going to drop off because a lot of them have just
• 1:15:11
  been noise and it and we've matured past that.
• 1:15:15
  And then you've got these kind of flagship the the the shop
• 1:15:18
  that looks like a boat. I reckon these more mid tier
• 1:15:21
  brands have done their do it for the gramme, the activations, the
• 1:15:23
  funny, the silly things. Probably now have to think about
• 1:15:28
  what, what's real like what is that experiential retail look
• 1:15:32
  like for them and where do they actually put some stake in the
• 1:15:35
  ground and and and make it a real presence rather than just a
• 1:15:40
  pop up. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:15:41
  But Reef? I think that the, the whole, the
• 1:15:43
  thought you've mentioned it was the gramme is really
• 1:15:45
  interesting. And if you're going to the Gucci
• 1:15:48
  Cafe in the airport lounge, you're it's going to the gramme,
• 1:15:52
  you know, like it's, it's, it's those, it's almost like these
• 1:15:56
  luxury brands are creating gateways towards them.
• 1:15:59
  And so I can't buy the handbag, but I can, I can go part of the
• 1:16:03
  way. And so.
• 1:16:04
  Experience. I have an experience, but more
• 1:16:07
  importantly, have an earned media, create earned media for
• 1:16:11
  that their that their consumers or the aspirational consumers
• 1:16:14
  want to see, right. You know, you know, to to be in
• 1:16:18
  the airport going through Dubai and go to a Gucci cafe and share
• 1:16:20
  the experience because you're gonna because you're excited,
• 1:16:23
  because you're on a plane. Yeah, that's pretty cool.
• 1:16:26
  And that and and Gucci may have not got that share if they just
• 1:16:32
  stayed totally in retail. When you look at the brands in
• 1:16:35
  terms of LVMH curing, Richmond, Hermes, they're all
• 1:16:39
  recalibrating their strategies for China to sort of adapt to
• 1:16:44
  these new market realities as luxury within China grows and
• 1:16:49
  luxury Chinese brands grow bare face with these pressures.
• 1:16:54
  But so labouring the point experiential luxury outpaces
• 1:16:59
  physical goods. So through global personal
• 1:17:02
  luxury good sales, as as I mentioned that dropped by 1 to
• 1:17:06
  3% in 2024, experienced luxury sector like hospitality curated
• 1:17:13
  events that grew by 5% and that's driven by young consumers
• 1:17:18
  increasingly preferring. So at least memorable experience
• 1:17:22
  like you were saying, Gucci Cafe, you take your camera out,
• 1:17:24
  you put it on Instagram or TikTok and it provides that
• 1:17:27
  dopamine validation or that validation for for the consumer,
• 1:17:31
  which challenges that whole physical possessions marking of
• 1:17:35
  both of them are still there. And then just to sort of finish
• 1:17:38
  off flagship stores as cultural icons very similar to what we've
• 1:17:42
  seen in Dubai, we're seeing in China and the LVMH store sort of
• 1:17:47
  see this And my prediction this will spread out like Formula One
• 1:17:51
  for cars where the technology there sort of goes into
• 1:17:54
  mainstream cars. This will happen and it will
• 1:17:57
  have a massive impact because what we'll see that store
• 1:18:01
  closures specifically in China aren't sort of retreats.
• 1:18:05
  This signals the strategic direction of retailers going for
• 1:18:09
  few powerhouses and reducing their network of stores and
• 1:18:15
  luxury sort of leading in that luxury houses or redirecting
• 1:18:18
  investments to these the smaller stores.
• 1:18:21
  And in summary, you know, LBMH involves strategic priorities,
• 1:18:26
  reducing the noise, enriching meaning, and then looking at how
• 1:18:31
  to cultivate that cultural resonance.
• 1:18:34
  And I think the future definitely belongs, as you've
• 1:18:38
  seen in Dubai and as you've seen in China to those retail brands
• 1:18:43
  that can enrich that personal, enrich the personal experience,
• 1:18:48
  but it takes it just beyond product acquisition and hence
• 1:18:54
  why culture becomes such a key thing.
• 1:18:56
  I think Laura, you're you were going to go next in your Oh,
• 1:19:00
  it's. Not all right.
• 1:19:02
  I've just got one for you guys today and I was reading The
• 1:19:06
  Australian, is it the Australian Bureau of Statistics?
• 1:19:11
  I was laughing and they said yeah, well, I will.
• 1:19:13
  I was. I was reading the high highlight
• 1:19:16
  reel. What do you sleep?
• 1:19:17
  I was laughing at the the word surge.
• 1:19:20
  So it it looks like the retail sales year on year for last
• 1:19:24
  month have surged 3.3%. I don't know if I'd call it a
• 1:19:28
  surge, but that's what they they said.
• 1:19:30
  And so retail sales are reaching 37.3 billion in Australia.
• 1:19:36
  So read it without the mention in specifics, but it doesn't
• 1:19:41
  take a rocket science to figure it out.
• 1:19:44
  It was saying 11% growth has came from online bargain
• 1:19:47
  shoppers. So it's just a little bit
• 1:19:50
  potentially skewed wrong, right. Like it gives the sentiment that
• 1:19:54
  retail in Australia is doing well, but it's actually we're
• 1:19:58
  we're at a bit of a crisis point where rents, rates and
• 1:20:01
  businesses are quite worried. Local businesses 11% growth
• 1:20:06
  online without bargain shopper is 100%.
• 1:20:08
  Coming from the team you and the the Shen and the likes.
• 1:20:12
  You know, we know that their massive focus on this market
• 1:20:15
  last year, their sales were from Sheenwood 1.2 billion to
• 1:20:19
  Australian consumers. So yeah, and.
• 1:20:22
  And it was. It led me down a little bit of a
• 1:20:25
  rabbit hole and the Australian Fashion Council, the CEO has
• 1:20:30
  been very vocal about potentially needing to push some
• 1:20:34
  guardrails around Australian retail.
• 1:20:36
  At the same time, one of the issues we have is 97, you say
• 1:20:42
  fashion items sold in country come from offshore.
• 1:20:46
  So it, you know, like I think, yeah.
• 1:20:50
  Yeah, and guardrails don't work, though.
• 1:20:52
  Like, I know, you know, Alibaba dropped a billion dollars in
• 1:20:56
  infrastructure in Korea. The Korean retailers are up in
• 1:20:58
  arms lobbying the government to put protectionist measures in
• 1:21:02
  place. But if they're arguing about
• 1:21:05
  that, they've already missed the boat.
• 1:21:06
  If we're worrying about protectionist measures, they've
• 1:21:08
  already missed the boat. It's already done.
• 1:21:11
  Yeah, the the one thing I quite liked about what she was saying,
• 1:21:14
  I know that in France, I think they've put like a bit of a a
• 1:21:17
  tax back on fast fashion. The one thing that I think
• 1:21:23
  that's it's great, however, I start to question who who pays
• 1:21:27
  for it because if you put a $5 tax to the consumer of the buy
• 1:21:32
  fast fashion, but the alternative here is not really
• 1:21:35
  there. They're going to pay the extra
• 1:21:36
  $5 and the only person that is as you know is affected as the
• 1:21:41
  consumer. So I do like the fact that the
• 1:21:44
  assuring fashion council are like actually going first we
• 1:21:48
  need to look at what's going on in a backyard and have a bit an
• 1:21:51
  assessment and how we build up some kind of manufacture.
• 1:21:54
  Can we go back to some level of manufacturing control and
• 1:21:57
  country. And it really just talks, I
• 1:22:00
  mean, Alex, complete extremes, right?
• 1:22:02
  You're talking about Dubai and the Middle East, this super
• 1:22:06
  luxury and then just this back to the normal world, which as
• 1:22:11
  the retailers with physical retail, you know, they're
• 1:22:14
  they're they're they're hard at it right now.
• 1:22:17
  So yeah, so it's spend is up and sentiment is in the middle of
• 1:22:22
  the road with the consumer and they're spend, the sales are up
• 1:22:27
  and it's been driven by more Chinese goods coming in and
• 1:22:32
  flooding the Australian market. So we'll have to just watch how
• 1:22:36
  that plays out. That's.
• 1:22:38
  No, I haven't got good. Well, I haven't got good news
• 1:22:40
  then for the Australian Fashion Council because my little, my
• 1:22:44
  first one today is a little bit about something that's happened
• 1:22:47
  earlier this year and that is the re entry of Chinese
• 1:22:51
  technology to India. And we've seen in March, April
• 1:22:54
  this year, the launch of a partnership between Reliance
• 1:22:58
  Retail. So Reliance is probably one of
• 1:23:00
  the largest retail conglomerates in India and Sheehan.
• 1:23:04
  So Sheehan's been banned for five years in that partnership,
• 1:23:09
  right? Operational control rests with
• 1:23:11
  Reliance, with data localization, all the data is
• 1:23:14
  stored in India. So she and doesn't have access
• 1:23:16
  to the data and addresses all the privacy issues and
• 1:23:19
  technology and technology. The technology operate under
• 1:23:22
  licence by Reliance. But the key thing about this
• 1:23:26
  partnership, apart from the scale it can then take to the
• 1:23:30
  Indian market, is that all the stuff that's been sourced for
• 1:23:36
  the first time, it's been made in India.
• 1:23:38
  So you think about that because she and then go, OK, cool, we
• 1:23:41
  can do fast fashion Chinese sauce, but for us in Australia,
• 1:23:46
  it's going to be Chinese sauce and Indian sourced.
• 1:23:51
  So all of a sudden we have two global powerhouses coming
• 1:23:54
  together, right? And this is really this is this
• 1:23:59
  is not just an implication for India domestically, but for the
• 1:24:03
  Xi'an platform in every market in which they operate.
• 1:24:06
  So from an Australian point of view, to your point, Laura,
• 1:24:10
  we're going to say a lot more product because there's going to
• 1:24:12
  be a lot more supply because they're coming from two
• 1:24:15
  production mad, you know, mega houses of India and China as
• 1:24:20
  opposed to just one. So this is a big change, a big
• 1:24:24
  change. And this happened this year.
• 1:24:26
  And it's like, you know, you automatically achieve scale if
• 1:24:30
  you're alliance and you're in India, but then you take Xi'an's
• 1:24:34
  distribution around the world and their ability to source
• 1:24:37
  product from both India and China.
• 1:24:40
  And this is game changing in global fast fashion.
• 1:24:44
  So that's number one. The number two thing I have
• 1:24:47
  today is I'm going to talk about the first technology in retail
• 1:24:52
  that's going from East to West rather than West to East.
• 1:24:57
  And I'm talking about live commerce now.
• 1:25:00
  So for many of us in Western countries, you just you really
• 1:25:04
  don't get the scale of this. So to put you in perspective,
• 1:25:09
  coming out of just before you know, 221 of the world's largest
• 1:25:14
  at that time live commerce events was Alibaba's Singles
• 1:25:19
  day. So 11th of November day in 2020,
• 1:25:23
  they generated their pre sales campaign generated 7.5 billion
• 1:25:29
  US in 30 minutes, all live commerce enabled.
• 1:25:34
  OK, so you go OK, cool, that's China, but it's not us.
• 1:25:38
  It's massive but but that's still pretty massive.
• 1:25:41
  But then let's bring it closer to home.
• 1:25:43
  So let's talk about L'Oreal now. Now L'Oreal is a live commerce
• 1:25:48
  aficionado in the region. So when I talk about L'Oreal,
• 1:25:52
  L'Oreal came out of COVID and went you know what, we're going
• 1:25:54
  to do something online. So they launch live commerce in
• 1:25:58
  Malaysia. So they produced and they have a
• 1:26:01
  obviously a virtual beauty festival.
• 1:26:03
  They extended to brands like L'Oreal, L'Oreal, brands like
• 1:26:06
  Ghania, Maybelline. Obviously in L'Oreal Paris for
• 1:26:10
  example, there were eight brands they used when they launched
• 1:26:13
  this campaign. So Malaysia's 3540 million
• 1:26:16
  people, it's not so much bigger than Australia.
• 1:26:18
  So it's a mid sized country. It's not massive.
• 1:26:20
  They did more sales for L'Oreal in 24 hours through live
• 1:26:25
  commerce than they would normally do for a whole month.
• 1:26:29
  This is in recent. Times, you know, this is insane.
• 1:26:33
  So we're not seeing this technology arrive here.
• 1:26:36
  But the thing I would say is that Gen Z, right, are the most
• 1:26:42
  global, global demographic of all time.
• 1:26:46
  So I can guarantee you they all know no matter where they're
• 1:26:49
  domiciled, what each other are doing.
• 1:26:51
  So it will happen, right? It will happen in London, it
• 1:26:55
  will happen in New York and it will happen in Sydney.
• 1:26:57
  The second one at L'Oreal case study, which is amazing.
• 1:27:00
  L'Oreal is so committed now to live commerce in Southeast Asia
• 1:27:05
  that in Indonesia, in Jakarta, they have 4, so 14, not 414 live
• 1:27:12
  live commerce studios running 24/7 beaming content around the
• 1:27:18
  region, around Southeast Asia. Every market in Southeast Asia
• 1:27:22
  is doing double digit e-commerce growth.
• 1:27:25
  So they're running L'Oreal is running 14 continuous streams
• 1:27:31
  simultaneously, everything from makeup tutorials to hair care
• 1:27:36
  products to usage. And this is going completely
• 1:27:40
  nuts. Now the and so obviously
• 1:27:42
  Indonesia say is like 300 million people in the fourth
• 1:27:44
  most populous country in the world, but they're actually
• 1:27:48
  streaming that all out around the region as well.
• 1:27:50
  So Vietnam experiencing double digit e-commerce growth, you
• 1:27:53
  know all these markets. So this is wild, right?
• 1:27:57
  This is the yeah. So this is going to happen in
• 1:28:00
  all markets around the world because Gen Z will drive this
• 1:28:02
  and the next generation generation alpha will be all
• 1:28:05
  over this. Reflex, do you think because I,
• 1:28:09
  I know that they, they shop very different, right?
• 1:28:11
  And they've all had these, it's been driven by apps and it's
• 1:28:14
  always been available to do. And then we've not really had it
• 1:28:18
  available to do. But then do you think it will
• 1:28:22
  like I think it will have a place, but I think we've got
• 1:28:25
  TikTok shop in like UK and the. UN.
• 1:28:28
  So I'm not with these platforms, the content is being produced.
• 1:28:32
  They're agnostic of platform. It's TikTok shop.
• 1:28:35
  So TikTok Byte Dance, more than 50% of Tokopedia.
• 1:28:40
  Now Tokopedia is the eBay in Indonesia.
• 1:28:43
  So we're seeing the sale of the product live commerce as being
• 1:28:46
  the platform, but it's being distributed, been sold through
• 1:28:50
  Tokopedia, through shopping and through and through L'oreal's
• 1:28:55
  own own branded channels. OK.
• 1:28:59
  So you as a consumer, you've got a choice.
• 1:29:01
  We're not saying, we're not saying it's ticks or tick tock
• 1:29:04
  shops is just one of them, right?
• 1:29:06
  But what we're saying is they're producing the content and
• 1:29:08
  pushing it across multiple platforms.
• 1:29:10
  Right. Like, and again, this may be a
• 1:29:12
  dumb question to me, live commerce is it's a theme.
• 1:29:16
  Are you saying it's a tech? No, it's not a tech, It's it's a
• 1:29:18
  theme, basically this content stream that it's really they're
• 1:29:22
  not, they aren't really blow reals not fussy if it if a
• 1:29:26
  consumer sees it via Talkopedia or a consumer sees it via
• 1:29:29
  shopping or a consumer sees it via their own owned media brand
• 1:29:33
  channels. Yeah, I think the likes of like
• 1:29:36
  doing it right now and let's use Australia, the US and UK, we've
• 1:29:40
  got like TikTok as like where we can get a lot of that.
• 1:29:44
  Then the websites I guess could be doing more live commerce, but
• 1:29:48
  then we're limited in the platforms that do it, whereas
• 1:29:51
  Asia has been so overly indexed and that's the way they love to
• 1:29:55
  shop. I said that that's going to be
• 1:29:58
  the barrier, but I totally, I totally get you.
• 1:30:00
  And only that scale can actually do this.
• 1:30:05
  I think, I think you've got platforms, you've got plat,
• 1:30:09
  you've got a, there's a distribution piece, an audience
• 1:30:11
  media distribution piece and there's a platform piece.
• 1:30:13
  There's, there's the other two pieces.
• 1:30:15
  But if you, I mean in Australia, you saw Live Commerce Australia
• 1:30:20
  launch all the work with Oz Her and Beauty, right?
• 1:30:23
  Oz Her and Beauty have got a programme running non-stop now
• 1:30:26
  in Australia. So they're doing it.
• 1:30:27
  So Guy Napper and his and his crew.
• 1:30:31
  So they've been doing it, you know, so this is out there in
• 1:30:34
  Australia. It has not, it hasn't not
• 1:30:35
  happened to you. And for them, I don't know how
• 1:30:39
  many they're talking about hundreds of thousands of social
• 1:30:42
  media followers. They could mobilise and and
• 1:30:44
  create a movement like that. So I think to your point, Laura,
• 1:30:49
  it's not just it's, yeah, there's got to be platform and
• 1:30:51
  technology capability in the market, but there's also got to
• 1:30:55
  be audience around those platforms to actually make it
• 1:30:58
  pop, if you know what I'm saying.
• 1:31:00
  Now, the thing about Oz hair and beauty is that they've got a
• 1:31:03
  huge following socially, I think probably on the gramme, right,
• 1:31:06
  which allows them then to go push back out to the gramme and
• 1:31:10
  then push them back to their own channels, right?
• 1:31:13
  So, yeah, you're right. But I think those channels that
• 1:31:17
  we'll establish, but I think, you know, consumers, that people
• 1:31:21
  are people, right? So, and as we've talked about
• 1:31:24
  Gen Z before, they are the most connected globally of any
• 1:31:27
  generation, right? They know each other's good.
• 1:31:30
  And Australia's a good example, right?
• 1:31:32
  You know, most kids going to university, English is their
• 1:31:36
  second language in their home in Australia, right?
• 1:31:39
  Big population of Asian Indian all around the region.
• 1:31:44
  We are not, you know, we are not European LED country as much as
• 1:31:49
  we think we are. There is and this generation
• 1:31:52
  particularly is enormous and they are already connected and
• 1:31:56
  orientated this way. And so we're just waiting, we're
• 1:31:59
  waiting for the technology platforms to become available
• 1:32:02
  and we're waiting for the distribution mechanism.
• 1:32:04
  And, and I and I, I mean, you don't, it's not live commerce,
• 1:32:07
  but you only have to look at what Jane Lew's done with Showpo
• 1:32:10
  in terms of the way she's used social media.
• 1:32:12
  It's a small step, you know it's not a big step.
• 1:32:15
  I, I definitely think in the more like, I think we'll, I
• 1:32:19
  think the aspects of it that all work really well and they
• 1:32:22
  haven't been adopted to where they have.
• 1:32:25
  I just think we've got such a different.
• 1:32:27
  I remember when live commerce tech popped up a few years ago,
• 1:32:31
  a lot of the details found and I think that it's changed it's
• 1:32:34
  changed since then is that the people wanted video content but
• 1:32:38
  they weren't that and either live by right now.
• 1:32:43
  However, I've seen one in my. I work with a business called
• 1:32:46
  TSN which is like. I know them well, shopping
• 1:32:50
  media. The TV shopping channel and when
• 1:32:53
  you look at how the consumers behave watching TV, it's it's
• 1:32:57
  live shopping, right? They're literally buying, it's
• 1:33:00
  showing them a countdown on screen.
• 1:33:02
  It's been so fascinating to work with a business like that that's
• 1:33:06
  aimed at an older demo demographic.
• 1:33:08
  It's television, but it's got all the aspects and the
• 1:33:12
  customers love it. So with you, I think it's going
• 1:33:14
  to pop. I just, I think it'll pop a lot
• 1:33:17
  differently and what it's done a. 100% I think culturally are
• 1:33:20
  different. I think, I mean, one of the
• 1:33:22
  things we see in Asia around the region is when grocery, when
• 1:33:26
  grocery shopping, particularly after COVID became a mainstream
• 1:33:29
  thing to do online, the rising tide lifted all boats and you
• 1:33:34
  now can't compare live commerce in China to anywhere else in the
• 1:33:37
  world. It's just another world away,
• 1:33:40
  right? But the thing that's happening
• 1:33:41
  in live commerce is grocery in China.
• 1:33:45
  And what that will do is change the nature of every category for
• 1:33:49
  live commerce because when because grocery shopping is a
• 1:33:52
  routine, it's not a novelty, it's not a one off.
• 1:33:55
  It's not yeah, it happens every week.
• 1:33:58
  And so when you see that behaviour change, you see a lift
• 1:34:01
  in all e-commerce. And one of the things might I
• 1:34:04
  hypothesise coming out of COVID. And you think about what
• 1:34:07
  Woolworths did with click and collect in Australia, right?
• 1:34:10
  How how that whole world just changed, right?
• 1:34:13
  e-commerce soared because all of a sudden e-commerce became part
• 1:34:17
  of the daily routine. And I think that that connection
• 1:34:21
  with something we do every day meant that then no shopping
• 1:34:25
  experiences, which were, you know, once a month or once every
• 1:34:28
  three months became now, well, like, I won't even go.
• 1:34:31
  I'll just, I'll, I'll, I can just buy that now.
• 1:34:34
  And so, yeah, I think it's a fascinating time.
• 1:34:36
  And I really, I think the way we turn up as Australians in live
• 1:34:40
  commerce is going to be very interesting.
• 1:34:42
  And I think it's not going to be led by us.
• 1:34:44
  But I'm too often. But but you're going to see some
• 1:34:46
  Gen Z shoppers ripping this apart, you know?
• 1:34:49
  Yeah, I think on on that bombshell, I'm just conscious of
• 1:34:52
  time. Anything else before we close
• 1:34:54
  out? Not much for me.
• 1:34:55
  I I I've had this week was a good fun.
• 1:34:58
  It's good fun topics, luxury, rampant consumerism in in in
• 1:35:02
  fast fashion and and live commerce.
• 1:35:05
  All pretty exciting stuff. That's all for me.
• 1:35:07
  I probably the only thing I I find super interesting is that
• 1:35:11
  just think it's making mine go wow, like India and China
• 1:35:15
  partnering. You wouldn't have thought that
• 1:35:18
  like they've been like, like like India I think is the second
• 1:35:23
  or third biggest man of global manufacturer for apparel.
• 1:35:27
  I think they're #2 so the fact that they, they're like, almost
• 1:35:30
  like joining forces, it's, it'll be interesting.
• 1:35:35
  It's it's the scale is insane. The tides are shifting and
• 1:35:38
  that's why I, I think retailers are always looking for what
• 1:35:42
  what's happening to try and stay ahead of all of these changes.
• 1:35:46
  And with that, thank you. I'm just look forward to seeing
• 1:35:48
  you guys next week. Absolutely all about next week.
• 1:35:51
  I'm I'm away Alex. So I will, I'll you will have to
• 1:35:53
  do without me. So it might be you might have to
• 1:35:56
  do 3 and two because I'll be, I'll be skiing in New Zealand.
• 1:36:00
  Oh, nice, nice. So yeah.
• 1:36:03
  I'll do it. Doing it tough.
• 1:36:05
  Take care. Hey, guys, bye.