What: Financial Times partnered with PayPal to host a webinar panel discussion with Cameron McLean, SVP of Europe, and Australia Enterprise at PayPal; Sandra Alzetta, VP and Global Head of Commerce & Customer Service at Spotify; Gabriele Griesbacher, Global Director of Payments at Entain Group; and David Pitt, UK VP at SilverRail Technologies.

Why it is important: The webinar discussed how major global organisations are approaching e-commerce in an economic downturn. Executives from PayPal, Spotify, Entertain Group and SilverRail Technologies discuss how they are adapting to changing consumer behaviour in a digital economy. The overall theme of how big retailers are planning to persevere through economic downturn is by providing a secure, seamless, and frictionless payment process for customers.

Financial Times x PayPal: E-Commerce: Building resilience in a downturn

What: CES is an annual trade show organized by the Consumer Technology Association. The event typically hosts presentations of new products and technologies in the consumer electronics industry. NRF Big Show features the latest retail solutions to highlight breakthrough technology, and introduce the ideas, people and partners that are shaping up the retail industry.

Why it is important: IADS’ partner, Retail Hub, was asked to share the key topics and takeaways from the 2023 CES and NRF conferences.

CES and NRF are two events where you can find everything connected to innovation. Some major topics addressed that have been sparking innovation were:

-    Labor shortage

-    Experience

-    Smart cameras (autonomous driving)

-    Supply chain transparency

While innovation continues to accelerate, the money to back innovation projects dwindled in 2022 compared to 2021. These investments are directly linked to the health of the financial markets, therefore the 2022 strain has impacted retail tech. But technology will continue to be a major piece in how companies will compete to have an edge in the future retail space. The only technology that was not receiving less money in the 2022 is everything connected to tech, climate tech, and sustainability.

The top funded business models over the past year were multi product marketplaces, financing platforms (BNPL), B2B horizontal marketplaces, e-commerce rollups, social reselling platforms, B2B e-commerce software suites, CPG brands e-commerce software suites, e-commerce storefronts, CPG brand analytics, and marketplace software suites.

The key technology themes found at CES were: enterprise tech innovation, metaverse, Web 3.0, transportation, mobility, heath technology, sustainability, gaming and services.

Finally, it was noted that when it comes to emerging markets, Africa is starting to become a hub for innovation.

Watch the interview here 

What: Financial Times partnered with PayPal to host a webinar panel discussion with Cameron McLean, SVP of Europe, and Australia Enterprise at PayPal; Sandra Alzetta, VP and Global Head of Commerce & Customer Service at Spotify; Gabriele Griesbacher, Global Director of Payments at Entain Group; and David Pitt, UK VP at SilverRail Technologies.

Why it is important: The webinar discussed how major global organisations are approaching e-commerce in an economic downturn. Executives from PayPal, Spotify, Entertain Group and SilverRail Technologies discuss how they are adapting to changing consumer behaviour in a digital economy. The overall theme of how big retailers are planning to persevere through economic downturn is by providing a secure, seamless, and frictionless payment process for customers.

Financial Times x PayPal: E-Commerce: Building resilience in a downturn

What: Bain retail and technology experts sit down with industry leaders, Pierre-Nicolas Hurstel, CEO of Arianee, and Stéphanie Zolesio-Roux, Executive General Manager of Casino Immobilier, to discuss Web3 and its impact on retail.

Why it is important: Understanding Web3 and where it fits in retail strategies today, such as its impact on new business models, and the adoption process and potential barriers, can help retailers capitalize on the opportunities brought by Web3 technologies.

Forge Retail Showcase: Web3 in Retail

watch the recap here

What: Retail Dive hosted a webinar with guests Julie Mall, VP of Global Solutions Consulting at Elastic Path and Brenton Sellati, Senior Director of Product, Catalog Data Platform, at Wayfair, discussing how an agile can provide a simple path to modern merchandising success.

Why it is important: An agile catalog allows brands to respond to trends and customer preferences immediately by segmenting and updating their merchandise mix on the fly. Modern merchandising techniques also allow brands to optimize their assortments and offerings with the goal of delighting customers and boosting revenue throughout 2023.

Industry Dive Webinar Takeaways

What: Bain & Company introduced their Luxury Goods Worldwide Market Study in collaboration with Fondazione Altagamma.

Why it is important: The global luxury market has fully recovered from the COVID-19 crisis, having grown between 8-10% over 2019. With a +15% growth vs 2021 (at a constant exchange rate), luxury goods proved to be resilient and strong against macroeconomic indicators and global uncertainty. The outlook for 2023 is more cautious and anticipates slower growth, between 3 and 8% vs 2022.

Bain & Company 2022 luxury study

Bain & Company Conference Takeaways

Author: Guillaume Poitrinal

Formerly the Unibail-Rodamco CEO and the youngest CAC40 boss, Guillaume Poitrinal founded and runs WO2, a start-up real-estate company replacing concrete with solid wood, which is pioneering low-carbon real estate. Now accounting for EUR 400 million in turnover, the company built 300,000 sqm of offices around Paris and is building 1,000 new flats per year.

What: Poitrinal is de facto a player in the ecological transition, he shares his thoughts on the debate around the notion of modern ecology: on one hand, a sterile vision of ecology based on de-growth, and on the other hand, the hope of a fruitful positive ecology.

Why it is important: Condemning politically correct ecology and actions, he offers an entrepreneurial, clear-headed defence by choosing to combine ecology, consumption and growth. Eco-modernism is a winning model here. Low-carbon prosperity is possible and environmental responsibility is compatible with the profit motive as it is another form of profit. However, the angles taken and the lack of deep arguments for some of his positions make that book more of a political platform than a truly operational tool for CEOs and C-Suite.

Pour en finir avec l’apocalypse, Une écologie de l’action 

The IADS attended the 2023 edition of the NRF, including the annual FIRA meeting, as the Federation of International Retail Associations has been a crucial and powerful tool during this past year to establish contacts with retailers and gather insights about markets. For that reason, our goal is to maximize the value of the FIRA membership (€1,400 a year).

This year again, the session was fruitful, both in terms of learnings and persons encountered.

Also, contrary to the 2022 edition, this year the event went back to its normal attendance size, with 29 federations attending, represented by 55 delegates (vs. 15 federations last year), with the notable absence of the IGDS, who joined FIRA last year.

This document sums up the FIRA meetings. The NRF conferences we attended are summarized in a separate document, as well as the store visits. Also, our comments or plans for future actions are written in blue.

FIRA 23 MEETING REPORT

FIRA Meeting 2023 AGENDA

Fira Jan 23 meeting participant list

SPEAKER BIOS

The India retail Transformation by Kumar Rajagopalan

Democratising Digital Commerce by Kumar Rajagopalan

Cross border implications of EU policy on digital commerce by Maike Jansen X Alien Mulyk

Retail Cybersecurity Risks and Opportunities for International Collaboration BY Christian Beckner

Giving customers a voice in a world full of numbers by Alexander Genov

photo album

What: The conference held in Brussels on 29 November covered embracing transformation and uncertainty for retail and wholesale to continue their essential role.

Why it is important: A triple transformation is currently happening. It’s about sustainability, digitalisation and the skills which will be required to deal with both topics. 600 billion euros will have to be invested by 2030, as well as a total of 1.5 million people per year to be recruited.

Eurocommerce x McKinsey conference

What: Tech for Retail offers a complete and relevant overview of digital tools and technological innovations dedicated to the retail industry.

Why it is important: The conference pulls together interesting companies and solutions that are showcased over two days. This year, IADS attended the salon in Paris to scout out the key trends and startups that could be of value to our members. We have recounted the major themes and companies that are offering solutions to these trends.

Tech for Retail

Author: Maxine Bédat

What: Entrepreneur, researcher, and advocate Maxine Bédat follows the life of an American icon- a pair of jeans- to reveal what really happens behind the scenes of the entire lifecycle of our clothing, from production to their end of life.

Why it is important: The story uses a pair of pants to share the story of our global economy and the role that consumers play in it. The book pushes the audience to challenge their relationship with everyday consumer goods to reclaim their role as citizens so that we can create a more holistic society that benefits all people across the world, with the preservation of the planet at the core of our practices.

Unraveled: The Life and Death of a Garment

What: The Financial Times welcomed the audience to London with all panels and speakers focusing on the subject of Sustainability, Innovation & Customer-centricity

Why it is important: The point of the conference was to examine how the retail industry has fared following a period of high inflation, rising energy prices, a cost of living crisis and ongoing geopolitical volatility.

Financial Times Future of Retail 2023

What: GDI held the 72nd International Retail Sumbit in Zurich to discuss flow commerce and how shifting the boundaries is reshaping retail.

Why it is important: Smooth process flows have never been as important as they are now. Yet they have also never been as challenging. How does commerce stay in flux? A new poker for procurement has begun; new bets are being made on customer preferences.

GDI 72nd International Retail Summit 

Author: Richard Thaler, Cass Sunstein, Penguin Books

What: The Nudge theory, which was released in 2008 and adopted by many regulators across the planet, has been updated by its authors and applied to contemporary issues, among which the climate change.

Why it is important: Retailers already used nudging techniques in the past without labelling them as such. Having a clear and complete understanding of what it entails and how it works can help them to fine-tune their approach and potentially apply these techniques to encourage customers to buy in a more sustainable manner.

Nudge, the Final Edition

Author: David Fubini, Wiley

What: A very practical, exemplified and detailed set of advice for CEOs based on the experience of a seasoned McKinsey executive.

Why it is important:  Unlike many management manuals, this book tries to go behind the scene thanks to an impressive set of real-life examples of CEOs that the author has worked with in the past. As a result, the reading is extremely enjoyable, in addition to being crystal-clear and full of great ideas for anyone interesting in team management.

Hidden truths, what leaders need to hear but are rarely told

Author: Yves Morieux, Peter Tollman, Harvard Business Review Press

What: A new approach to complexity in organizations, based on “smart simplicity”

Why it is important:  It is easy to answer to the world’s increasing complexity by more “complicatedness” in organisations. Reviewing the organisations from IADS’ members and their evolution in the 2021 White Paper is a living proof of this easy temptation. The authors argue that actually, it is possible to achieve more, and better, by simplifying the structures, based on the knowledge that every human behaviour has a strategy. Understanding and leveraging this strategy is therefore crucial in order to simplify organisations.

Six Simple Rules, how to manage complexity without getting complicated

What: Key learnings and speakers from Shoptalk according to The Retail Bulletin.

Why it is important: Shoptalk is an interesting conference for anyone interested or involved in retail tech.

The Retail Bulletin takes stock of the most important themes discussed during the London edition of Shoptalk, that was held at the same time than the IGDS conference in Seattle in June 2022. They identified that personalization, building out eco-systems, autonomous deliveries and rich shopper engagement where the key topics this year.

Ahold Delhaize discussed about ecosystems by mentioning how they are merging the data from their food and nonfood customers (something that El Corte Ingles already does well), in order to provide them with easy checkout processes across all channels. Ahold Delhaize also announced the launch of a joint retail media service solution, as well as joint logistics.

Alibaba explained that they were accelerating in autonomous deliveries, with the Xiaomanlv, a logistics robot entirely developed in-house, able to deliver 50 packages at a time. They also discussed the success of their streaming operations on Taobao and how they are able to increase the customer engagement.

Learnings from Shoptalk 

Retailing from the outside-in

The IGDS has held its first annual department store summit since the ease of the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic, in Seattle, USA, with the support of Nordstrom. The IADS attended the whole event and made a selection of interesting conferences for its members.

IGDS 7th Global Department Store Summit

What: At the annual Global Fashion Summit in Copenhagen, fashion leaders gathered to discuss circularity, carbon, community, and pre-competitive collaboration.

Why it is important: The overlying message that came from the conference was that the industry needs to work together in order to make any progress.

Individual goals are a great start to approaching sustainability topics, but the industry is limited on how much progress can be made without more collaboration among players. The industry does have several alliances at play, but they are disjointed like The Fashion Pact and the UN Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action.

The Global Fashion Agenda shared the GFA Monitor which is a new report to guide fashion brands towards a net positive industry. GFA also unveiled the Global Circular Fashion Forum, a global initiative to scale the recycling of post-industrial textile waste in textile manufacturing countries. Supply chain transparency and traceability platform TrusTrace released an open-source traceability playbook in collaboration with campaigning organization Fashion Revolution and Amsterdam-based change agency Fashion for Good.

The conference was the opportunity for several major fashion brands to introduce new business models; a common thread was the concept of “timeless design” that is no longer seasonal as a sustainability solution.

While collaboration and exciting progress and announcements were greatly highlighted at the conference, there seemed to be some criticism about the lack of conflict between panelists on stage, remarking that collaboration often involves difficult conversations.

Key takeaways from the Global Fashion Summit: More diversity, more collaboration

What: The webinar covers how brands can future-proof their business models and what the future of sustainability will look like for the fashion industry.

Why it is important: Fashion is under pressure to improve its environmental and social footprint as problems including climate change and global inequality worsen, and expectations from investors and consumers are higher than ever. Some of the steepest challenges for fashion — such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions and cutting down on garment waste — are at odds with its conventional business model, which depends on increasing production and sales of new items.

Vogue Business Sustainability Forum: Fashion’s next sustainability chapter

What: The FT Climate Capital Live 2022 is a platform for politicians, business leaders and financiers to evaluate the risks and opportunities they face in light of the climate crisis.

Why it is important: The conference provided actionable insights on how regulatory changes, business strategies and innovative financing structures are moving the world forward to achieve net-zero goals and rapidly reduce GHG emissions through action rather than talk.

Financial Times Climate Capital Conference 

Author: Steve Dennis

What: In its first part, the book offers a comprehensive review of the current and changing retail landscape, advocating for branding over store closing. In its second part, the author gets more practical and suggests a method (a compass more than a map) and priorities for retailers to rethink their business taking into account the interweaved stores and e-commerce, and the necessary ingredients to make a store memorable.

Why it is important: Retail is not dead but boring retail is. While it is now obvious that retailers have to change, the problem is that they used to think they have time. While Covid accelerated the need for change, the author sets 8 paths to reach remarkable retail with the idea that experimenting, trying – and failing – is the best, if not the only way to succeed.

Book review: Remarkable Retail

What:  The Robin Report’s take on what to remember from the NRF.

Why it is important:  This year, innovation is not all at all about investing in new tech or new equipment, but smartly utilizing and upgrading the existing one, to optimize capex investments.

Gwen Morrison, former CEO of WPP and partner with Candezant Advisory, gives her views from the NRF Big show that took place earlier this month (and which we also reported). From her point of view, the lack of enthusiasm from big players (be them solution-providers or retailers themselves) left more room for smaller, younger innovators, as clearly visible in the innovation room, which was thriving, compared with the main exhibitor space which was more quiet.

When it comes to leadership she reports the speeches from Brian Cornell (CEO of Target) and Pete Nordstrom (President and Chief Brand Officer at Nordstrom), who both discussed about the supply chain, and the customer-centricity in the case of Target, or the efficiency of the right merchandising and price policy across channels for Nordstrom.

Among the innovations not to be missed, she mentions the metaverse, but more immediately applicable, also solutions allowing to optimize the physical space, not by investing in new equipment but by leveraging the existing one (for instance, by delivering special intelligence to existing security cameras, or adding the understanding of traffic trends in real time to store operators).

Regarding the 2022 NRF themes for the year, it is all about unified commerce, new shopping behaviours, purpose and values, and sustainability.

NRF, come and gone

What: Raynor de Best, Specialist Expert Financial Services & Real Estate at Statista, shared interesting insights about the topic of cryptocurrencies as it continues to develop as a trending topic facing businesses into 2022.

Why it is important: Cryptocurrencies, whilst not new, reached a new level of popularity in 2021 and increasingly got the attention of mainstream audiences across the world. NFTs accelerated this further, as they provide "real world" applications for these digital coins. One of these applications, the metaverse, could continue to grab headlines in 2022, along with China releasing its own digital currency during the 2022 Winter Olympics as a response to unregulated cryptocurrencies.

IADS Recap - The Cryptoverse - cryptocurrencies becoming mainstream

Statista presentation