The Voice of Retail Mark Letain, President of furniture retailer EQ3, Andrew Armstrong of omNovos dives into data and loyalty, and Rana el Kaliouby on the outer edges of AI and emotion
Welcome to the The Voice of Retail, I’m your host Michael LeBlanc, and this podcast is brought to you in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada and this episode is brought to you by omNovos - Canada’s Retail Customer Engagement Solutions Provider. Learn more at www.realcustomerengagement.com
On this episode we go to Winnipeg to meet Mark Letain, President at EQ3, a distinctive furniture retailer with stores in Canada and the U.S. that is part of the Pallister furniture business. We talk about the positioning of the business and the dynamic furniture retail industry, and how EQ3 helped out the Winnipeg community when they needed it the most.
Next Andrew Armstrong from omNovos joins me to talk about their perspectives on retail data strategy, the “jump ball” opportunity of the COVID-19 crisis, and how retailers can start their journey towards harnessing consumer data to create genuine loyalty.
Lastly from Boston Rana el Kaliouby, CEO & Co-Founder at Affectiva and Author of "Girl Decoded" joins us for an exclusive interview that takes us through her journey from a PhD in Computer Science and Post-Doc work at MIT to founding a company that explores the outer edges of AI and the integration of emotion and empathy.
But first, lets check in with Mark from EQ3
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Thanks to Mark and Rana for being my guests, and thanks to Andrew & omNovos for their support of this episode. If you liked this podcast you can subscribe on Apple iTunes or your favourite podcast platform, please rate and review, and be sure and recommend to a friend or colleague in the retail industry.
I’m Michael LeBlanc, Founder and President of M.E. LeBlanc and Company Inc. and you can learn more about me on www.meleblanc.co or of course on LinkedIn
Until next time, have a safe week!
Michael LeBlanc is the president and founder of M.E. LeBlanc & Company Inc, a senior retail advisor, keynote speaker and now, media entrepreneur. He has been on the front lines of retail industry change for his entire career.
Michael has delivered keynotes, hosted fire-side discussions and participated worldwide in thought leadership panels, most recently on the main stage in Toronto at Retail Council of Canada’s Retail Marketing conference with leaders from Walmart & Google. He brings 25+ years of brand/retail/marketing & eCommerce leadership experience with Levi's, Black & Decker, Hudson's Bay, CanWest Media, Pandora Jewellery, The Shopping Channel and Retail Council of Canada to his advisory, speaking and media practice.
Michael produces and hosts a network of leading retail trade podcasts, including the award-winning No.1 independent retail industry podcast in America, Remarkable Retail with his partner, Dallas-based best-selling author Steve Dennis; Canada's top retail industry podcast The Voice of Retail and Canada's top food industry and one of the top Canadian-produced management independent podcasts in the country, The Food Professor with Dr. Sylvain Charlebois from Dalhousie University in Halifax.
Rethink Retail has recognized Michael as one of the top global retail experts for the fifth year in a row, the National Retail Federation has designated Michael as on their Top Retail Voices for 2025, Thinkers 360 has named him on of the Top 50 global thought leaders in retail, RTIH has named him a top 100 global though leader in retail technology and Coresight Research has named Michael a Retail AI Influencer. If you are a BBQ fan, you can tune into Michael’s cooking show, Last Request BBQ, on YouTube, Instagram, X and yes, TikTok.
Michael is available for keynote presentations helping retailers, brands and retail industry insiders explaining the current state and future of the retail industry in North America and around the world.