Finding Your Passionate Core Customer

This week we explore some of the content from Steve's forthcoming book Leaders Leap: Transforming Your Company at the Speed of Disruption, which is now available for pre-order at book retailers worldwide. 

In particular, we go deep on a strategy of being "Special, Not Big" by significantly narrowing the aim of the customers you serve to be more intensely relevant and more highly differentiated. Finding your passionate core is about discovering those customers that sit at the heart of your customer bulls-eye and editing what you do to amplify your impact. In a world where it's harder and harder to become the compelling signal amid all the noise, trying to serve a mass audience is akin to losing a race to the bottom. Find your people, creating meaningful connections, and give them something to talk about.

But we kick things off with an overview of our upcoming busy Shoptalk schedule, including recording several episodes in our Bambuser sponsored remote podcast studio/beach cabana. Then it's on to the week in retail news, which features a return to the Wobbly Unicorn Corner to see what's new with Matches Fashion, Stitch Fix, and TheRealReal. We also share our take on strong quarters from Abercrombie & Fitch and American Eagle Outfitters two ANVB's (Analog Native Vertical Brands), while lamenting big whiffs from Victoria's Secret and Foot Locker. We conclude by trying to make sense of Wall Street's ebullient response to Target's latest earnings.

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About Us

Steve Dennis is a strategic advisor and keynote speaker focused on growth and innovation, who has also been named one of the world's top retail influencers. He is the bestselling authro of two books: Leaders Leap: Transforming Your Company at the Speed of Disruption and Remarkable Retail: How To Win & Keep Customers in the Age of Disruption. Steve regularly shares his insights in his role as a Forbes senior retail contributor and on social media.

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 fourth year in a row, 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.