Retail's Flight to Value, Target Stumbles, Plus Sephora NA's President & CEO Artemis Patrick (E)

Steve and Michael open this week’s episode with a deep dive into the retail news of the week, marked by sharp contrasts in performance across the retail landscape. Walmart continues to separate itself from the pack, delivering another standout quarter, as omni-channel rival Target delivers another challenging quarter. 

The news segment analyses strong results from the off-price sector as TJX and Ross Stores both post impressive sales gains. The turnaround at Gap Inc. shows encouraging signs  under CEO Richard Dickson despite continued weakness at Athleta. In home improvement, both Home Depot and Lowe’s see essentially flat comps as rate-locked consumers and affordability issues continue to weigh on spending. Furniture and home categories face rising tariff exposure, with Williams-Sonoma projecting its blended tariff rate jumping from 6% to 35%—a margin headwind that underscores industry-wide challenges. All told, the week’s earnings reveal a retail landscape where the biggest players capture more share while many others struggle to keep pace.

Steve and Michael revisit their encore interview with Artemis Patrick, President & CEO of Sephora North America—one of the most inspiring and resonant conversations in the show’s archive. Artemis shares her extraordinary personal journey from immigrating from Iran and growing up in foster care to becoming one of the most influential leaders in global beauty.

She details Sephora’s global reach (34 markets, 3,000 stores), 700+ North American freestanding locations, a huge presence at Kohl's, and 40M+ Beauty Insider members, while unpacking the brand’s unique power in incubating indie brands, championing diverse founders, and uniting physical and digital experiences long before Omni became a buzzword. Artemis also previews two transformational initiatives: a next-generation e-commerce platform enabling deeper personalization and a five-year renovation of every Sephora store—the largest capital project in the brand’s history.

After the interview the hosts each share their choice for buzziest story of the week before concluding with what's on their radar screens for the weeks ahead.

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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.