Diana Dimitian, VP, Managing Director South Europe at Levi Strauss & Co, Amanda Nichols Sr Manager, Industry Marketing from Kronos and Alexandra Zatarain, Co-Founder at Eight Sleep

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 features an interview with our sponsor Kronos who believes that great businesses are powered by great people.

On this episode we are going to learn about two great retail businesses, Levi Strauss and Eight Sleep.  First up on this episode live from Paris Diana Dimitian, Vice President and Managing Director South Europe at Levi Strauss & Co. talks about the strength of the brand and operating DTC and stores in Italy, Spain and France leading into and during the COVID crisis.

Next up Amanda Nichols Sr Manager, Industry Marketing from Kronos describes the strength and agility of this largely cloud based workforce management solution, employee management trends heading into 2020  and the key essential new requirements for employees for the COIVD-19 era

Finally live from New York Alexandra Zatarain, Co-Founder at Eight Sleep introduces her innovative product, sleep solution brand and DTC retail model that I first saw at Showfields in January, and is sparking a movement for better sleep during troubling times.

But first, lets check in with Diana live from Paris

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Thanks to Diana, Amanda and Alexandra for being my guests, and thanks to Kronos 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.