The Modern Retail Podcast

On this week's episode of the Modern Retail Rundown the staff starts out with an analysis of the pending Kroger and Albertsons merger, which is now on hold. This week also saw LVMH-backed L Catterton reportedly approaching toy maker Mattel for a potential acquisition. Finally, Amazon returns are overwhelming retail drop-off points like UPS and Staples -- so much so, the store employees now refer to customers with these returns as "Amazombies."

Tecovas wants to be more than just about cowboy boots. The nine-year-old company has big plans to become a high-end Western wear lifestyle brand."Initially, it sort of was known as the Warby Parker of cowboy boots, if you will," said CEO David Lafitte on the Modern Retail Podcast. "We've tried to sort of migrate the positioning of the brand into more of a premium lifestyle brand."Lafitte -- who previously held C-suite positions at Deckers -- has been leading Tecovas for the last two years, and his mandate has been to expand beyond its cowboy boots roots. That includes expanding the brand's apparel line as well as growing its retail footprint. The company, which has locations in 20 states, adds between 10 and 12 store every year. By 2023, it had 33 locations and is on track to open 11 stores this year.The stores, according to Lafitte, are integral to Tecovas's success. For one, the locations are experiential playgrounds -- most have liquor licenses and they all focus on one-to-one connections with customers. What's more, the stores present a way for new customers to learn about Tecovas and its products.Right now, apparel represents around 20% of Tecovas's revenue. The brand is focused on growing that -- as well as growing its overall women's business.Along those lines, as Tecovas continues to expand, it is going into new areas that aren't necessarily associated with Western culture. It is opening a location in Boston, for example, and is keeping an eye out for another East Coast spot."We've been looking in New York. We want to find the right spot," said Lafitte. "I'd like to be in Soho."

This podcast episode covers the huge success of Prime Day with over $14 billion in sales, Limited Too's comeback at Kohl's targeting young shoppers and parents, and Pacsun's expansion into men's athleisure with their new ARC line.

CEO John Fieldly discusses how Celsius rebranded from a negative calorie drink to a wellness beverage, focusing on health and beauty. The brand saw success in gyms and health clubs before entering grocery stores. With a 37% revenue growth and strategic partnerships, Celsius is now a premium player in the energy drink space.

On this week’s Modern Retail Rundown, the staff discusses the latest funding round raised by NA beer company Athletic Brewing in an effort to meet demand. Meanwhile, Nike announced it's bringing former executive Tom Peddie back to be vp of marketplace partnerships as the company refocuses on wholesale. Lastly, in September, Costco is raising its annual membership fee by $5 -- the first increase since 2017.

Lucky Energy wants to take on the Red Bulls and C4s of the world.The company's drink line, Lucky F*ck, launched last year and has been slowly building out its distribution. It's now available in around 2,000 store doors in Texas and California and is also sold on Amazon.According to CMO Hamid Saify, the strategy of growing Lucky Energy has been to get people's attention. Thus, the name of its product. The company has also launched some splashy guerrilla campaigns -- including a Coachella activation that involved a billboard asking people to call a phone number if they're looking for a "quick f*ck."Saify joined this week's Modern Retail Podcast and spoke about Lucky's growth so far and its future plans.In the early days, when Lucky's founder was distributing the beverages himself, "we just started seeing really crazy velocity because people were just leaning in and [were] like, 'What is this thing?' Saify said.Now, the focus is to continue that momentum. This includes launching in more convenience stores over the next year, as well as expanding to new regions like Florida.For a beverage brand, the best early-stage growth strategy is focused on getting people to try the beverage. That's why Saify is so bullish on convenience stores."I would say our first-year approach is: we really want to start making a ton of inroads into C-stores," he said.

On this week’s Modern Retail Rundown, the staff discusses Amazon's next move to compete with cheap marketplaces like Temu and Shein. The Information reported this week that the e-commerce giant is planning to launch a program for sellers to ship cheap goods directly from China. This week, the Fancy Food Show also took place in New York City, and we review some of the buzziest trends from the event. Finally, Walgreens announced plans to close its underperforming stores and focusing on profit-driving locations.

Babylist is making moves to be more than just a registry for soon-to-be parents.The company has been building a media business over the last four years, becoming its fastest-growing revenue stream."The original business model was affiliate," said Lee Anne Grant, Babylist's chief growth officer. "So it was working with a ton of different retailers and getting paid a commission. And then, fast forward 13 years later, we are now this platform with a bunch of different offerings like health, e-commerce, content -- anything a family needs."Grant joined the Modern Retail Podcast and spoke about how the company has grown over the last decade. This includes growing its media business and expanding into health and wellness.Grant joined Babylist four years ago. She began as a consultant, given the task of building the company's media business. Now, she's its chief growth officer -- overseeing new business opportunities like media and health care -- to help Babylist expand beyond its registry roots. This includes a retail concept the company opened in LA last year as well as a content business catered to its customers.As she sees it, a company like Babylist has the potential to be a media giant. Its customers read its newsletter and seek it out for educational content. Which is to say: new parents are looking for any help they can get, and that's great news for advertisers. Alongside that power, Grant also makes sure that Babylist maintains trust with its customers."We have pretty strict editorial guide guidelines, both for our organic editorial as well as our paid," she said. "We actually say no a good amount."Grant sees a bunch of potential as Babylist continues to grow. "We're very much an audience company," she said. "We're not as big as Amazon, but the amount of money that new parents, expecting parents [as well as] grandma spends -- it's a big enough opportunity to keep me excited to stay here."

This podcast discusses the impact of May's slow U.S. retail sales on consumer spending and the economy. It also covers Thrasio's comeback after bankruptcy, as well as updates on Care/of's troubles post-acquisition by Bayer.

Venture studio Squared Circles has lofty plans to launch the next big health, wellness and food products.The project first began a little over three years ago when Lukas Derksen, who hailed from the creative firm Sid Lee, began angel investing in brands alongside entrepreneurs Alexander Gilkes and Osman Khan. One of its early investments was in the hair wellness brand Nutrafol. They decided to formalize the program into an incubation studio.Over the years, however, Squared Circles decided to take a more hands-on approach -- instead of acting as an incubator and investor for external brands, the studio is now focused on launching and scaling its own businesses. With that, the company just raised a $40 million Series A led by L Catterton."The pitch to the partners that we're building with in the future is: OK, how do we actually build these things all the way to launch -- and even Series A -- without actually giving up necessarily any more of the cap table people?" said co-founder Derksen. He joined the Modern Retail Podcast and spoke about Squared Circle's growth so far.Currently, Squared Circles has incubated two brands -- cooking oil startup Algae Cooking and skin care company Magic Molecule. It has plans to launch other brands too in spaces like "nutritious food products tailored to the GLP-1 generation" and "delivering functional medicine to children in tasty alternatives," according to its website.According to Derksen, all of these ideas come from data. "We start very much from a consumer insight place -- and that's something that we strive for every single time," he said.The focus now is to continue launching new products and getting them ready to market as quickly as possible. Though VC funding isn't as plentiful as it was a few years ago, Derksen said there is still an appetite for certain areas."The two categories that have been outspending on disproportionately are health and wellness and food and beverage," he said.