Retail Unwrapped - from The Robin Report

Hosted by The Robin Report

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Episodes

296

Latest episode

Jun 2026

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EN-US

About the show

Welcome to Retail Unwrapped, a podcast from The Robin Report. Join Shelley E. Kohan as she shares insights and unpacks issues at the core of retail and consumer products. The conversations are lively and the opinions are honest. New episodes every Friday.

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60 recent

June 12, 202620 min

EP 296: Gaming AI Search

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!AI search is growing at over 300 percent while traditional browser search is declining. Most retailers and brands are completely unprepared for what that means for their search visibility. Join Shelley and Heather Holmes, Founder of Publicity for Good, as they unpack how brands need to think like their customers and understand how they use agentic search engines including ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini. Key signals: Consumers are bypassing a brand website, asking AI for recommendations and going directly to purchase. Over 90 percent of what AI surfaces in search results comes from earned media, not paid advertising; brands cannot buy their way to the top of an AI search result. And credibility through legitimate reviews, third-party features, directory listings, and high-domain-authority publications all influence how AI ranks a brand. Listen and learn how to figure out this complex AI paradigm.Special Guest: Heather Holmes, Founder of Publicity for Good For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

June 5, 202635 min

EP 295: Are Your ORC Forensics Up to Date?

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!As organized crime gets bolder and more sophisticated, so do the tools that retailers can deploy to stop criminals in their tracks. ORC has become a $112 billion annual loss for retailers with mass theft feeding fencing operations across a retail enterprise. Every retailer needs to be concerned about what these gangs are up to, how they're infiltrating their organizations and impacting not just their profitability, but also the safety of their customers and their employees. It has gotten so flagrant that 90 percent of frontline workers say they’ve had situations in the store that make them feel unsafe. Join Shelley and Gary Sankri, Retail Lead at Esri, as they discuss risk assessment and reveal the strategies and forensics tools retailers can use to reverse this ORC tide. They explain how data sharing, facial recognition, parking lot surveillance, escape routes, license plate readers, timing analysis, heat maps, RFID scanning tools and high-tech security cameras that are loaded with heat and sonic sensors that are valuable ammunition in arsenals to fight retail crime. Listen and learn how to be highly-alert and proactive to help prevent ORC. Special Guest:Gary Sankary, Retail Industry Lead, EsriFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

May 29, 202625 min

EP 294: The AI-Empowered Store

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!Just released, ICSC and McKinsey do a deep dive in a new report, “Shopping in the age of AI: Redefining stores for a new era.” Spoiler alert: Agentic AI could drive up to $1 trillion in U.S. retail revenue by 2030. Join Shelley and Stephanie Cegielski, Vice President of Public Relations and Industry Education at ICSC as they dig into the findings. Find out how speed of agentic adoption is outpacing most retail roadmaps and what happens when consumer expectations and spending behavior converge in an agentic powered marketplace. Meeting the expectations of highly informed consumers will rely on AI for everything from convenience to discovery. The big question? Are your retail operations ready? Listen and learn how to catch up to the future. Special Guest: Stephanie Cegielski, Vice President, Public Relations & Industry Education of ICSCFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

May 22, 202628 min

EP 293: The Comeback of Century 21 NYC

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!Iconic Century 21 closed its doors in 2020, not the first retail victim of the fallout from the pandemic. Five years later the brand’s comeback story marks a page in retail lore. Join Shelley and Larry Mentzer, COO of Century 21 NYC as they tell the story of the courage it takes to learn from mistakes and protect a legacy. They discuss second acts, managing a balance sheet, competing in physical retail and the dramatic shift in shopper behavior. In a frenzied digital marketplace, they reveal that FOMO is no longer a tactic, it's a survival strategy. Creating urgency inside a physical store based in lower Manhattan, particularly without an ecommerce safety net, is now a core operating discipline to win Gen Z and rebuild a heritage brand.Special Guest: Larry Mentzer, COO of Century 21 NYCFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

May 15, 202625 min

EP 292: How to Be Human in the AI Era

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!Conversations in C-suites about AI typically bring up cost efficiencies, job cutbacks, competitive edges and workplace transformation. What leaders don’t discuss is being human in an AI era and what fundamental human skills and talents are not replaceable. Often the human being gets forgotten and people become numbers. What should retail executives be focusing on with their workforce? Join Shelley and Dominick Miserandino, CEO of RTMNexus, as they challenge the current conversation with what employees really want to hear: You are part of the journey and we're going to help you with the AI that we're implementing. They talk about taking a 30,000-foot viewpoint about the many impacts and implications of AI led by a map charting where you're headed. They emphasize how conversations that matter pave the way for successful AI integration. Listen and learn how to build trustworthy relationships by listening and understanding and how to communicate in relatable and relevant ways with any organization’s most important resource: its employees.Special Guest: Dominick Miserandino, CEO, RTMNexus For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

May 8, 202626 min

Ep 291: Luxury’s Future After the War in Iran

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!The global luxury market has been experiencing a quiet crisis, and the war in Iran has accelerated its fragile spiral downward disrupting the Middle East as an emerging luxury market. With over $7.5 trillion in Gulf regional wealth projected to double by 2050, the big question is not whether luxury demand survives the conflict, but whether brands have a long-term strategy. Join Shelley and TRR contributors Arick Wierson and Pamela Danziger as they deconstruct the impact of the war and challenge the conventional wisdom driving luxury brand strategy. They discuss how betting on Middle Eastern elites to keep spending abroad while their home region is under siege is not an intelligent strategy. Listen and learn how luxury brands can reclaim their status and position in the Mideast and cultivate new emerging markets in Africa.Special Guests:Arick Wierson, TRR contributor, political analyst and Emmy-winning producer Pamela Danziger, TRR contributor, founder Unity Marketing and luxury expertFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

May 1, 202629 min

EP 290: The Next Frontier: Agentic AI and Operations

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!AI isn’t just a use case; it's a new commerce channel and operating model designed to amplify loyalty economics. Agents will help customers personally through discovery, comparisons, purchase, and fulfilling their orders. So retail, which has always been shaped by that interface between the customer and the merchant, is experiencing epic change. Join Shelley, Roland Ehigiamusoe, Principal of Retail and Consumer Products + AI and Engineering and Saurabh Vijayvergia, Managing Director of Retail AI Strategy and Engineering at Deloitte Consulting, as they unwrap the future of the next level of customer engagement and operations through this structural change. Analysts are projecting a quarter of global ecommerce will be enabled by AI agents by 2030. The next advancements in agentics will be on the supply side; listen and learn what it will take for retailers to transform their operations with agent-ready data infrastructure. Hear it from the experts: Agent ecommerce will be won by retailers who stop asking how to use AI and start asking how to make sure AI chooses us.Special Guests:Saurabh Vijayvergia, Managing Director, Retail AI Strategy and Engineering, Deloitte ConsultingRoland Ehigiamusoe, Principal, Retail and Consumer Products + AI and Engineering | Deloitte Consulting LLPFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

April 24, 202628 min

EP 289: Jockey Turns 150 Years Old and Is Still Inventing

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!A family-owned, 150-year-old brand continues to succeed by sticking to the foundational values of the brand despite short-term disruptions and short-term market volatility. It’s no accident that Jockey has built something that is rare in the retail industry — a brand consumers have trusted for 150 years. Join Shelley and Mark Fedyk, President and COO of Jockey, as they reveal how the brand has been an inventor looking for a better way or a way to solve a problem, why complacency is a threat, and how to make sure you don't lose sight and connection with the consumer. Learn how to steward a legacy brand through a marketplace moving at warp speed and why discipline is such a most powerful competitive advantage in retail. In Jockey’s case, family ownership is a strategic asset that has sustained its long-term momentum.Special Guest: Mark Fedyk, President and COO of JockeyFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

April 17, 202627 min

EP 288: Succession: Hire the Enemy or Promote Within?

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!CEO succession can be a minefield. Who makes the decision? Who gets the crown? Retail just lived through its most turbulent CEO cycle in a generation. Retail companies reported 41 CEO exits through August 2025, a 116 percent increase from the same period a year earlier making retail the top industry for CEO turnover. Join TRR contributors and retail experts Phil Lempert and Mark Cohen as they discuss and debate the imprecise science of leadership succession. This candid conversation holds nothing back on the both the great decisions and dismal choices in recent CEO appointments. Listen and learn who’s doing it right and who’s in for trouble among grocery and general merchandise retail brands.For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

April 10, 202633 min

EP 287: GLP-1 Is a Disruption Retailers Aren’t Ready For

We'd love to have your feedback and ideas for future episodes of Retail Unwrapped. Just text us!The fastest-growing consumer behavior shift isn't driven by a trend, a digital platform, or a fickle generation: it’s a weight loss drug. GLP-1 adoption is accelerating so fast that Ozempic is outpacing iPhone adoption curves in the same timeframe. Retailers (both grocery and apparel) are treating this trend as a passing diet fad. Join Shelley with Liza Amlani, Founder of Retail Strategy Group and Ali Furman, PwC's Consumer Markets Industry Leader as they challenge retailers to confront how to serve customers when body sizes change faster than the systems built to serve them. One outlook? Up to 400 million apparel units could be misaligned with actual demand by 2027, with retailers facing up to a $5 billion margin hit from oversized inventory, returns, and markdowns. Listen and learn why the GPT craze is an opportunity, not a transaction, for retailers who build trust with consumers whose bodies, wardrobes, and identities are all in flux. That loyalty will outlast the drug itself.Special Guests: Liza Amlani, Principal and Founder, Retail Strategy Group and Ali Furman, Consumer Markets Industry Leader, PwCFor more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.