RetailCraft - digital retail, ecommerce and brands - Retail Podcast

What does it take to be the number one premium beauty retailer both online and in-store across 22 countries? In this episode, Ian Jindal welcomes Philipp Andree, Chief Commercial Officer at Douglas Group, to explore how the company blends heritage and innovation in the fast-evolving beauty sector. Philipp shares how Douglas is redefining omnichannel retail, leveraging AI to enhance the customer experience, and trans...

In this episode of RetailCraft, Ian Jindal speaks with Giovanni Lepori, Vice President of Global Retail at Rothy’s, from the brand’s flagship store in New York. Giovanni shares how Rothy’s has revolutionized footwear manufacturing with 3D knitting technology, built a sustainable and scalable business model, and expanded into physi...

This episode of RetailCraft takes us inside premium cycling brand Rapha, our host Ian Jindal chats with Joel Natale, Chief Commercial Officer, at Rapha's London headquarters. Their conversation explores how this 20-year-old brand transformed cycling culture, built a powerful community, and continues to balance premium positioning with growth.

In this episode, Ian Jindal speaks with Alec Mills, co-founder of Dame, about the journey of creating sustainable and toxin-free period products. They discuss the challenges faced in the industry, the importance of changing the conversation around menstruation, whether men have a role in women's health discussions. Alec shares insights on product innovation, market positioning, and the impact of collaborations with larger brands. T...

Welcome to a special episode featuring Mark from Guitar Guitar, who joins us to celebrate the company's 20th anniversary. Hosted by Ian Jindal, Editor-in-Chief of Internet Retailing, and Georgia from Adobe, this episode dives deep into the evolution of Guitar Guitar and its unique approach to music retail.

Mark shares the history of Guitar Guitar, from its humble beginnings to becoming a significant player in the music retail indus...

Welcome to an illuminating discussion with Rad, VP of Supply Chain at Flaconi, Germany's leading online beauty marketplace. In this episode, we delve into the fascinating supply chain management domain within the beauty sector. 

Since its inception in 2011, Flaconi has made gains in the German market, with over 25% share, and continues its successful journey across multiple European countries. Rad, with his extensive experience han...

At the end of NRF 2024 in New York I was able to chat with Juliet Scott-Croxford of Brompton Bicycle. Juliet is President, North America, and leads the growth of this quintessentially British brand in the market.

Brompton is an urban-first, engineering-born, British-made success story, and so the transition to the US is an interesting one. Leading with a combination of product quality and clubhouse retail vibe, they have been at th...

SISTIR is a coffee-originated gifting brand, that grew from a sisterly conversation (SIS) about coffee (Stirred) around the ideal '3am blend' to power parents through that mid-night wake-up moment for a crying baby.

SISTIR's founder, Georgie Janion-Shaw, joins us in the studio and we hare about the brand's beginnings and how the combination of branding savvy, punning and the availability of a gifting channel in NotOnTheHighStreet a...

Our studio chat with Kieron (Digital Director at Blackwells, part of the Waterstones group of booksellers) had a number of firsts... Not only the first podcast of 2024 (Happy New Year to one and all!) but also the first time that Georgia and I had been given gifts. In our prep for the studio session Kieron had asked us what were the last three books we'd read. He used this to predict a book for each of us and wrapped them for us to...

Ntola and Raine joined Georgia and me in the studio and reminded us just why a roundtable discussion is so much fun and enlightening!

Raine - the head of digital at New Look (www.newlook.com) - talks us through how to connects with the 'moments' in customers' lives, and of course the planning, data, heuristics and approaches needed to deliver that at scale. We hear about her experiences ranging from luxury and digital (Farfetch) to...

Paddy joined us in the studio with "time" clearly on his mind. Throughout our zinger-filled, high-protein chat, Paddy returned to the theme of "if you find a fix for time, you'll see the sales".

B&Q is the £4bn-ish turnover DIY retailer that is now part of the Kingfisher PLC group (which also includes in its portfolio the trade-focused Screwfix, plus Castorama and Brico Depot in France and Koctas in Turkey.

During our conversat...

Some 'summer listening' in this episode, where we take as our theme "retailers and the arts". There's a long and illustrious history of retail professionals swapping the stores for galleries, but with our current digital dimension there's still a consumer/customer/visitor/individual connection.

In the studio today we have Ros Lawler, COO of the National Portrait Gallery, fresh from a multi-year reworking of the space, the interpret...

Molly Dobson is the Managing Director of Currys Business, the B2B operation of the long-established Currys brand, that covers white goods to smart devices via outdoors electricals and gaming... basically anything with a plug or voltage! See www.currys.co.uk. Molly explodes into our studio like a positive force of nature, and takes us at a gallop through the business, the service approach, and how expertise, people, systems and grea...

Two fresh angles that speak to the developments in multichannel retail - changes in formats, product, audience engagement and business models.

Our first guest, Charlotte Fairbairn, talks us through the model of MyWardrobeHQ, the luxury-rental-subscription-white-label genre-defying multi-hyphenate business that's carving a new path for fashion brands in the re-commerce, circular economy.

We learn from Charlotte some of the operation...

In our second run-and-record session from NRF 2023 in New York in January 2023, we catch up with Mike Wallwork, Head of eCommerce at Footasylum, the fast-growing destination for sneakerheads in the UK... 

From a distinct, Manchester-born DNA in 2005, the business has grown rapidly online and into 66 stores. In our conversation Mike gives us an insight into the knowledge, passion and expertise in the team that connects a very demand...

During an exceptionally busy NRF 2023 in January in New York we managed to grab some time with Gijs van Engelen, the Chief Digital Officer and member of the Board at Hunkemöller, one of the largest lingerie specialists in Europe. They have a direct site in the UK (https://www.hunkemoller.co.uk/), while also selling via retailers like Next, and a US/Global site at https://www.hunkemoller.com. Meanwhile their stores are to be seen in...