May 27, 2026 • 56 mins
Operating a business strictly for profit is an outdated, exhausting leak on long-term sustainability. True organizational energy comes from aligning corporate objectives with a distinct, larger mission that transforms standard daily operations into purposeful problem solving. For many leaders, the disconnect between personal values and their professional output creates a heavy friction point that ultimately stalls organizational growth. We sit down with Bryan Welch, an experienced media executive, entrepreneur, and co-founder of Consumer Impact Events, to map out the tactical reality of leading an impact-driven enterprise.
We get into the specific mechanics of balancing a purpose-driven mission with the raw, daily puzzles of traditional retail operations. Bryan details his 50 year business journey from running community newspapers to managing massive media spaces like Mother Earth News, revealing why deep interest sustains a career far longer than raw passion alone. Our conversation pivots into technical territory as we break down the rise of Agentic Commerce, analyzing how artificial intelligence utilizes data points from rigorous B Corporation certifications to fundamentally shift consumer shopping behaviors. We also analyze the unglamorous friction points existing between suppliers and big retail merchants, exploring data-backed methods to remove costly food waste, streamline distribution loops, and foster collaborative value creation.
Operators frequently get torpedoed during market scaling because they rely on theory instead of directly confronting the logistical realities of category pricing. True sustainable growth requires a grounded mindset shift, a willingness to embrace the messy variables of human error, and the courage to strip away manufactured brand identities. Viewers will walk away with a functional framework for auditing their supply chain inefficiencies, an understanding of the incoming artificial intelligence landscape, and a blueprint for executing authentic leadership.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:07):
Hello and welcome to the Retail Journey Podcast.
I'm Charles Greenhouse, one ofyour hosts.
And I am James Harris.
SPEAKER_01 (00:14):
And today we're speaking with Brian Welch about
purpose-driven businesses.
Brian, welcome to the RetailJourney.
Thank you.
It's great to be here.
I've been looking forward tothis since I think I asked you
to be on here.
(00:41):
And sometimes they're the samething, sometimes they're not.
One, you know, what's your likewhere's your fire for purpose
driven coming from?
And what got you into it?
SPEAKER_00 (00:53):
Well, what got me into it was more or less
accidental.
I was a journalist when I gotout of college and I went to
work in the local newspaperbusiness, which, you know, felt
very purpose-driven, you know,every kind of good, social good,
and truth to power, environment.
I covered in the environment,you know, and I covered
(01:13):
government.
And um eventually I ended uprunning community newspapers.
And by that time, it was a sortof habit as well as just a
source of energy.
I found, you know, I foundrunning businesses that every
day are trying to make the worlda better place really
interesting, really engaging.
(01:35):
And um I, after 15 years, movedinto the bigger media business,
magazines and events and otherthings.
But I was able to build acompany around conscientious
lifestyles.
We had a magazine, a bigmagazine called Mother Earth
News.
We had magazines about naturalhealth, um, the environment, uh,
(01:59):
self-reliance.
And again, I think my motivationwas fundamentally that I found
it more interesting to work onprojects that had some larger
meaning in the world, that hadthe that were oriented toward
making the world a better place.
It was just more interesting forme to run that kind of business.
(02:20):
And it evolved that way.
So that, you know, today I'maround 50 years uh in business,
and I've never been uhassociated with a business that
wasn't the purpose-driven inthat way.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's fascinating.
SPEAKER_02 (02:36):
I love being able to follow interest into maturing
into passion, and then uh thatjust becomes the a much greater
motivator, probably creatingyour best work, whereas
sometimes people who don't havean interest and don't have a
passion, their work suffers thewhole time.
SPEAKER_00 (02:54):
You know, that's true.
And if we're working on thingsthat have a deeper meaning for
us, we have more energy, ourfocus is better.
Yeah, you know, it's I think itI think, you know, I might I'm
pretty sure that I I've beenmore successful doing this kind
of thing because of myfundamental interest in it.
(03:17):
The other side of that equationis also uh fascinating to me,
which is, you know, businesseslike mine have always attracted
people who were out to changethe world with this sense of
mission, but who were motivatedfirst by passion and less so by
(03:40):
interest.
Unfortunately, that leads to akind of idealism burnout.
Passion can run out.
Yeah, because the world's a bigcomplicated place.
Yeah.
And to see it change in anysignificant way in one lifetime
is kind of unlikely, really.
Yeah.
But if you find, I think ifyou're motivated by the exercise
(04:01):
of trying to make things better,yeah.
And if you're motivated by afundamental interest in making
things better, that it's it hasbetter, it's more endurable,
more sustainable.
SPEAKER_01 (04:14):
And I I think sometimes when we think about
making the world a better place,we think about changing the
world in mass today.
Right.
Versus I want to be a positiveinfluence.
I want to be a positive light inmy little corner of the world.
SPEAKER_03 (04:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:29):
Right.
I think sometimes we try, we tryto, it has to be all or nothing.
SPEAKER_03 (04:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:34):
But but I can I can influence everybody in this room
today.
There's a lot of people I can'tinfluence, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (04:40):
I've been really attracted to the the mind space
of becoming the type of personthat, you know, has the impact
that I'm wanting, that thatlives in a way that um will
result in the thing I'm tryingto push.
SPEAKER_00 (04:57):
Yeah, isn't that that's such a profound
observation, I think.
You know, I personally believethat our intention in every
moment is changing the world inminute ways.
And if I look over the if I lookover the course of my life at
people who have influenced me,sometimes, you know, it was a
fleeting conversation at acounter in a coffee shop or uh
(05:22):
sitting in an airport waitingfor a plane.
Fleeting conversations, but aconversation with someone who
kindled something in me thatended up being very
motivational.
And so I don't think we knowwhere our greatest impact might
be over the course of alifetime.
But that moment by momentintention is, I think, where I
(05:43):
think it's uh profound.
SPEAKER_02 (05:45):
That's where I feel like people I think of who are
purposeful, like they're presentto that moment and they are
where they are, and they're theyhave intent as they're you know
having a conversation, trying todo things.
And I've certainly had momentswhere I was very intentional and
had moments where I was very notintentional and unintentionally
(06:05):
created things that are like,boy, I wish I had not said that.
Oh boy, I wish I had notimpacted that person in that
way.
Oh, right.
And then only afterwards do Ihave a kind, loving friend come
up to me like, Do you realizethat they're upset with you?
Like, no, no idea.
You know, and so I know we allhave uh it's a kind of a
constant act of rebalancing whenit comes to walking with purpose
(06:27):
and intention.
I'd love to hear you know yourthoughts or reflection on that
as you've you've I mean, walkedthat way professionally, but are
also human and have have youryour ups and downs.
SPEAKER_00 (06:38):
Oh, to say the least, you know, I believe it's
a matter of practice.
I think it's something one canpractice.
Yeah.
I'm personally a meditator,yeah.
And one of the most basic andfundamental and enduring things
I think that comes from ameditation practice is just in
sitting and watching your ownthoughts and feelings
(07:01):
non-judgmentally, yeah, youdevelop a kind of understanding
of your reactivity.
And that so that reactivitydecreases.
You're more able to consideryour your reactions because you
you get to know yourself in away that allows you to do what
your reactions have been.
Yes, you are, yeah.
And you're able to create somespace uh between um the
(07:24):
phenomenon and your reaction tothe phenomenon.
And in that space, we I thinkcan make better decisions.
Uh, but as you say, not everytime.
Right.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (07:35):
Yeah.
It's more like baseball, youknow?
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (07:38):
Because uh, you know, 350 batting average is is
pretty great.
Um, but anywhere we're rightfailed 65% of the time and still
be like, hey, I was pretty goodpro class.
That's right that's kind ofscored.
SPEAKER_00 (07:49):
Uh the you know, when I when I teach meditation,
I tell people the absolute firststep, most fundamental thing, is
friendliness toward yourself sothat you're able to observe
yourself in a non-judgmental wayand not go down a spiral of
negative feelings towardyourself.
SPEAKER_01 (08:09):
That the non-judgmental part of that,
because I meditate as well, notnearly as consistently as I once
did, and I'm going to fix that.
But that noticing withoutjudging, it sounds so simple.
But once you start doing it,then you can start doing it out
here.
And I realized, at least in mylife, you know, 10, 15 years ago
(08:29):
when I started messing around,playing around with that, was
I'm burning a lot of energyjudging people for sure.
Didn't you know, like probablynot consciously, it's just
habitual.
Uh, but it took that slowingdown to notice, like, oh, I'm
doing this to them, I'm doingthis to me.
And if I just stop doing it,it's gone.
SPEAKER_00 (08:49):
It's yeah, much more free.
And the amount of time andenergy it takes, the amount of
attention it takes to run anappraisal of every single
thought we have is you know,it's a heavy burden.
It really is.
SPEAKER_01 (09:02):
And distracts us from other things.
Makes us not present.
Yeah.
Um, so I I met you in thecontext of one of your more
recent endeavors, the ConsumerInsights Summit.
Um, I'm sorry.
Consumer Impact Summit.
Yeah, um tell us about it.
How um, yeah, what was the youknow, what was the seed that
(09:23):
grew into what it is?
And then just for people thataren't familiar with the
Consumer Impact Summit, what uhwhat you all do.
SPEAKER_00 (09:31):
Sure.
Well, as a product of the kindof businesses I've run, I've
been uh probably 25 yearsinvolved in various uh
purpose-driven or impact-drivenuh business organizations,
right?
Um 20 years ago, there was theSocial Venture Network.
More recently, there was the BCorporation movement, conscious
(09:54):
capitalism.
And they've all been inspiringto me and engaging.
And I I've you know developedmany very important
relationships through them.
But one of the weaknesses ofthose events, from my
perspective, was always theamount of time we spent talking
about why we run impact-drivenbusinesses and talking about,
(10:16):
oh, in a perfect world, therecould be this or that or the
other thing.
Where the most importantlearning experiences I had were
my conversations with otheroperators about how we were
solving the daily puzzles, howwe were making the necessary
compromises, you know, just the,you know, the sort of thing that
(10:36):
you all teach all the time here,and the sort of thing that you
this bring to your clients athigh impact.
I think, you know, there was areal need in the community of
impact-driven businesses forthose kinds of discussions.
So my friend Jeff Clapper, whoruns Eighth and Walton here in
(10:58):
Bentonville, he and I had beentalking for some time about how
we'd like for there to be aconference that was very focused
in that way, where thepresenters were almost all
people with operating roles inbusinesses getting the job done.
And um, so I had some extra timea couple of years ago, and Jeff
(11:20):
and I had just been casuallychatting about thing, these
things.
And Jeff said, let's uh let's doit.
And so we started uh what wecall consumer impact events, I
guess about a year and a halfago, had the first event in
September last year.
And um, you know, I've beenthrough several startup
(11:45):
experiences.
Yeah.
And so I always keep a parachutepacked.
Yeah.
Um, but uh we after last year'sevent, um we had 230 some
attendees and 55 really coolspeakers, and it just generated
(12:07):
really lovely energy.
And so both of us wanted to doit again.
And so the next one's coming upthis coming September.
SPEAKER_01 (12:13):
Yeah, we were fortunate enough to to have a
small part there um last year.
Um, and it was a great event.
Um met people there that I'vestayed in touch with, um, heard
things that are we're stillusing, uh implementing.
So really great, especially fora first year.
There's a million things thatcan go wrong in a in an event,
(12:35):
and it was very well done.
Uh, I imagine you'll see a lotof growth this year, and we're
excited to be a part of itagain.
I'm glad.
SPEAKER_00 (12:43):
I think we we are seeing a lot of growth, and I
think almost everyone there uhfelt that energy.
And you know, uh uh from myperspective, a lot of that
energy came from this geographicsetting from Northwest Arkansas.
It's a unique market like that.
It's unique.
The just the energy for businessand for entrepreneurism in this
(13:08):
region, I think it's more uhconcentrated than anywhere else
I've ever been.
And virtually every businessperson I meet in Northwest
Arkansas wants fundamentally tobe part of a business that's
values driven, that shares theirvalues.
Something bigger than you.
Something bigger than you, thatexact thing.
(13:29):
Yeah.
And so there's all this localenergy combined with um a lot of
purpose-driven business veteranswho come from, you know, uh
Northern California or Oregon orthe East Coast, who are really
unfamiliar with the businessenvironment of Northwest
(13:49):
Arkansas.
And, you know, it was a surpriseto me.
I didn't see that going into theevent.
But the both both groups, bothgroups in our constituency were
discovering a new source ofenergy and inspiration, and I
think enjoying each other verymuch.
And so it was uh it was fun.
SPEAKER_02 (14:12):
Yeah, I feel like um it may be naive.
I'm interested in yourperspective, this you know, a
non-judgmental view of yourthoughts, this the concept in
meditation.
I feel like in this space, we'retalking about our why for the
thing that's bigger than us,there's energy behind that.
(14:33):
And and the consumer impactsummit was really about the how.
Like, well, then how, or howmight we this and how might we
that?
And that just feels like a verynon-judgmental assessment of our
our actions, our practices, ourwhat's working here, what's not
working there.
And it's not about you know,measuring sticks and who's best
(14:53):
here.
It's just like how can we allimprove?
Because if if purpose-drivenbrands are doing more and doing
better, then there's theirpurposes are being better yet
fulfilled, yeah, and there's acumulative impact on our planet,
our environment, our our in um,you know, neighborhoods, our
community, those that we get towork with, and consumer
themselves.
(15:14):
Um, is it a bit naive, or uh itfeels like there's a uniqueness
here where in North WestArkansas, I feel more so than
not, people are just trying tobe better, trying to find ways
to be better and delighted tohelp each other along that
journey.
SPEAKER_00 (15:30):
You know, the energy generated by business is so
different than the cliche aboutit.
There's there's sort of amongpeople who aren't business
people who who have not runbusinesses, there's this notion
that that the primary motivationis greed, or totally that um,
you know, that there's somethingsordid or dirty about the whole
(15:54):
thing, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (15:55):
There's my high school brain, I chose music
education as my major becausebusiness majors were clearly
just greedy and they didn't knowwhat they wanted to do.
Yeah, but they knew they wantedmoney.
Yeah, obviously they've changedto business, but but yeah, I had
that exact, you know, just sortof misconception.
SPEAKER_00 (16:10):
Right.
What I found, and I was likeyou, I mean, I was a poet, I was
a creative writing major.
Yeah, you know, um all the highearning uh uh yeah, exactly.
We had we really had we got avery clear view of our career.
SPEAKER_03 (16:25):
Yes, exactly.
SPEAKER_00 (16:26):
Um and then, you know, I'm at a local newspaper,
I get promoted into a businessposition, and I was sort of
immediately, I was surprised andsort of immediately gratified by
the clean energy that'sgenerated in a task where you
(16:52):
get measured every day, yeah.
Where you can aggregateresources that you can then use
to, you know, based on your ownvalues, you know, how do you
want to uh allocate thoseresources?
Yeah.
And what good would you like todo in the world with the money
that you're making?
Um, I found that reallygratifying.
(17:15):
I sort of found, I think, avocation in that.
Yeah.
Um, and I I wanted to do itbetter.
And in the conversations abouthow we do these things, you
know, uh I've run, I've been onthe boards of nonprofits.
I've run one nonprofit for ashort period of time.
(17:36):
You're always talking about thewhy.
It you have you raise moneybased on the why, you have a
board full of people who aretalking about the why.
And the arguments and the thecompeting for perspective is
endless.
And personally, I find thatquite frustrating.
(17:58):
It I didn't take to it.
It's not I love the practicalityof business, I love the the
puzzle solving of business, andI love taking the resources and
the energy that businesses canaggregate and pursuing higher
goals with them.
(18:18):
Yeah.
And I find that combination.
SPEAKER_01 (18:22):
I'm sure there's people out there right now that
are rolling their eyes saying,oh, purpose-driven, yeah, yeah.
Wait till the money, you know,doesn't come in, then we'll know
your purpose or whatever.
Yeah.
Um, but I think about it alittle more strategically.
You know, it's not uncommonrefrain, uh, culture eats
strategy for breakfast.
Yeah.
Right.
So good cultures um have allkinds of research that show us
that people want to work at acompany that's doing something
(18:44):
beyond earning money and payingthem.
Absolutely.
That that's that's causingsomething.
So it's an easy thing to, evenif you just want it for the
practicality nature of, hey, westand for this.
SPEAKER_00 (18:55):
We and then, oh yeah, I can lockstep, you know.
Well, not to mention that youthen end up attracting employees
who are values driven in theirlives, they're less likely to
steal, they work harder, theyshow up earlier, they stay later
when they need to.
You know, you're you're buildinghigher quality resources because
(19:17):
you've established a higherquality company.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (19:20):
I love that.
And we've got to you know takeownership.
And when you really think aboutownership, you you want to have
a better impact on on thosearound you, on your own life,
your family, your neighbors, ofcourse, your clients and your
coworkers.
And it's just um, it becomes anot a not a spiral down, but
(19:41):
like a building block that justaccumulates over a career.
SPEAKER_00 (19:45):
Yeah, I think that's that's true.
And I think we're we may be uhentering an era now when uh a
company's value system maybecome a more important
component in its data set.
Yeah.
Because we don't know how it'sgoing to evolve, but it seems
(20:06):
pretty likely that intelligentagents are going to start
representing and working forconsumers.
Yeah.
And when that happens, the wholereal is uh now revealed.
The process of shopping, youknow, everybody wants to do
business with the people whoshare their values.
And those values have been sortof easy to blur and to
(20:31):
misrepresent in the past, butartificial intelligence is very
good at looking at all thedetails and comparing one
company to another, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (20:42):
It feels like there's no downside to that.
Um, like I love that.
I picture the you know, you eatat a restaurant, you have no
problem eating there, and thenyou work at that same
restaurant, you stop eatingthere, like that reveals
something is wrong.
Something was terribly wrongthat you would never have known
because the the front that wasput up was, you know, frankly,
(21:03):
edible.
And then when you get backthere, you see what actually
happens, like, yeah, I'm noteating here.
Um, and I feel like it's it's sogood for that to be known, like
for it to be unknown, for it tobe a thing misrepresented, yeah,
is awful.
And it always will come out inthe wash eventually.
And to your point, consumers arethe ability to trick is is gone,
(21:26):
going away quickly.
I hope it goes away entirely,where it's just like, yeah, I
hope you have good, and thedeeper you dig, the more good
you find across everything thatyou you do as an organization so
that uh you will continue tosucceed.
You'll have sustainable growth.
SPEAKER_00 (21:43):
Right.
And are you are I assume you'reboth familiar with B
corporations and what theyrepresent.
SPEAKER_02 (21:50):
So we're not sure everyone in the audience will
be.
SPEAKER_00 (21:53):
Yeah.
Well, we can I mean, simply put,there since uh two thousand.
2008.
There in 2008, uh B Lab wasformed, and it was an organ it
was a a nonprofit thatestablished the certificate
certification process for bothyou know social and
(22:16):
environmental human resourcespractices so that if you're if
your company can pass thispretty rigorous assessment of
how well you take care of yourpeople, how well you serve your
community, how well you care forthe environment, whatever
business you're in, um, then youcan be certified as a B
corporation.
(22:37):
I I bring this up.
Well, and so I certified myfirst company as a B Corporation
the year that B corporationswere invented in 2008.
And it was the eighth yeah,there's the number again.
It was the eighth B Corporation.
There are 8,000 across the worldtoday.
(22:57):
Um, so I was on board for thisidea really early on.
It just seemed like what I hopedwas consumers would start
recognizing the logo, the BCorporation logo, and the
consumer behavior would shift.
And, you know, I that hasn'thappened to the degree that
those of us there at the timehoped it would.
SPEAKER_03 (23:17):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (23:18):
But if you think about it from an AI perspective,
when you there are uh in thecurrent assessment, I think
there's something like the 1,700individual areas that are
assessed, scoring areas,something like that in the
assessment.
SPEAKER_02 (23:35):
So it's a lot of rubber stamp that you pay for.
SPEAKER_00 (23:38):
And you know, a consumer can't begin to dig in
to that amount of data comparingone company to another.
But an agent can't.
Interesting.
And so all those data areavailable to companies that have
certified themselves to put inthe front of their data set to
be immediately noticed by the bythe bots as they roam around.
SPEAKER_01 (24:01):
We're starting to work on that ourselves because
we manage digital listings forour clients, and agentic
commerce is the thing now.
Uh as far back as like October,I believe, of last year, 30% of
traffic coming to certainretailer websites was coming
from Chat GPT alone.
Really?
Wow.
That's a huge number.
SPEAKER_00 (24:20):
It's a really huge number.
So how humans shop, it soundslike it's changing in a big way
and very rapidly.
Very rapidly.
And I think you know, as you'resaying, um it's gonna make it
much harder to present amanufactured identity for your
company.
SPEAKER_03 (24:40):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (24:40):
There's gonna have to be some legitimacy there
because now we have thispresence with us, this other
intelligence that can look atthe details, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (24:50):
And the irony of like AI-generated images and
videos deepening the convictionon I want to see something real
and authentic.
Because once you see and feellike, oh, this was fake, I've
been duped, it's like I hatethat.
SPEAKER_01 (25:04):
Well, I think we're gonna see that in customer
service too, as everything goesto agents and bots.
Um, people are gonna want humaninteraction.
Is it there's gonna be a highervalue placed on it, isn't there?
Yeah.
So I don't think like I don'tthink AI is ever going away, but
I do think we will start to livemore intentionally, like
fragmented lives where this ismy tech time, this is my garden
(25:29):
time, this is when I'm out insomething real.
Uh, you know, now I meanobviously there's the fear of
people talking to bots insteadof humans and things like that.
I just think there's gonna be alarge kind of swing back to
okay, this tool is great, ithelps me be more efficient, come
up with ideas, but I want to bearound people too.
(25:50):
I wanna I want to have ashopping experience that is is
flesh and blood.
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
For sure.
Yeah.
The I I was listening tosomething they were talking
about how medical care mightchange, you know, and there's
the idea, I mean, that a hugepercentage of all the surgeries
could be done through robots bythe best human surgeon alive.
(26:16):
You know, no matter where youare, right?
Yeah, if if you have the if youhave access to the intelligence
and the robots, those surgeriescan all be done by the world
expert.
But of course, when we go to thedoctor and we want to explain
how we're feeling, yeah, I thinkwe want to look at a pair of
(26:38):
human eyes across the room whoseunderstanding that.
How vulnerable can you be with amachine?
Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_01 (26:45):
I I don't I guess we don't know yet, but yeah, yeah,
we'll see.
And and then answer like maybeyou may not know the answer to
this, but what about liability?
And how do you I guess you couldsue the company that used the
bot, but usually like doctorshave liability insurance for a
reason.
For sure.
SPEAKER_00 (27:02):
And yeah, I think there's so many questions.
It's a it's an exciting andmysterious time.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Even even the I listen to lotsof stuff about AI, and even the
world experts.
They they actually don't knowhow it's making itself.
Yeah.
Wow.
Which is a wild uh uhpossibility.
SPEAKER_02 (27:22):
I'm always drawn to those that are uh able to admit
that they don't know.
Yeah.
As opposed to the definitivethis is how this is going to
happen.
SPEAKER_00 (27:30):
Yeah.
We have uh we have a uh speakerwho just uh confirmed yesterday
as a speaker, uh Kimberly Schenkis her name, and she has a
company called I believe it'sNovi.
Yeah, a new company, fairly newcompany.
Uh but Kimberly graduated fromMIT as an engineer, went into
(27:52):
the Air Force, ended up acaptain in the Air Force working
on top secret AI projects.
She did that for 10 years, andthen she founded this company.
And I'm so excited to thinkabout what she will have to
share because you know, therenow that her company, Novi,
(28:13):
advises both retailers andbrands about how to prepare for
these and for these agents foragentic availability shopping
search.
Exactly.
SPEAKER_01 (28:27):
Yeah.
I met Kimberly at uh Expo Westthis year.
I thought she was veryimpressive.
She sure is, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:32):
And Alistair Dorward, a mutual friend of
ours, is uh an advisor for hercompany.
SPEAKER_01 (28:37):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (28:38):
And so uh they may do a presentation together,
which is quite.
SPEAKER_01 (28:41):
That's funny because I saw Alistair went over and
said hi.
He said, Let me introduce you tosomebody.
I thought it might have happenedthat way.
SPEAKER_00 (28:47):
That's what I was thinking.
That that's probably how thatworks.
Yeah, yeah.
The retail can be and reallyjust but that's an interesting
pairing too, because Alistair,uh, who spoke last year, uh you
probably met him at yeah, we setuh he's one of the ones I was
referring to that was stayed intouch with that I met at the
Impact Summit.
So Alistair has been thefounding CEO of half a dozen uh
(29:09):
consumer product brands,purpose-driven consumer product
band brands.
That's his career, that's hisspecialty, including method.
Right.
Like not drop-in-the-bucketbrands, no, founding CEO of
method.
And he gave a tour de Force Talklast year, basically by talking
about challenges that he facedin his companies and how he and
(29:33):
his teams solved the puzzlesalong the way, the bad luck, the
good luck, and it was it was uhI I thought it was a fantastic
talk, um, because it's realworld experience.
I what was uh trying to thinkone of the fun one of my
favorite my favorite part of thestory because I was there for
(29:55):
that.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Um he said when we when they were direct to
consumer, right?
Um so their package was just abrown box that kind of opened up
and it is for drops for laundrydrops and dishwasher drops.
He said, So we startedapproaching retail, and like,
wait a minute, how do we do howdo we do packaging?
Uh and and for the life cycle ofthe business, you know, normally
(30:17):
that's on the front side ifyou're if you're starting a
traditional retail.
That stood out to me assomething that was kind of
interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (30:23):
And his experience in that realm is also very
interesting because at Method,yeah, the whole way method got
into Target, which was their bitthat was that brand's huge
breakthrough.
Yeah, was Target was redesigningstores.
And Target's uh design peoplewere looking for brands that
were packaged in a way thatworked in their new design
(30:47):
framework.
And Method, just one of Method'sfounders was this design wonk
and was very into the shape ofthe bottles and the colors and
everything else, and it meshedperfectly with Target's
redesign, and that was theirbreakthrough.
unknown (31:05):
Love it.
SPEAKER_00 (31:05):
Yeah, you know, all the ways it can happen or not
happen, it's really fun.
SPEAKER_02 (31:09):
I mean, we're the retail journey podcast, it's
nonlinear.
Um, there's not just onejourney, there's not just one
path.
Generally speaking, our audienceis largely on the supplier side,
you know, in this day-to-dayinteraction of trying to solve
and create value across retailor on the retailer side doing
(31:31):
the same thing.
Your lens has been on likepurpose-driven brands.
I'd love to hear yourperspective.
Like if you were in either oneof those seats, what are the
things that you would want toknow from your experience that
would make us that would makeeach of them better on the
merchant side and on the sort ofsales and supplier side?
SPEAKER_00 (31:54):
That's funny because I think what I what I would
observe are almost contradictorystatements for the two sides,
because you know, I I'menvisioning a more productive
relationship between the two.
Yeah.
On the supplier side, I thinkone of the great myths is if
your purpose or if your designor if your specific flavor is
(32:18):
wonderful enough, um, you'regonna get premium pricing.
You know.
So you create a business that'screating a product that has to
be premium priced, but you'regoing into a category that has
very little premium in it, andthey end up getting torpedoed at
the at the point where they'reready, you know, when they try
(32:39):
to scale.
Right.
Um, and in the purpose-drivenbusiness community, that's a
that's uh epidemic.
Oh, totally.
You know, everybody thinks,well, this is so pure and so
wonderful.
Right.
They're gonna love spending moreon it.
They're gonna love spending moreon it.
And, you know, um the theretailer, neither the retailers
nor the shoppers seem to beready to do that.
(33:00):
Right.
But on then if I look at it fromthe retailer perspective, um, I
would say more attention to thedetails of how the products are
created, yeah, could create moreproductive partnerships between
the people who created thesupply chain, the manufacturing
(33:23):
process, the ingredient set, andthe people who have it on their
shelves and are selling it tothe consumers.
Yeah.
And of course, big retail needsto run according to formulae,
formulae, obviously, because ofscale.
SPEAKER_03 (33:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:43):
But I think they've also painted over some levels of
detail that could be quiteproductive, uh, both for the
suppliers and the retailersthemselves, if they were willing
to engage a little more in thecomplexity of how products are
created.
SPEAKER_02 (33:59):
Yeah.
I think I've seen, I mean, someof the best conversations in
that, which I it is hard.
Right.
It is hard.
But you have to, if you'rewalking through someone's
manufacturing facility andwatching the friction points,
you can together solve them ifyou're a retail and supplier.
And I've had some of those wherewe're walking around and we are
(34:22):
talking to the operationsmanager, you're watching the
sales guy just sweat bulletsbecause the ops manager isn't
sugarcoating a darn thingbecause your Walmart.
He's just like, ah, total hatewhen you guys, you know, and
he's just why can't you?
And how come you have it?
And they're just they'reunloading.
I mean, I've brings me anenormous amount of joy.
(34:42):
The merchant at the time, youknow, watching the like, huh?
But at the end of the day, if ifwhat they're saying is like, oh,
well, if if we make thisdecision differently, then all
of that scrap right there goesaway.
And you know what that scrapactually represents?
That my customer definitelycares about is cost.
Yeah.
There's a lot of customers thatwant to care about not wasting
(35:06):
for the sake of the environment.
Right.
But might not be willing to payextra for that.
And they sure as heck arewilling to pay less for
anything.
Yeah.
And if you happen to alsoimprove the impact on the
environment, it's like, guys,this is impact.
This is where you can dosomething that truly triple
bottom line is shared valuecreation and the thing that's
(35:31):
most valuable.
And it but it's hard work.
You have to you have to be ableto understand the context of
like, okay, well, when orderscome in this way, they create
this amount of tension and thenthis amount of waste and this
impact.
And it's obvious when you'resitting there.
When you're in their contact,like, wow, that's a waste of
time.
Why don't we just change yourminimum order quantity to this?
(35:53):
Or why don't we not put thepackage on the shelf that way?
We can put it on this way.
And suddenly hundreds ofthousands of dollars are solved
because Walmart's huge.
SPEAKER_00 (36:03):
Yeah.
Um isn't it interesting how manylayers of interpretation and
training and handling arerequired between a supplier and
the retailer.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, this town is obviousit's absolutely packed with
people who are somewhere in thatrelationship chain because it's
(36:27):
so hard for a big retailer and asupplier to just have a
constructive exchange directly.
It becomes very difficult.
Oh, for sure.
That's surprising andinteresting to me.
We had a case I was close tolast year where a seafood
company was, you know, had adirector of sales who was
clearly getting paid onexpanding sales volume, right?
(36:51):
Right.
And that person was working, Iassume, through a broker with
the big retailer.
And the CFO just notices thattheir bottom line is getting
consumed by waste.
You know, they're they'reexpiry, the the the seafood was
(37:11):
going bad.
Yeah.
And but because of the peopleinvolved and because of how they
were incentivized, it took anoutside consultant to come in
and say, hey, you need to pulldistribution back.
There's a way that this can beadjusted.
Let's look at the actual, let'slook at the data.
I mean, I assume you allprobably tackle this kind of
(37:32):
thing all the time.
Let's look at the data and wecan we can target the
distribution.
You're gonna end up sellingtwo-thirds as much fish, and
you're gonna be end up makingthree times as much money.
SPEAKER_02 (37:45):
Exactly.
And also, once that fish isthrown away, you know what it's
never doing?
You know, nourishing a human orlike it's gone.
SPEAKER_00 (37:53):
You know, it's no longer a food waste is a bit of
an environmental issue as well.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (37:59):
I remember the you know, early stage, uh, you know,
I was at John Brown Universityum going through you know school
projects and the cobblestoneproject started to to come and
evolve, and it's like, how do westop and solve food waste?
And it was just mind-boggling tosee how much of food that's like
still super good, but it thetime like it, you know, we're 48
(38:23):
hours away from this not beingat all edible, yeah.
And you can't keep the menuwhole and expect to use it,
right?
We know that this food's gonnago bad.
Yeah.
Um, and we made so much soupthat was like awesome.
Yeah.
But you would have it wasn't onthe menu, it wasn't the plan,
but it's how you you solve.
And I think there's a creativitylike what's it look like to walk
(38:45):
into a situation with somehumility, with the people that
have the ability to influencedecisions.
Um, and my hope is thatmerchants and suppliers alike
can start thinking about Iwonder where it's not about
banging your fist on the tablefor reduced cost.
Although there are maybe there'stimes where that's totally
necessary, and I've for suredone it.
Um desk banger and where can Iactually remove cost and then
(39:09):
share in the value that'screated?
SPEAKER_00 (39:11):
Yeah.
Um is there room?
I'm just curious about this.
I'm not passing judgment in anyway.
But is there room to build morementorship into the merchant's
role?
You know, is there are thereways that we could engage that
would help the merchants speak,well, uh exchange information
(39:35):
with the suppliers in in moreeducational and in you know
honestly, I love like where mymind goes immediately consumer
impact summit, um, like a sortof round table of removing waste
from systems with merchants andsuppliers.
SPEAKER_02 (39:52):
And I think what's key pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00 (39:54):
That sounds really cool.
SPEAKER_02 (39:55):
What's key is it's not like if it's your merchant,
yeah.
It's hard to have maybe aspecific conversation because
then you know there's a costchange that you must submit.
If it's someone else, then wecan actually find ways to reduce
costs.
And I think there would bedelight in the ability to share.
And I think what you'll findthere's a maybe one of you wants
(40:16):
to moderate that panel.
Be delighted to.
I think if you ask, there's amisconception on where
merchants' desire to innovateand collaborate comes from.
Some of it is is earned becauseyour plate as a merchant
overflows with abundance everyday.
Yeah.
Emails are one of those things.
There is never going to beenough time.
(40:37):
And I'm sorry for everyone thatemailed me when I was a merchant
that I still never responded to.
Um it's there's just like athere's a reality here.
Some are actually very good atit.
I don't know how.
SPEAKER_00 (40:47):
But not to mention the girls back in college whose
texts you never returned.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (40:51):
That's also a uh I don't think I had that problem.
No, but that was an issue.
Um I love that.
But ruthless prioritization isone of I think the fundamental
ingredients in being a bestin-class merchant.
You have to be able toruthlessly prioritize.
(41:12):
And sometimes that uninvites acollaborative conversation that
does need to be had.
SPEAKER_03 (41:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:18):
And I think it's a little bit incumbent on the
merchants to make sure you'reclear on like, I want to
collaborate, I want thesethings.
I'm strategically invested inremoving waste on behalf of our
customers.
It's the entire flywheel.
Like that was the beginning ofthe flywheel.
You remove costs from thesystem, you lower retail, you
sell more, which allows you toremove costs and it's really
productive.
SPEAKER_00 (41:39):
That's why Walmart exists, isn't it?
SPEAKER_02 (41:40):
I mean, it is a simple idea of collaboration of
how might we actually make a lotby selling a lot, not by selling
it for a lot.
SPEAKER_03 (41:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:50):
And come alongside the consumer instead of seeing
how much can I get out of them?
SPEAKER_03 (41:54):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (41:54):
And that whole concept is is beautiful.
I think there's a little bitincumbent on the supplier to
push into the conversation, tohave the courage to say, hey, I
want to figure these things out,but I know we can't do it alone.
We're going to need to worktogether.
Are you open to thisconversation?
SPEAKER_00 (42:13):
Well, and I know one of the things that you all do in
your business, which isabsolutely critical, is
educating the suppliers on howthe retailer thinks.
In among small to medium-sizedsuppliers.
(42:33):
They just it's very hard if youhaven't been very close to a big
retailer.
Oh, yeah.
It's very hard to why on earthwould they do that?
Right.
All the time.
SPEAKER_02 (42:44):
The most common, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:46):
All the time.
And the workload that a merchantcarries is unimaginable,
probably, to a lot of people.
SPEAKER_02 (42:53):
Yeah.
There's a similar, you know, onthe merchant side.
Why on earth would they do that?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (42:58):
Oh, of course.
SPEAKER_02 (42:59):
And operator to to merchant.
Yeah.
Why do they do that?
In those training programs, theyuh they made us early days.
Like I spent eight weeks in thestore stocking shelves.
And before I did that, I'msorry, and I think I've admitted
it on the show before, of like,I just was like, man, why are
associates in the store so lazyto not execute my beautifully
planned modular exactly as itwas intended?
(43:21):
And then I was in the storesetting my beautifully planned
modular.
And it's like, oh yeah, thisdoesn't fit.
There's a 0% chance I'm doingthis.
I'm gonna shove it right hereand move on to the next.
SPEAKER_00 (43:32):
Yeah, not to mention the workload that that person is
carrying.
100%.
SPEAKER_02 (43:35):
Yeah, you know, the the one that stuck out to me is
the the chicken nuggets thatwere not meant to be in the
stock dump bin.
You know, nowhere on a playbookwas it like, hey, someone's
gonna go to the deli, eat acouple nuggets, and then just
dump the rest in this stock bin.
And you know who has to dealwith it?
Whoever walked by it, saw it,was like, hmm.
I'm sorry, I didn't know.
I don't think you I don't thinkthose chicken nuggets are
(43:58):
supposed to be there.
We need To clean this up, figureout what socks are contaminated,
and it's not part of the plan,you know, but it's true tale,
it's real life, it's it'shumans.
SPEAKER_01 (44:08):
Yeah, humans.
We are starting to approach ontime.
So before we do our lightninground, uh tell anybody who
should be at the consumer impactsummit and how do they get
information?
SPEAKER_00 (44:19):
Well, uh, you know, I think anyone who's interested
in aligning their business lifewith their values would get a
lot out of being at the ConsumerImpact Summit.
Um and the uh September 15th to17th at the Ledger in
Bentonville.
(44:40):
Um and it's a lot of fun.
Yeah.
And you know, after 50 years, Ifind these stories and the
people involved very inspiring.
Every time I met two or threepeople yesterday whose stories
really lit me up.
Yeah.
Shall I tell one real quick onthe stuff?
(45:01):
Yeah, sure.
Yeah.
Um, so one of our speakers is uha woman.
Her story is she was gettingdivorced, she was becoming a
single mom.
She didn't know how she's gonnamake a living, she was in a
panic.
Her brother said, you know, youalways told mother that her
salad dressing should be instores.
(45:22):
You should sell you should makesalad dressing and sell it to
your neighbors.
So she started doing that, andshe went to Whole Foods and got
empty Clementine boxes and putthem in the put the dressing in
the Clementine boxes becausethey were very pretty, and she
then she would deliver it to herneighbors and she started doing
this.
And then one day the producemanager at her Whole Foods said,
(45:42):
Uh, Clementine season is over, Ican't get any more boxes for
you.
But what were you doing withthem?
SPEAKER_02 (45:48):
Yeah, why do you want all these climate books?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (45:50):
And she said, Well, I make salad dressing and sell
it to my neighbors.
And he said, Well, bring some.
And he showed it to the storemanager, and they liked it.
They took it to the region, anda few months later she was in
the Whole Foods region.
Uh-huh.
Then she went nationwide, andand either now or in the very
near future, they'll be inseveral hundred Walmart stores.
SPEAKER_01 (46:13):
Oh, I love that story.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (46:14):
Dressed up dressing, I believe that's right.
That sounds right.
That sounds right.
That's a great story.
Um, and so stories like that.
I they light me up, and yeah,that's what it's all about.
That's great.
SPEAKER_01 (46:23):
So our lightning round, we like three three quick
questions.
Uh, first one, what are youreading, watching, listening to?
SPEAKER_00 (46:32):
Yeah.
Um, so we'll start withlistening to.
I've been doing a deep dive onartificial intelligence.
Um I think it's you know, justfascinating.
Uh and I think it it's anevolutionary step for our
(46:55):
species.
And I think it's gonna changealmost everything.
Everything.
And none of us knows in whatways, but it's yeah, it's
fascinating.
Yeah.
Uh reading, I uh just finished abook called Fluke, which um I'm
not gonna remember the name ofthe author right now.
(47:16):
I'm not I'm not particularlygood at that, but uh there there
aren't a lot of books calledFluke.
Right, yeah.
Uh and uh it's a new book.
Um and it talks about how misledwe are by our notion that
everything that arises in theworld or that happens in the
(47:36):
world is a direct result of asimple set of circumstances.
So why do some people becomebillionaires?
Well, the idea is they weresmarter, they worked harder.
Um if you actually look at thedata, you know, you look at how
many Amazons were started atother times and their relative
engineering quality, and and youknow, if you look at all the
(48:00):
other variables, it was timing.
You know, Amazon is Amazonbecause it happened to be
started at exactly the rightmoment for Amazon to be started.
And you know, he he does awonderful job of looking into
the statistics and proving inmathematical ways that luck is
absolutely huge in thisuniverse.
(48:21):
Yeah.
And that when we when we makedecisions or read the data or
draw conclusions from theselinear uh total narratives that
we like to create, yeah,generally speaking, we're
mistaken.
False comfort.
And it causes us to go forwardin making bad decisions.
SPEAKER_02 (48:39):
Correlations, not cause issues.
SPEAKER_00 (48:41):
Yes, exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (48:42):
As uh, you know, we're we're data nerds here.
We really like using data on theend.
And that reality is one that'salways like cause for pause.
You know, like thatspreadsheet's not a vision into
the future.
No, it's a reality of what hashappened.
Yes.
There's still live dynamics thatare always going to change.
Yeah.
So that's where you knowjudgment, relationship,
strategy, looking aroundcorners.
SPEAKER_00 (49:01):
Well, yeah, and don't we like to leech all the
complexity out of the history,out of the historical data?
Right.
Oh, totally.
Um, and believe that itrepresents some sort of solid
state.
You know, uh, but of course itdoesn't.
SPEAKER_01 (49:14):
Speaking of reading, I've been reading Brian Welch on
Substack.
Uh, everybody should check thatout.
Nice a lot of inspirationalwriting I've enjoyed a lot.
SPEAKER_02 (49:23):
Well, speaking of inspiration, the next one is
your biggest retail blender thatyou learned from.
SPEAKER_00 (49:28):
Oh, let's see.
Super interesting.
So um I I I think at retail, sofor a long time I ran a magazine
called Mother Earth News.
And at the time it was a reallypretty significant magazine.
You know, it was a couple ofhundred thousand copies at at
retail, just newsstand, notmentioned subscription and
(49:49):
everything else.
And um the gospel in themagazine business at that time
was that you had to have peopleon your cover.
And so we tried all kinds ofpeople.
We tried, you know, uh gardenersand farmers and celebrities, and
(50:11):
we weren't getting greatresults.
We were out of people.
We ran a loaf of fresh bread ona on a cover and it killed.
SPEAKER_03 (50:20):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (50:22):
And so then we started finally actually
starting to look at data andmeasuring and trying different
things and running A-B splitsacross the newsstand.
And what we discovered was thatfor our magazine, it was quite
complex.
But Mother Earth News had uhabout 30% of its readers can
(50:45):
describe themselves as veryliberal politically, and about
30% of its readers describedthemselves as very conservative
politically.
And so every time we run a perran a person on the cover, we
lost 30% automatically lost 30%.
But bread.
So it came down to bread, yeah,fresh vegetables, and red barns.
(51:07):
Really?
All those three things.
Here's very unoffens,inoffensive uh everybody likes
fresh bread, fresh vegetables,and red barns.
Yeah.
Um but here's the you know,speak going back to the
complexity uh part of theconversation, not berries.
SPEAKER_02 (51:26):
Yeah, I can't have those.
SPEAKER_00 (51:28):
For some reason, fruits and vegetables of every
other kind sold great.
But every try every time wetried to run a cover with
berries on it, it didn't dowell.
And I had a re So fluffy well, Ihad a retailer, uh a guy in the
in the grocery business tell me,he said um it's it might be
(51:49):
because their their uh li theirshelf life is so short.
Right.
And so people have some sort ofdeep psychological aversion to
something that's either notgoing to be ripe or it's gonna
be overripe.
SPEAKER_01 (52:05):
They're not gonna eat it that day, it's gonna go
bad.
SPEAKER_00 (52:07):
Exactly right.
Yeah, yeah, I don't remember itis today, so I'm not picking up
an egg.
But but I but I went, you know,the years went by with me doing
the wrong thing on the covers ofthese magazines.
This is so fist.
And so yeah, that was my biggestblender.
I like it.
And it was several blenders,many blenders, yeah, one after
another.
Years, yeah, that's right.
SPEAKER_01 (52:26):
So and last question what are you over the next 12
months, what are you reallylooking forward to?
What are you excited aboutanticipating?
SPEAKER_00 (52:36):
Well, on the on the Consumer Impact Summit, um it's
so fun as the agenda comestogether because I get to meet
all these people who arespeaking and have conversations
and talk about their message andwork on that, collaborate on
that.
And that's just huge fun.
(52:57):
So I'm very excited about that.
And I had a book come out lastweek.
Um, and um, it's about grief andhow it connects people.
SPEAKER_02 (53:08):
And as a result, what's the book title?
And where can we buy it?
SPEAKER_00 (53:12):
It's called The Gift of a Broken Heart.
Yeah, and you can buy it, Ithink, everywhere.
It's Amazon, Barnes and Noble.
SPEAKER_02 (53:19):
Walmart.com?
SPEAKER_00 (53:20):
I think so, yeah.
Let's go.
Um, and as a result, I go, I'vebeen around talking to people
about that topic, and I'mmeeting dozens and dozens of
people who have been carryingsome kind of really profound
grief that they haven't shared.
Yeah.
And that's a super yeah, um,that's the loneliest place in
(53:45):
the world.
Wow.
And so moving to hear theirstories.
And yeah.
So um my year's short shaping upgreat.
So it's great.
SPEAKER_02 (53:56):
Yes.
Thanks for uh for writing it andfor uh you know having the
courage to step into somethingthat ironically alienates, but
many many have it in common.
SPEAKER_00 (54:05):
Yes, well, everybody has it in common.
Right.
Every human being grieves.
Everybody does, everybody loses.
Um my son died in 2013.
He was a drug addict, and we hada really you know devastating uh
both the disease and his deathwere devastating.
SPEAKER_03 (54:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (54:22):
But uh it also opened up in a way it it
relieved me of theresponsibility for going around
seeming invulnerable.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (54:37):
You know, because um this isn't a burden I can just
shoulder and walk around withit.
SPEAKER_01 (54:43):
The mess came off.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:45):
I found that comparing loss, there's no
there's no fruit in that.
There's no but but we all haveit in common.
Um not not the same by anymeans, but in 2014, my firstborn
son died.
Oh but it was soon after birth.
SPEAKER_00 (54:59):
Yeah, but still you can't compare one thing to the
other.
I try when people tell me abouttheir dog who died, I try, I you
know, I do my best.
No, I do early on after you losea kid, that is really hard to
deal with.
But over the years, you know,I've really worked on opening my
heart to the fact that thosefeelings are real.
And you know, a a pet dog cancan fill a huge part, a huge
(55:24):
role in a person's life.
SPEAKER_02 (55:26):
It's all about attachment, how attached to the
thing is pulling to their depthof of pain and and offering it
also back.
Yes.
Um, but yes, right after it's itwas uh but right after when you
believe my wife on that.
It's like, oh my gosh, peopleyeah, come on.
SPEAKER_01 (55:40):
So we're we're we're the same.
My dog just died.
SPEAKER_02 (55:43):
Yeah, yeah.
I know exactly what you'retalking about.
SPEAKER_00 (55:46):
Well, and it isn't that crass, but people, you
know, it it and that was hardfirst.
The other thing that's hard ispeople who um can't resist
talking about their brilliantchildren constantly.
When it's fresh, when you'velost a kid and it's fresh, that
also is is difficult.
And in, you know, but my wifeand also my wife and I also
(56:07):
admit we have also have adaughter, and she's been super
successful.
And and we admit to each otherthat if both of our kids had
turned out that way, we wouldthink we had done it.
SPEAKER_01 (56:20):
That's true.
That's that's insightful.
Yeah, that's good.
Yeah, well, thank you so much,Brian, for joining us.
I've been looking forward tothis and uh I had a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_00 (56:30):
I did too.
Thank you for having me.
Thanks for being here.
SPEAKER_01 (56:32):
And always thank you for joining us.
Uh, you can always get any ofour podcasts, video or audio, on
our website, highimpactanalytics.com, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Thank you.
Hello and welcome to the Retail Journey Podcast.
I'm Charles Greenhouse, one ofyour hosts.
And I am James Harris.
SPEAKER_01 (00:14):
And today we're speaking with Brian Welch about
purpose-driven businesses.
Brian, welcome to the RetailJourney.
Thank you.
It's great to be here.
I've been looking forward tothis since I think I asked you
to be on here.
(00:41):
And sometimes they're the samething, sometimes they're not.
One, you know, what's your likewhere's your fire for purpose
driven coming from?
And what got you into it?
SPEAKER_00 (00:53):
Well, what got me into it was more or less
accidental.
I was a journalist when I gotout of college and I went to
work in the local newspaperbusiness, which, you know, felt
very purpose-driven, you know,every kind of good, social good,
and truth to power, environment.
I covered in the environment,you know, and I covered
(01:13):
government.
And um eventually I ended uprunning community newspapers.
And by that time, it was a sortof habit as well as just a
source of energy.
I found, you know, I foundrunning businesses that every
day are trying to make the worlda better place really
interesting, really engaging.
(01:35):
And um I, after 15 years, movedinto the bigger media business,
magazines and events and otherthings.
But I was able to build acompany around conscientious
lifestyles.
We had a magazine, a bigmagazine called Mother Earth
News.
We had magazines about naturalhealth, um, the environment, uh,
(01:59):
self-reliance.
And again, I think my motivationwas fundamentally that I found
it more interesting to work onprojects that had some larger
meaning in the world, that hadthe that were oriented toward
making the world a better place.
It was just more interesting forme to run that kind of business.
(02:20):
And it evolved that way.
So that, you know, today I'maround 50 years uh in business,
and I've never been uhassociated with a business that
wasn't the purpose-driven inthat way.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's fascinating.
SPEAKER_02 (02:36):
I love being able to follow interest into maturing
into passion, and then uh thatjust becomes the a much greater
motivator, probably creatingyour best work, whereas
sometimes people who don't havean interest and don't have a
passion, their work suffers thewhole time.
SPEAKER_00 (02:54):
You know, that's true.
And if we're working on thingsthat have a deeper meaning for
us, we have more energy, ourfocus is better.
Yeah, you know, it's I think itI think, you know, I might I'm
pretty sure that I I've beenmore successful doing this kind
of thing because of myfundamental interest in it.
(03:17):
The other side of that equationis also uh fascinating to me,
which is, you know, businesseslike mine have always attracted
people who were out to changethe world with this sense of
mission, but who were motivatedfirst by passion and less so by
(03:40):
interest.
Unfortunately, that leads to akind of idealism burnout.
Passion can run out.
Yeah, because the world's a bigcomplicated place.
Yeah.
And to see it change in anysignificant way in one lifetime
is kind of unlikely, really.
Yeah.
But if you find, I think ifyou're motivated by the exercise
(04:01):
of trying to make things better,yeah.
And if you're motivated by afundamental interest in making
things better, that it's it hasbetter, it's more endurable,
more sustainable.
SPEAKER_01 (04:14):
And I I think sometimes when we think about
making the world a better place,we think about changing the
world in mass today.
Right.
Versus I want to be a positiveinfluence.
I want to be a positive light inmy little corner of the world.
SPEAKER_03 (04:29):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:29):
Right.
I think sometimes we try, we tryto, it has to be all or nothing.
SPEAKER_03 (04:34):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (04:34):
But but I can I can influence everybody in this room
today.
There's a lot of people I can'tinfluence, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (04:40):
I've been really attracted to the the mind space
of becoming the type of personthat, you know, has the impact
that I'm wanting, that thatlives in a way that um will
result in the thing I'm tryingto push.
SPEAKER_00 (04:57):
Yeah, isn't that that's such a profound
observation, I think.
You know, I personally believethat our intention in every
moment is changing the world inminute ways.
And if I look over the if I lookover the course of my life at
people who have influenced me,sometimes, you know, it was a
fleeting conversation at acounter in a coffee shop or uh
(05:22):
sitting in an airport waitingfor a plane.
Fleeting conversations, but aconversation with someone who
kindled something in me thatended up being very
motivational.
And so I don't think we knowwhere our greatest impact might
be over the course of alifetime.
But that moment by momentintention is, I think, where I
(05:43):
think it's uh profound.
SPEAKER_02 (05:45):
That's where I feel like people I think of who are
purposeful, like they're presentto that moment and they are
where they are, and they're theyhave intent as they're you know
having a conversation, trying todo things.
And I've certainly had momentswhere I was very intentional and
had moments where I was very notintentional and unintentionally
(06:05):
created things that are like,boy, I wish I had not said that.
Oh boy, I wish I had notimpacted that person in that
way.
Oh, right.
And then only afterwards do Ihave a kind, loving friend come
up to me like, Do you realizethat they're upset with you?
Like, no, no idea.
You know, and so I know we allhave uh it's a kind of a
constant act of rebalancing whenit comes to walking with purpose
(06:27):
and intention.
I'd love to hear you know yourthoughts or reflection on that
as you've you've I mean, walkedthat way professionally, but are
also human and have have youryour ups and downs.
SPEAKER_00 (06:38):
Oh, to say the least, you know, I believe it's
a matter of practice.
I think it's something one canpractice.
Yeah.
I'm personally a meditator,yeah.
And one of the most basic andfundamental and enduring things
I think that comes from ameditation practice is just in
sitting and watching your ownthoughts and feelings
(07:01):
non-judgmentally, yeah, youdevelop a kind of understanding
of your reactivity.
And that so that reactivitydecreases.
You're more able to consideryour your reactions because you
you get to know yourself in away that allows you to do what
your reactions have been.
Yes, you are, yeah.
And you're able to create somespace uh between um the
(07:24):
phenomenon and your reaction tothe phenomenon.
And in that space, we I thinkcan make better decisions.
Uh, but as you say, not everytime.
Right.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (07:35):
Yeah.
It's more like baseball, youknow?
SPEAKER_00 (07:38):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (07:38):
Because uh, you know, 350 batting average is is
pretty great.
Um, but anywhere we're rightfailed 65% of the time and still
be like, hey, I was pretty goodpro class.
That's right that's kind ofscored.
SPEAKER_00 (07:49):
Uh the you know, when I when I teach meditation,
I tell people the absolute firststep, most fundamental thing, is
friendliness toward yourself sothat you're able to observe
yourself in a non-judgmental wayand not go down a spiral of
negative feelings towardyourself.
SPEAKER_01 (08:09):
That the non-judgmental part of that,
because I meditate as well, notnearly as consistently as I once
did, and I'm going to fix that.
But that noticing withoutjudging, it sounds so simple.
But once you start doing it,then you can start doing it out
here.
And I realized, at least in mylife, you know, 10, 15 years ago
(08:29):
when I started messing around,playing around with that, was
I'm burning a lot of energyjudging people for sure.
Didn't you know, like probablynot consciously, it's just
habitual.
Uh, but it took that slowingdown to notice, like, oh, I'm
doing this to them, I'm doingthis to me.
And if I just stop doing it,it's gone.
SPEAKER_00 (08:49):
It's yeah, much more free.
And the amount of time andenergy it takes, the amount of
attention it takes to run anappraisal of every single
thought we have is you know,it's a heavy burden.
It really is.
SPEAKER_01 (09:02):
And distracts us from other things.
Makes us not present.
Yeah.
Um, so I I met you in thecontext of one of your more
recent endeavors, the ConsumerInsights Summit.
Um, I'm sorry.
Consumer Impact Summit.
Yeah, um tell us about it.
How um, yeah, what was the youknow, what was the seed that
(09:23):
grew into what it is?
And then just for people thataren't familiar with the
Consumer Impact Summit, what uhwhat you all do.
SPEAKER_00 (09:31):
Sure.
Well, as a product of the kindof businesses I've run, I've
been uh probably 25 yearsinvolved in various uh
purpose-driven or impact-drivenuh business organizations,
right?
Um 20 years ago, there was theSocial Venture Network.
More recently, there was the BCorporation movement, conscious
(09:54):
capitalism.
And they've all been inspiringto me and engaging.
And I I've you know developedmany very important
relationships through them.
But one of the weaknesses ofthose events, from my
perspective, was always theamount of time we spent talking
about why we run impact-drivenbusinesses and talking about,
(10:16):
oh, in a perfect world, therecould be this or that or the
other thing.
Where the most importantlearning experiences I had were
my conversations with otheroperators about how we were
solving the daily puzzles, howwe were making the necessary
compromises, you know, just the,you know, the sort of thing that
(10:36):
you all teach all the time here,and the sort of thing that you
this bring to your clients athigh impact.
I think, you know, there was areal need in the community of
impact-driven businesses forthose kinds of discussions.
So my friend Jeff Clapper, whoruns Eighth and Walton here in
(10:58):
Bentonville, he and I had beentalking for some time about how
we'd like for there to be aconference that was very focused
in that way, where thepresenters were almost all
people with operating roles inbusinesses getting the job done.
And um, so I had some extra timea couple of years ago, and Jeff
(11:20):
and I had just been casuallychatting about thing, these
things.
And Jeff said, let's uh let's doit.
And so we started uh what wecall consumer impact events, I
guess about a year and a halfago, had the first event in
September last year.
And um, you know, I've beenthrough several startup
(11:45):
experiences.
Yeah.
And so I always keep a parachutepacked.
Yeah.
Um, but uh we after last year'sevent, um we had 230 some
attendees and 55 really coolspeakers, and it just generated
(12:07):
really lovely energy.
And so both of us wanted to doit again.
And so the next one's coming upthis coming September.
SPEAKER_01 (12:13):
Yeah, we were fortunate enough to to have a
small part there um last year.
Um, and it was a great event.
Um met people there that I'vestayed in touch with, um, heard
things that are we're stillusing, uh implementing.
So really great, especially fora first year.
There's a million things thatcan go wrong in a in an event,
(12:35):
and it was very well done.
Uh, I imagine you'll see a lotof growth this year, and we're
excited to be a part of itagain.
I'm glad.
SPEAKER_00 (12:43):
I think we we are seeing a lot of growth, and I
think almost everyone there uhfelt that energy.
And you know, uh uh from myperspective, a lot of that
energy came from this geographicsetting from Northwest Arkansas.
It's a unique market like that.
It's unique.
The just the energy for businessand for entrepreneurism in this
(13:08):
region, I think it's more uhconcentrated than anywhere else
I've ever been.
And virtually every businessperson I meet in Northwest
Arkansas wants fundamentally tobe part of a business that's
values driven, that shares theirvalues.
Something bigger than you.
Something bigger than you, thatexact thing.
(13:29):
Yeah.
And so there's all this localenergy combined with um a lot of
purpose-driven business veteranswho come from, you know, uh
Northern California or Oregon orthe East Coast, who are really
unfamiliar with the businessenvironment of Northwest
(13:49):
Arkansas.
And, you know, it was a surpriseto me.
I didn't see that going into theevent.
But the both both groups, bothgroups in our constituency were
discovering a new source ofenergy and inspiration, and I
think enjoying each other verymuch.
And so it was uh it was fun.
SPEAKER_02 (14:12):
Yeah, I feel like um it may be naive.
I'm interested in yourperspective, this you know, a
non-judgmental view of yourthoughts, this the concept in
meditation.
I feel like in this space, we'retalking about our why for the
thing that's bigger than us,there's energy behind that.
(14:33):
And and the consumer impactsummit was really about the how.
Like, well, then how, or howmight we this and how might we
that?
And that just feels like a verynon-judgmental assessment of our
our actions, our practices, ourwhat's working here, what's not
working there.
And it's not about you know,measuring sticks and who's best
(14:53):
here.
It's just like how can we allimprove?
Because if if purpose-drivenbrands are doing more and doing
better, then there's theirpurposes are being better yet
fulfilled, yeah, and there's acumulative impact on our planet,
our environment, our our in um,you know, neighborhoods, our
community, those that we get towork with, and consumer
themselves.
(15:14):
Um, is it a bit naive, or uh itfeels like there's a uniqueness
here where in North WestArkansas, I feel more so than
not, people are just trying tobe better, trying to find ways
to be better and delighted tohelp each other along that
journey.
SPEAKER_00 (15:30):
You know, the energy generated by business is so
different than the cliche aboutit.
There's there's sort of amongpeople who aren't business
people who who have not runbusinesses, there's this notion
that that the primary motivationis greed, or totally that um,
you know, that there's somethingsordid or dirty about the whole
(15:54):
thing, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (15:55):
There's my high school brain, I chose music
education as my major becausebusiness majors were clearly
just greedy and they didn't knowwhat they wanted to do.
Yeah, but they knew they wantedmoney.
Yeah, obviously they've changedto business, but but yeah, I had
that exact, you know, just sortof misconception.
SPEAKER_00 (16:10):
Right.
What I found, and I was likeyou, I mean, I was a poet, I was
a creative writing major.
Yeah, you know, um all the highearning uh uh yeah, exactly.
We had we really had we got avery clear view of our career.
SPEAKER_03 (16:25):
Yes, exactly.
SPEAKER_00 (16:26):
Um and then, you know, I'm at a local newspaper,
I get promoted into a businessposition, and I was sort of
immediately, I was surprised andsort of immediately gratified by
the clean energy that'sgenerated in a task where you
(16:52):
get measured every day, yeah.
Where you can aggregateresources that you can then use
to, you know, based on your ownvalues, you know, how do you
want to uh allocate thoseresources?
Yeah.
And what good would you like todo in the world with the money
that you're making?
Um, I found that reallygratifying.
(17:15):
I sort of found, I think, avocation in that.
Yeah.
Um, and I I wanted to do itbetter.
And in the conversations abouthow we do these things, you
know, uh I've run, I've been onthe boards of nonprofits.
I've run one nonprofit for ashort period of time.
(17:36):
You're always talking about thewhy.
It you have you raise moneybased on the why, you have a
board full of people who aretalking about the why.
And the arguments and the thecompeting for perspective is
endless.
And personally, I find thatquite frustrating.
(17:58):
It I didn't take to it.
It's not I love the practicalityof business, I love the the
puzzle solving of business, andI love taking the resources and
the energy that businesses canaggregate and pursuing higher
goals with them.
(18:18):
Yeah.
And I find that combination.
SPEAKER_01 (18:22):
I'm sure there's people out there right now that
are rolling their eyes saying,oh, purpose-driven, yeah, yeah.
Wait till the money, you know,doesn't come in, then we'll know
your purpose or whatever.
Yeah.
Um, but I think about it alittle more strategically.
You know, it's not uncommonrefrain, uh, culture eats
strategy for breakfast.
Yeah.
Right.
So good cultures um have allkinds of research that show us
that people want to work at acompany that's doing something
(18:44):
beyond earning money and payingthem.
Absolutely.
That that's that's causingsomething.
So it's an easy thing to, evenif you just want it for the
practicality nature of, hey, westand for this.
SPEAKER_00 (18:55):
We and then, oh yeah, I can lockstep, you know.
Well, not to mention that youthen end up attracting employees
who are values driven in theirlives, they're less likely to
steal, they work harder, theyshow up earlier, they stay later
when they need to.
You know, you're you're buildinghigher quality resources because
(19:17):
you've established a higherquality company.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (19:20):
I love that.
And we've got to you know takeownership.
And when you really think aboutownership, you you want to have
a better impact on on thosearound you, on your own life,
your family, your neighbors, ofcourse, your clients and your
coworkers.
And it's just um, it becomes anot a not a spiral down, but
(19:41):
like a building block that justaccumulates over a career.
SPEAKER_00 (19:45):
Yeah, I think that's that's true.
And I think we're we may be uhentering an era now when uh a
company's value system maybecome a more important
component in its data set.
Yeah.
Because we don't know how it'sgoing to evolve, but it seems
(20:06):
pretty likely that intelligentagents are going to start
representing and working forconsumers.
Yeah.
And when that happens, the wholereal is uh now revealed.
The process of shopping, youknow, everybody wants to do
business with the people whoshare their values.
And those values have been sortof easy to blur and to
(20:31):
misrepresent in the past, butartificial intelligence is very
good at looking at all thedetails and comparing one
company to another, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (20:42):
It feels like there's no downside to that.
Um, like I love that.
I picture the you know, you eatat a restaurant, you have no
problem eating there, and thenyou work at that same
restaurant, you stop eatingthere, like that reveals
something is wrong.
Something was terribly wrongthat you would never have known
because the the front that wasput up was, you know, frankly,
(21:03):
edible.
And then when you get backthere, you see what actually
happens, like, yeah, I'm noteating here.
Um, and I feel like it's it's sogood for that to be known, like
for it to be unknown, for it tobe a thing misrepresented, yeah,
is awful.
And it always will come out inthe wash eventually.
And to your point, consumers arethe ability to trick is is gone,
(21:26):
going away quickly.
I hope it goes away entirely,where it's just like, yeah, I
hope you have good, and thedeeper you dig, the more good
you find across everything thatyou you do as an organization so
that uh you will continue tosucceed.
You'll have sustainable growth.
SPEAKER_00 (21:43):
Right.
And are you are I assume you'reboth familiar with B
corporations and what theyrepresent.
SPEAKER_02 (21:50):
So we're not sure everyone in the audience will
be.
SPEAKER_00 (21:53):
Yeah.
Well, we can I mean, simply put,there since uh two thousand.
2008.
There in 2008, uh B Lab wasformed, and it was an organ it
was a a nonprofit thatestablished the certificate
certification process for bothyou know social and
(22:16):
environmental human resourcespractices so that if you're if
your company can pass thispretty rigorous assessment of
how well you take care of yourpeople, how well you serve your
community, how well you care forthe environment, whatever
business you're in, um, then youcan be certified as a B
corporation.
(22:37):
I I bring this up.
Well, and so I certified myfirst company as a B Corporation
the year that B corporationswere invented in 2008.
And it was the eighth yeah,there's the number again.
It was the eighth B Corporation.
There are 8,000 across the worldtoday.
(22:57):
Um, so I was on board for thisidea really early on.
It just seemed like what I hopedwas consumers would start
recognizing the logo, the BCorporation logo, and the
consumer behavior would shift.
And, you know, I that hasn'thappened to the degree that
those of us there at the timehoped it would.
SPEAKER_03 (23:17):
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (23:18):
But if you think about it from an AI perspective,
when you there are uh in thecurrent assessment, I think
there's something like the 1,700individual areas that are
assessed, scoring areas,something like that in the
assessment.
SPEAKER_02 (23:35):
So it's a lot of rubber stamp that you pay for.
SPEAKER_00 (23:38):
And you know, a consumer can't begin to dig in
to that amount of data comparingone company to another.
But an agent can't.
Interesting.
And so all those data areavailable to companies that have
certified themselves to put inthe front of their data set to
be immediately noticed by the bythe bots as they roam around.
SPEAKER_01 (24:01):
We're starting to work on that ourselves because
we manage digital listings forour clients, and agentic
commerce is the thing now.
Uh as far back as like October,I believe, of last year, 30% of
traffic coming to certainretailer websites was coming
from Chat GPT alone.
Really?
Wow.
That's a huge number.
SPEAKER_00 (24:20):
It's a really huge number.
So how humans shop, it soundslike it's changing in a big way
and very rapidly.
Very rapidly.
And I think you know, as you'resaying, um it's gonna make it
much harder to present amanufactured identity for your
company.
SPEAKER_03 (24:40):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (24:40):
There's gonna have to be some legitimacy there
because now we have thispresence with us, this other
intelligence that can look atthe details, you know.
SPEAKER_02 (24:50):
And the irony of like AI-generated images and
videos deepening the convictionon I want to see something real
and authentic.
Because once you see and feellike, oh, this was fake, I've
been duped, it's like I hatethat.
SPEAKER_01 (25:04):
Well, I think we're gonna see that in customer
service too, as everything goesto agents and bots.
Um, people are gonna want humaninteraction.
Is it there's gonna be a highervalue placed on it, isn't there?
Yeah.
So I don't think like I don'tthink AI is ever going away, but
I do think we will start to livemore intentionally, like
fragmented lives where this ismy tech time, this is my garden
(25:29):
time, this is when I'm out insomething real.
Uh, you know, now I meanobviously there's the fear of
people talking to bots insteadof humans and things like that.
I just think there's gonna be alarge kind of swing back to
okay, this tool is great, ithelps me be more efficient, come
up with ideas, but I want to bearound people too.
(25:50):
I wanna I want to have ashopping experience that is is
flesh and blood.
SPEAKER_00 (25:55):
For sure.
Yeah.
The I I was listening tosomething they were talking
about how medical care mightchange, you know, and there's
the idea, I mean, that a hugepercentage of all the surgeries
could be done through robots bythe best human surgeon alive.
(26:16):
You know, no matter where youare, right?
Yeah, if if you have the if youhave access to the intelligence
and the robots, those surgeriescan all be done by the world
expert.
But of course, when we go to thedoctor and we want to explain
how we're feeling, yeah, I thinkwe want to look at a pair of
(26:38):
human eyes across the room whoseunderstanding that.
How vulnerable can you be with amachine?
Yeah, right.
SPEAKER_01 (26:45):
I I don't I guess we don't know yet, but yeah, yeah,
we'll see.
And and then answer like maybeyou may not know the answer to
this, but what about liability?
And how do you I guess you couldsue the company that used the
bot, but usually like doctorshave liability insurance for a
reason.
For sure.
SPEAKER_00 (27:02):
And yeah, I think there's so many questions.
It's a it's an exciting andmysterious time.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Even even the I listen to lotsof stuff about AI, and even the
world experts.
They they actually don't knowhow it's making itself.
Yeah.
Wow.
Which is a wild uh uhpossibility.
SPEAKER_02 (27:22):
I'm always drawn to those that are uh able to admit
that they don't know.
Yeah.
As opposed to the definitivethis is how this is going to
happen.
SPEAKER_00 (27:30):
Yeah.
We have uh we have a uh speakerwho just uh confirmed yesterday
as a speaker, uh Kimberly Schenkis her name, and she has a
company called I believe it'sNovi.
Yeah, a new company, fairly newcompany.
Uh but Kimberly graduated fromMIT as an engineer, went into
(27:52):
the Air Force, ended up acaptain in the Air Force working
on top secret AI projects.
She did that for 10 years, andthen she founded this company.
And I'm so excited to thinkabout what she will have to
share because you know, therenow that her company, Novi,
(28:13):
advises both retailers andbrands about how to prepare for
these and for these agents foragentic availability shopping
search.
Exactly.
SPEAKER_01 (28:27):
Yeah.
I met Kimberly at uh Expo Westthis year.
I thought she was veryimpressive.
She sure is, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (28:32):
And Alistair Dorward, a mutual friend of
ours, is uh an advisor for hercompany.
SPEAKER_01 (28:37):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (28:38):
And so uh they may do a presentation together,
which is quite.
SPEAKER_01 (28:41):
That's funny because I saw Alistair went over and
said hi.
He said, Let me introduce you tosomebody.
I thought it might have happenedthat way.
SPEAKER_00 (28:47):
That's what I was thinking.
That that's probably how thatworks.
Yeah, yeah.
The retail can be and reallyjust but that's an interesting
pairing too, because Alistair,uh, who spoke last year, uh you
probably met him at yeah, we setuh he's one of the ones I was
referring to that was stayed intouch with that I met at the
Impact Summit.
So Alistair has been thefounding CEO of half a dozen uh
(29:09):
consumer product brands,purpose-driven consumer product
band brands.
That's his career, that's hisspecialty, including method.
Right.
Like not drop-in-the-bucketbrands, no, founding CEO of
method.
And he gave a tour de Force Talklast year, basically by talking
about challenges that he facedin his companies and how he and
(29:33):
his teams solved the puzzlesalong the way, the bad luck, the
good luck, and it was it was uhI I thought it was a fantastic
talk, um, because it's realworld experience.
I what was uh trying to thinkone of the fun one of my
favorite my favorite part of thestory because I was there for
(29:55):
that.
SPEAKER_01 (29:56):
Um he said when we when they were direct to
consumer, right?
Um so their package was just abrown box that kind of opened up
and it is for drops for laundrydrops and dishwasher drops.
He said, So we startedapproaching retail, and like,
wait a minute, how do we do howdo we do packaging?
Uh and and for the life cycle ofthe business, you know, normally
(30:17):
that's on the front side ifyou're if you're starting a
traditional retail.
That stood out to me assomething that was kind of
interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (30:23):
And his experience in that realm is also very
interesting because at Method,yeah, the whole way method got
into Target, which was their bitthat was that brand's huge
breakthrough.
Yeah, was Target was redesigningstores.
And Target's uh design peoplewere looking for brands that
were packaged in a way thatworked in their new design
(30:47):
framework.
And Method, just one of Method'sfounders was this design wonk
and was very into the shape ofthe bottles and the colors and
everything else, and it meshedperfectly with Target's
redesign, and that was theirbreakthrough.
unknown (31:05):
Love it.
SPEAKER_00 (31:05):
Yeah, you know, all the ways it can happen or not
happen, it's really fun.
SPEAKER_02 (31:09):
I mean, we're the retail journey podcast, it's
nonlinear.
Um, there's not just onejourney, there's not just one
path.
Generally speaking, our audienceis largely on the supplier side,
you know, in this day-to-dayinteraction of trying to solve
and create value across retailor on the retailer side doing
(31:31):
the same thing.
Your lens has been on likepurpose-driven brands.
I'd love to hear yourperspective.
Like if you were in either oneof those seats, what are the
things that you would want toknow from your experience that
would make us that would makeeach of them better on the
merchant side and on the sort ofsales and supplier side?
SPEAKER_00 (31:54):
That's funny because I think what I what I would
observe are almost contradictorystatements for the two sides,
because you know, I I'menvisioning a more productive
relationship between the two.
Yeah.
On the supplier side, I thinkone of the great myths is if
your purpose or if your designor if your specific flavor is
(32:18):
wonderful enough, um, you'regonna get premium pricing.
You know.
So you create a business that'screating a product that has to
be premium priced, but you'regoing into a category that has
very little premium in it, andthey end up getting torpedoed at
the at the point where they'reready, you know, when they try
(32:39):
to scale.
Right.
Um, and in the purpose-drivenbusiness community, that's a
that's uh epidemic.
Oh, totally.
You know, everybody thinks,well, this is so pure and so
wonderful.
Right.
They're gonna love spending moreon it.
They're gonna love spending moreon it.
And, you know, um the theretailer, neither the retailers
nor the shoppers seem to beready to do that.
(33:00):
Right.
But on then if I look at it fromthe retailer perspective, um, I
would say more attention to thedetails of how the products are
created, yeah, could create moreproductive partnerships between
the people who created thesupply chain, the manufacturing
(33:23):
process, the ingredient set, andthe people who have it on their
shelves and are selling it tothe consumers.
Yeah.
And of course, big retail needsto run according to formulae,
formulae, obviously, because ofscale.
SPEAKER_03 (33:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (33:43):
But I think they've also painted over some levels of
detail that could be quiteproductive, uh, both for the
suppliers and the retailersthemselves, if they were willing
to engage a little more in thecomplexity of how products are
created.
SPEAKER_02 (33:59):
Yeah.
I think I've seen, I mean, someof the best conversations in
that, which I it is hard.
Right.
It is hard.
But you have to, if you'rewalking through someone's
manufacturing facility andwatching the friction points,
you can together solve them ifyou're a retail and supplier.
And I've had some of those wherewe're walking around and we are
(34:22):
talking to the operationsmanager, you're watching the
sales guy just sweat bulletsbecause the ops manager isn't
sugarcoating a darn thingbecause your Walmart.
He's just like, ah, total hatewhen you guys, you know, and
he's just why can't you?
And how come you have it?
And they're just they'reunloading.
I mean, I've brings me anenormous amount of joy.
(34:42):
The merchant at the time, youknow, watching the like, huh?
But at the end of the day, if ifwhat they're saying is like, oh,
well, if if we make thisdecision differently, then all
of that scrap right there goesaway.
And you know what that scrapactually represents?
That my customer definitelycares about is cost.
Yeah.
There's a lot of customers thatwant to care about not wasting
(35:06):
for the sake of the environment.
Right.
But might not be willing to payextra for that.
And they sure as heck arewilling to pay less for
anything.
Yeah.
And if you happen to alsoimprove the impact on the
environment, it's like, guys,this is impact.
This is where you can dosomething that truly triple
bottom line is shared valuecreation and the thing that's
(35:31):
most valuable.
And it but it's hard work.
You have to you have to be ableto understand the context of
like, okay, well, when orderscome in this way, they create
this amount of tension and thenthis amount of waste and this
impact.
And it's obvious when you'resitting there.
When you're in their contact,like, wow, that's a waste of
time.
Why don't we just change yourminimum order quantity to this?
(35:53):
Or why don't we not put thepackage on the shelf that way?
We can put it on this way.
And suddenly hundreds ofthousands of dollars are solved
because Walmart's huge.
SPEAKER_00 (36:03):
Yeah.
Um isn't it interesting how manylayers of interpretation and
training and handling arerequired between a supplier and
the retailer.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, this town is obviousit's absolutely packed with
people who are somewhere in thatrelationship chain because it's
(36:27):
so hard for a big retailer and asupplier to just have a
constructive exchange directly.
It becomes very difficult.
Oh, for sure.
That's surprising andinteresting to me.
We had a case I was close tolast year where a seafood
company was, you know, had adirector of sales who was
clearly getting paid onexpanding sales volume, right?
(36:51):
Right.
And that person was working, Iassume, through a broker with
the big retailer.
And the CFO just notices thattheir bottom line is getting
consumed by waste.
You know, they're they'reexpiry, the the the seafood was
(37:11):
going bad.
Yeah.
And but because of the peopleinvolved and because of how they
were incentivized, it took anoutside consultant to come in
and say, hey, you need to pulldistribution back.
There's a way that this can beadjusted.
Let's look at the actual, let'slook at the data.
I mean, I assume you allprobably tackle this kind of
(37:32):
thing all the time.
Let's look at the data and wecan we can target the
distribution.
You're gonna end up sellingtwo-thirds as much fish, and
you're gonna be end up makingthree times as much money.
SPEAKER_02 (37:45):
Exactly.
And also, once that fish isthrown away, you know what it's
never doing?
You know, nourishing a human orlike it's gone.
SPEAKER_00 (37:53):
You know, it's no longer a food waste is a bit of
an environmental issue as well.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (37:59):
I remember the you know, early stage, uh, you know,
I was at John Brown Universityum going through you know school
projects and the cobblestoneproject started to to come and
evolve, and it's like, how do westop and solve food waste?
And it was just mind-boggling tosee how much of food that's like
still super good, but it thetime like it, you know, we're 48
(38:23):
hours away from this not beingat all edible, yeah.
And you can't keep the menuwhole and expect to use it,
right?
We know that this food's gonnago bad.
Yeah.
Um, and we made so much soupthat was like awesome.
Yeah.
But you would have it wasn't onthe menu, it wasn't the plan,
but it's how you you solve.
And I think there's a creativitylike what's it look like to walk
(38:45):
into a situation with somehumility, with the people that
have the ability to influencedecisions.
Um, and my hope is thatmerchants and suppliers alike
can start thinking about Iwonder where it's not about
banging your fist on the tablefor reduced cost.
Although there are maybe there'stimes where that's totally
necessary, and I've for suredone it.
Um desk banger and where can Iactually remove cost and then
(39:09):
share in the value that'screated?
SPEAKER_00 (39:11):
Yeah.
Um is there room?
I'm just curious about this.
I'm not passing judgment in anyway.
But is there room to build morementorship into the merchant's
role?
You know, is there are thereways that we could engage that
would help the merchants speak,well, uh exchange information
(39:35):
with the suppliers in in moreeducational and in you know
honestly, I love like where mymind goes immediately consumer
impact summit, um, like a sortof round table of removing waste
from systems with merchants andsuppliers.
SPEAKER_02 (39:52):
And I think what's key pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00 (39:54):
That sounds really cool.
SPEAKER_02 (39:55):
What's key is it's not like if it's your merchant,
yeah.
It's hard to have maybe aspecific conversation because
then you know there's a costchange that you must submit.
If it's someone else, then wecan actually find ways to reduce
costs.
And I think there would bedelight in the ability to share.
And I think what you'll findthere's a maybe one of you wants
(40:16):
to moderate that panel.
Be delighted to.
I think if you ask, there's amisconception on where
merchants' desire to innovateand collaborate comes from.
Some of it is is earned becauseyour plate as a merchant
overflows with abundance everyday.
Yeah.
Emails are one of those things.
There is never going to beenough time.
(40:37):
And I'm sorry for everyone thatemailed me when I was a merchant
that I still never responded to.
Um it's there's just like athere's a reality here.
Some are actually very good atit.
I don't know how.
SPEAKER_00 (40:47):
But not to mention the girls back in college whose
texts you never returned.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (40:51):
That's also a uh I don't think I had that problem.
No, but that was an issue.
Um I love that.
But ruthless prioritization isone of I think the fundamental
ingredients in being a bestin-class merchant.
You have to be able toruthlessly prioritize.
(41:12):
And sometimes that uninvites acollaborative conversation that
does need to be had.
SPEAKER_03 (41:17):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:18):
And I think it's a little bit incumbent on the
merchants to make sure you'reclear on like, I want to
collaborate, I want thesethings.
I'm strategically invested inremoving waste on behalf of our
customers.
It's the entire flywheel.
Like that was the beginning ofthe flywheel.
You remove costs from thesystem, you lower retail, you
sell more, which allows you toremove costs and it's really
productive.
SPEAKER_00 (41:39):
That's why Walmart exists, isn't it?
SPEAKER_02 (41:40):
I mean, it is a simple idea of collaboration of
how might we actually make a lotby selling a lot, not by selling
it for a lot.
SPEAKER_03 (41:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (41:50):
And come alongside the consumer instead of seeing
how much can I get out of them?
SPEAKER_03 (41:54):
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (41:54):
And that whole concept is is beautiful.
I think there's a little bitincumbent on the supplier to
push into the conversation, tohave the courage to say, hey, I
want to figure these things out,but I know we can't do it alone.
We're going to need to worktogether.
Are you open to thisconversation?
SPEAKER_00 (42:13):
Well, and I know one of the things that you all do in
your business, which isabsolutely critical, is
educating the suppliers on howthe retailer thinks.
In among small to medium-sizedsuppliers.
(42:33):
They just it's very hard if youhaven't been very close to a big
retailer.
Oh, yeah.
It's very hard to why on earthwould they do that?
Right.
All the time.
SPEAKER_02 (42:44):
The most common, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (42:46):
All the time.
And the workload that a merchantcarries is unimaginable,
probably, to a lot of people.
SPEAKER_02 (42:53):
Yeah.
There's a similar, you know, onthe merchant side.
Why on earth would they do that?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (42:58):
Oh, of course.
SPEAKER_02 (42:59):
And operator to to merchant.
Yeah.
Why do they do that?
In those training programs, theyuh they made us early days.
Like I spent eight weeks in thestore stocking shelves.
And before I did that, I'msorry, and I think I've admitted
it on the show before, of like,I just was like, man, why are
associates in the store so lazyto not execute my beautifully
planned modular exactly as itwas intended?
(43:21):
And then I was in the storesetting my beautifully planned
modular.
And it's like, oh yeah, thisdoesn't fit.
There's a 0% chance I'm doingthis.
I'm gonna shove it right hereand move on to the next.
SPEAKER_00 (43:32):
Yeah, not to mention the workload that that person is
carrying.
100%.
SPEAKER_02 (43:35):
Yeah, you know, the the one that stuck out to me is
the the chicken nuggets thatwere not meant to be in the
stock dump bin.
You know, nowhere on a playbookwas it like, hey, someone's
gonna go to the deli, eat acouple nuggets, and then just
dump the rest in this stock bin.
And you know who has to dealwith it?
Whoever walked by it, saw it,was like, hmm.
I'm sorry, I didn't know.
I don't think you I don't thinkthose chicken nuggets are
(43:58):
supposed to be there.
We need To clean this up, figureout what socks are contaminated,
and it's not part of the plan,you know, but it's true tale,
it's real life, it's it'shumans.
SPEAKER_01 (44:08):
Yeah, humans.
We are starting to approach ontime.
So before we do our lightninground, uh tell anybody who
should be at the consumer impactsummit and how do they get
information?
SPEAKER_00 (44:19):
Well, uh, you know, I think anyone who's interested
in aligning their business lifewith their values would get a
lot out of being at the ConsumerImpact Summit.
Um and the uh September 15th to17th at the Ledger in
Bentonville.
(44:40):
Um and it's a lot of fun.
Yeah.
And you know, after 50 years, Ifind these stories and the
people involved very inspiring.
Every time I met two or threepeople yesterday whose stories
really lit me up.
Yeah.
Shall I tell one real quick onthe stuff?
(45:01):
Yeah, sure.
Yeah.
Um, so one of our speakers is uha woman.
Her story is she was gettingdivorced, she was becoming a
single mom.
She didn't know how she's gonnamake a living, she was in a
panic.
Her brother said, you know, youalways told mother that her
salad dressing should be instores.
(45:22):
You should sell you should makesalad dressing and sell it to
your neighbors.
So she started doing that, andshe went to Whole Foods and got
empty Clementine boxes and putthem in the put the dressing in
the Clementine boxes becausethey were very pretty, and she
then she would deliver it to herneighbors and she started doing
this.
And then one day the producemanager at her Whole Foods said,
(45:42):
Uh, Clementine season is over, Ican't get any more boxes for
you.
But what were you doing withthem?
SPEAKER_02 (45:48):
Yeah, why do you want all these climate books?
Right.
SPEAKER_00 (45:50):
And she said, Well, I make salad dressing and sell
it to my neighbors.
And he said, Well, bring some.
And he showed it to the storemanager, and they liked it.
They took it to the region, anda few months later she was in
the Whole Foods region.
Uh-huh.
Then she went nationwide, andand either now or in the very
near future, they'll be inseveral hundred Walmart stores.
SPEAKER_01 (46:13):
Oh, I love that story.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (46:14):
Dressed up dressing, I believe that's right.
That sounds right.
That sounds right.
That's a great story.
Um, and so stories like that.
I they light me up, and yeah,that's what it's all about.
That's great.
SPEAKER_01 (46:23):
So our lightning round, we like three three quick
questions.
Uh, first one, what are youreading, watching, listening to?
SPEAKER_00 (46:32):
Yeah.
Um, so we'll start withlistening to.
I've been doing a deep dive onartificial intelligence.
Um I think it's you know, justfascinating.
Uh and I think it it's anevolutionary step for our
(46:55):
species.
And I think it's gonna changealmost everything.
Everything.
And none of us knows in whatways, but it's yeah, it's
fascinating.
Yeah.
Uh reading, I uh just finished abook called Fluke, which um I'm
not gonna remember the name ofthe author right now.
(47:16):
I'm not I'm not particularlygood at that, but uh there there
aren't a lot of books calledFluke.
Right, yeah.
Uh and uh it's a new book.
Um and it talks about how misledwe are by our notion that
everything that arises in theworld or that happens in the
(47:36):
world is a direct result of asimple set of circumstances.
So why do some people becomebillionaires?
Well, the idea is they weresmarter, they worked harder.
Um if you actually look at thedata, you know, you look at how
many Amazons were started atother times and their relative
engineering quality, and and youknow, if you look at all the
(48:00):
other variables, it was timing.
You know, Amazon is Amazonbecause it happened to be
started at exactly the rightmoment for Amazon to be started.
And you know, he he does awonderful job of looking into
the statistics and proving inmathematical ways that luck is
absolutely huge in thisuniverse.
(48:21):
Yeah.
And that when we when we makedecisions or read the data or
draw conclusions from theselinear uh total narratives that
we like to create, yeah,generally speaking, we're
mistaken.
False comfort.
And it causes us to go forwardin making bad decisions.
SPEAKER_02 (48:39):
Correlations, not cause issues.
SPEAKER_00 (48:41):
Yes, exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (48:42):
As uh, you know, we're we're data nerds here.
We really like using data on theend.
And that reality is one that'salways like cause for pause.
You know, like thatspreadsheet's not a vision into
the future.
No, it's a reality of what hashappened.
Yes.
There's still live dynamics thatare always going to change.
Yeah.
So that's where you knowjudgment, relationship,
strategy, looking aroundcorners.
SPEAKER_00 (49:01):
Well, yeah, and don't we like to leech all the
complexity out of the history,out of the historical data?
Right.
Oh, totally.
Um, and believe that itrepresents some sort of solid
state.
You know, uh, but of course itdoesn't.
SPEAKER_01 (49:14):
Speaking of reading, I've been reading Brian Welch on
Substack.
Uh, everybody should check thatout.
Nice a lot of inspirationalwriting I've enjoyed a lot.
SPEAKER_02 (49:23):
Well, speaking of inspiration, the next one is
your biggest retail blender thatyou learned from.
SPEAKER_00 (49:28):
Oh, let's see.
Super interesting.
So um I I I think at retail, sofor a long time I ran a magazine
called Mother Earth News.
And at the time it was a reallypretty significant magazine.
You know, it was a couple ofhundred thousand copies at at
retail, just newsstand, notmentioned subscription and
(49:49):
everything else.
And um the gospel in themagazine business at that time
was that you had to have peopleon your cover.
And so we tried all kinds ofpeople.
We tried, you know, uh gardenersand farmers and celebrities, and
(50:11):
we weren't getting greatresults.
We were out of people.
We ran a loaf of fresh bread ona on a cover and it killed.
SPEAKER_03 (50:20):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (50:22):
And so then we started finally actually
starting to look at data andmeasuring and trying different
things and running A-B splitsacross the newsstand.
And what we discovered was thatfor our magazine, it was quite
complex.
But Mother Earth News had uhabout 30% of its readers can
(50:45):
describe themselves as veryliberal politically, and about
30% of its readers describedthemselves as very conservative
politically.
And so every time we run a perran a person on the cover, we
lost 30% automatically lost 30%.
But bread.
So it came down to bread, yeah,fresh vegetables, and red barns.
(51:07):
Really?
All those three things.
Here's very unoffens,inoffensive uh everybody likes
fresh bread, fresh vegetables,and red barns.
Yeah.
Um but here's the you know,speak going back to the
complexity uh part of theconversation, not berries.
SPEAKER_02 (51:26):
Yeah, I can't have those.
SPEAKER_00 (51:28):
For some reason, fruits and vegetables of every
other kind sold great.
But every try every time wetried to run a cover with
berries on it, it didn't dowell.
And I had a re So fluffy well, Ihad a retailer, uh a guy in the
in the grocery business tell me,he said um it's it might be
(51:49):
because their their uh li theirshelf life is so short.
Right.
And so people have some sort ofdeep psychological aversion to
something that's either notgoing to be ripe or it's gonna
be overripe.
SPEAKER_01 (52:05):
They're not gonna eat it that day, it's gonna go
bad.
SPEAKER_00 (52:07):
Exactly right.
Yeah, yeah, I don't remember itis today, so I'm not picking up
an egg.
But but I but I went, you know,the years went by with me doing
the wrong thing on the covers ofthese magazines.
This is so fist.
And so yeah, that was my biggestblender.
I like it.
And it was several blenders,many blenders, yeah, one after
another.
Years, yeah, that's right.
SPEAKER_01 (52:26):
So and last question what are you over the next 12
months, what are you reallylooking forward to?
What are you excited aboutanticipating?
SPEAKER_00 (52:36):
Well, on the on the Consumer Impact Summit, um it's
so fun as the agenda comestogether because I get to meet
all these people who arespeaking and have conversations
and talk about their message andwork on that, collaborate on
that.
And that's just huge fun.
(52:57):
So I'm very excited about that.
And I had a book come out lastweek.
Um, and um, it's about grief andhow it connects people.
SPEAKER_02 (53:08):
And as a result, what's the book title?
And where can we buy it?
SPEAKER_00 (53:12):
It's called The Gift of a Broken Heart.
Yeah, and you can buy it, Ithink, everywhere.
It's Amazon, Barnes and Noble.
SPEAKER_02 (53:19):
Walmart.com?
SPEAKER_00 (53:20):
I think so, yeah.
Let's go.
Um, and as a result, I go, I'vebeen around talking to people
about that topic, and I'mmeeting dozens and dozens of
people who have been carryingsome kind of really profound
grief that they haven't shared.
Yeah.
And that's a super yeah, um,that's the loneliest place in
(53:45):
the world.
Wow.
And so moving to hear theirstories.
And yeah.
So um my year's short shaping upgreat.
So it's great.
SPEAKER_02 (53:56):
Yes.
Thanks for uh for writing it andfor uh you know having the
courage to step into somethingthat ironically alienates, but
many many have it in common.
SPEAKER_00 (54:05):
Yes, well, everybody has it in common.
Right.
Every human being grieves.
Everybody does, everybody loses.
Um my son died in 2013.
He was a drug addict, and we hada really you know devastating uh
both the disease and his deathwere devastating.
SPEAKER_03 (54:21):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (54:22):
But uh it also opened up in a way it it
relieved me of theresponsibility for going around
seeming invulnerable.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (54:37):
You know, because um this isn't a burden I can just
shoulder and walk around withit.
SPEAKER_01 (54:43):
The mess came off.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (54:45):
I found that comparing loss, there's no
there's no fruit in that.
There's no but but we all haveit in common.
Um not not the same by anymeans, but in 2014, my firstborn
son died.
Oh but it was soon after birth.
SPEAKER_00 (54:59):
Yeah, but still you can't compare one thing to the
other.
I try when people tell me abouttheir dog who died, I try, I you
know, I do my best.
No, I do early on after you losea kid, that is really hard to
deal with.
But over the years, you know,I've really worked on opening my
heart to the fact that thosefeelings are real.
And you know, a a pet dog cancan fill a huge part, a huge
(55:24):
role in a person's life.
SPEAKER_02 (55:26):
It's all about attachment, how attached to the
thing is pulling to their depthof of pain and and offering it
also back.
Yes.
Um, but yes, right after it's itwas uh but right after when you
believe my wife on that.
It's like, oh my gosh, peopleyeah, come on.
SPEAKER_01 (55:40):
So we're we're we're the same.
My dog just died.
SPEAKER_02 (55:43):
Yeah, yeah.
I know exactly what you'retalking about.
SPEAKER_00 (55:46):
Well, and it isn't that crass, but people, you
know, it it and that was hardfirst.
The other thing that's hard ispeople who um can't resist
talking about their brilliantchildren constantly.
When it's fresh, when you'velost a kid and it's fresh, that
also is is difficult.
And in, you know, but my wifeand also my wife and I also
(56:07):
admit we have also have adaughter, and she's been super
successful.
And and we admit to each otherthat if both of our kids had
turned out that way, we wouldthink we had done it.
SPEAKER_01 (56:20):
That's true.
That's that's insightful.
Yeah, that's good.
Yeah, well, thank you so much,Brian, for joining us.
I've been looking forward tothis and uh I had a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_00 (56:30):
I did too.
Thank you for having me.
Thanks for being here.
SPEAKER_01 (56:32):
And always thank you for joining us.
Uh, you can always get any ofour podcasts, video or audio, on
our website, highimpactanalytics.com, or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Thank you.
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