Retail Unwrapped from The Robin Report

Retailing During Wartime

Mark Cohen — Wed, 04 Mar 2026 05:01:00 +0000

The publicly stated explanation for this war, which is taking place between the U.S. and Israel in Iran, is the explicit intent to foment regime change. It’s anyone’s guess how this conflict will proceed or eventually end. Since World War II, regime changes have almost never succeeded as planned or anticipated. Not in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Yugoslavia, the USSR, Afghanistan, or Syria, to name just a few conflicts.

How will the war in Iran affect the retail industry? And the answer is: Disruptions in trade and travel will force retail to take a conservative path in 2026.

Retail Predictions on the War with Iran

Like it or not, a lot of economic—and therefore retail effects—of this brand-new conflict will hinge upon the conditions surrounding the safe passage of tankers through the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz. This is where 15 percent of the world’s oil and 20 percent of the world’s liquified natural gas originates and transits. Analysts estimate that even using alternate routing, a serious constraint in the Persian Gulf and at Hormuz could remove 8 to 10 million barrels per day from the market, enough to add perhaps $20 a barrel to crude oil prices if conditions worsen. Oil prices, currently at $72 a barrel, have already begun to climb and could easily hit, if not well exceed, $100 a barrel if this conflict isn’t quickly resolved, according to many economists who follow this lifeblood of the world’s economy. In trying to make sense of this new war, the prediction of a four-to-five-week engagement doesn’t sound credible. What is now happening in Iran is not in any way analogous to what just happened in Venezuela.

Is This Gas Shortage Déjà Vu?

So far, this war does not foretell the disastrous, albeit short-term, gasoline shortages that occurred in late 1973 and early 1974 when OPEC created an oil embargo on U.S.-bound petroleum shipments. Then, gasoline supply became extremely scarce; strict rationing took place in most major market centers. The retail business, broadly writ, was decimated for months on end. I was a Department Manager at A&S’s largest branch store in Hempstead, Long Island. Business dropped like a rock everywhere except in downtown Brooklyn, where gasoline was rationed throughout Metro NYC. If you couldn’t fill your car’s tank with a limited, every other day allotment of gasoline to get to work, you certainly weren’t predisposed to go shopping if you didn’t have to.

Since then, thanks largely to the onset of oil shale extraction techniques, the U.S. has developed significant oil independence. But this war does foretell a highly likely increase in already inflated energy prices. Historically, a $1 increase in crude can translate into roughly a 2 to 3 cent per gallon move at the pump; one analyst recently pegged the near-term pass-through at about 13 cents per gallon from the latest run-up. Higher fuel prices hit shoppers twice: directly at the gas station pump and through transportation surcharges embedded in the supply chain of the products on shelves.

More Economic Uncertainty

This new pressure on our economy will pile up on top of whatever replaces Trump’s illegal tariff strategy along with already rising retail prices of just about everything that is widely consumed by us all, and unprecedented increases in healthcare expenses. None of this bodes well for an already inconsistent retail environment with an industry struggling with uneven performances at the bottom of the retail food chain at stores like Target, instability in the middle at stores like Kohl’s and Macys, and chaos at the very top as Saks Global attempts to unwind its completely self-induced train wreck.

How will this affect Wall Street and all those consumers whose disposable incomes are directly or indirectly affected by the performance of the Street? Will a handful of tech companies, which have propped up the stock market throughout 2025, continue to provide air cover for an already stressed U.S. economy? Will the increased use of AI tech products continue to curtail new employment and fuel the increasingly evident presence of aggressive layoffs? I can’t predict the behavior of the stock market, but I think it’s clear that unemployment is going to become an increasingly problematic issue here. Reshoring remains a pipe dream as a near-term economic driver. The metal bending and needle trades are not, and maybe never will resurge in any meaningful way, certainly not this year.

Early Warning System

Retail, which has always been a canary in the coal mine with regard to the behavior of our overall economy, will now be under even more significant pressure this year. Retail does, after all, make up some 70 percent of the U.S. economy. The guarded prognosis, widely held by many, if not most, industry leaders, becomes even more problematic with a war underway in Iran. If this conflict becomes a “forever war,” which Trump promised would never occur on his watch, inflation could become explosive.

Reportedly, the American consumer, without regard to income level, currently lives paycheck to paycheck and is going to get hammered. They will support necessities as they have always done during difficult times, such as during Covid-19. But that’s it; discretionary purchases, otherwise known as general merchandise products, will get hammered as well.

Price will continue to be the primary driver of retail success and, as we’ve seen, not all retailers have the financial wherewithal and the assortment and merchandising disciplines to prevail. Is it possible that new fashion ideas will captivate the American consumer? Yes, but the consumers’ enthusiasm is invariably going to be muted. Add to all of this the upcoming November midterm elections will add fuel to the angst that seems to be increasingly blanketing consumer confidence.

A Forever War?

In my opinion, Trump will want to end this conflict as quickly as possible, but the Israelis are “in it to win it” and not predisposed to back off. Now, with the entire Middle East theater under fire, the likelihood that this conflict spills over into further disruptions in trade and travel is very real. In the face of all of this, conservatism in plans and outlook is vital for all retailers to navigate successfully, at least through the balance of this new year.

Is Saudi Arabia the New Luxury Hotspot?

Glyn Atwal — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 05:01:00 +0000

Entertainment Hub

Every retail trade show now has a Saudi presence. It is on a mission to prove its relevancy and profitability for brands outside the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA). Customers of these brands? Local, regional and international. Growth in regional tourism has benefited the Kingdom, which has not traditionally been considered a bucket-list destination. In 2025, Saudi Arabia welcomed a record 122 million domestic and inbound visitors, an increase of 5 percent versus 2024. But the Kingdom has bigger dreams.

The ambitions of Saudi Vision 2030 are gaining traction as the country works to diversify its economy. Saudi Arabia has positioned itself as both a regional and global entertainment hub, hosting mega-events ranging from Formula 1 and MDLBEAST Soundstorm to the FIFA World Cup in 2034. According to Taqua Malik, Founder & CEO at Freedomvisory Ltd, “Saudi Arabia is no longer an emerging market story, it is a scale-and-influence market where consumer sophistication, cultural confidence, and national transformation are converging at pace.”

Why should luxury brands expand their footprint into Saudi Arabia? It’s no longer an “emerging market” story; it is a scale-and-influence market where consumer sophistication, cultural confidence, and national transformation are converging at pace. For luxury, this is a chance to build enduring relevance with a young, discerning audience in a country shaping the region’s next chapter in culture, entertainment, tourism, and retail.

Tourism Retail

Anyone with a sweet tooth knows that Dubai chocolate has an unmistakable taste. This global culinary phenomenon is yet another reason to visit the Middle East. Dubai is already one of the world’s most popular tourist destinations and is reportedly the most popular city on TikTok. In other words, Dubai is a hotspot.

The success of Dubai Mall is a blueprint for why luxury retailers are chasing tourist spending. According to Chalhoub Group, personal luxury sales across the Gulf rose 6 percent to $12.8 billion in 2024 and are projected to reach $15 billion by 2027. This is arguably a much-needed boost to the bottom line of both waxing and waning luxury brands. Prada, for example, reported a 21 percent increase in revenue in the Middle East for Q3 2025.

Malls in the region remain powerful tourist magnets. The recent opening of Solitaire Mall in Riyadh has attracted a mix of lifestyle and luxury brands, from AAPE to Zegna. Retail investment is set to accelerate further. Knight Frank estimates that Riyadh will add 2.3 million square meters of retail space by 2030, including flagship developments such as the Mall of Saudi.

While tourist spending is estimated to account for approximately 50 to 60 percent of luxury sales in the Middle East, domestic demand will be pivotal to future growth. An expanding base of ultra-affluent consumers will have even greater spending power. According to the UBS Global Wealth Report 2025, Saudi Arabia leads the region with nearly 340,000 millionaires and is forecast to rise to 480,000 by 2029. This trend is cascading down the income pyramid. McKinsey & Co. projects that the number of households earning more than $250,000 annually will double between 2025 and 2050.

Next Gen Dominance

Saudi Arabia stands out as a youth-driven consumption market, with 63 percent of its population under the age of 30. It is a demographic dynamic that luxury brands can no longer afford to ignore. Dolce & Gabbana’s flagship store in Diriyah, which includes the DG Caffè, is now one of the brand’s largest locations globally.

The true game changer, however, is the rapid transformation of the economy. Women now account for more than one-third of Saudi Arabia’s workforce and over 45 percent of new entrepreneurs. This shift has empowered women to express personal identity and style in increasingly visible ways. According to Chalhoub Group research, Saudi women are the most engaged consumers of makeup and fragrance in the region. As Taqua Malik notes, “For luxury, this is a chance to build enduring relevance with a young, discerning audience in a country shaping the region’s next chapter in culture, entertainment, tourism, and retail.”

Cultural Relevance

Success in Saudi Arabia will be determined not only by a brand’s retail footprint, but also by its ability to embrace cultural relevance. According to The Future Laboratory, more than three-quarters (77 percent) of respondents believe luxury brands should offer localized collections or seasonal exclusives. For example, Brunello Cucinelli’s abaya capsule and Loro Piana’s Ramadan collection celebrate and respect local cultural identity.

Cultural relevance also extends beyond product into service and engagement. Discretion and intimacy are central to the luxury experience. Loro Piana’s Riyadh boutique, for example, features a VIC room, a private, appointment-only space. Malik observes, “The Saudi luxury consumer is values-led and socially attuned: they invest in quality, heritage, and prestige, but they also look for meaning, local resonance, and a brand’s ability to show respect through detail.”

For retailers, digital strategy must be equally culturally fluent. More than 90 percent of young Saudis actively use Snapchat, and high engagement combined with strong trust in peer networks makes the platform a vital touchpoint for luxury brands. Brands such as Givenchy were part of Snapchat’s 2025 AR Ramadan Mall. Malik adds that Saudis are “digitally fluent and globally aware, yet deeply proud of identity, rewarding brands that understand the nuance of Saudi social codes, family dynamics, and occasion-driven dressing.”

Saudi Arabia is still widely perceived as culturally conservative, but it is undergoing a shift not only in what consumers buy, but also in where they buy it. According to PwC, Saudi consumers make approximately 40 to 50 percent of their luxury purchases abroad. As luxury brands expand their physical presence within the Kingdom, spending will move closer to home.

Luxury brands can enter the Saudi market through multiple avenues. An investment license is primarily required when a brand intends to operate through its own Saudi entity, but it’s not the only route to market. Many luxury houses partner with regional operators such as the Chalhoub Group to navigate market entry, from securing prime retail locations to regulatory compliance and logistics. As Malik notes, “Partnering early can be an effective way to move quickly and de-risk rollout.” For example, Missoni recently opened its first store in Riyadh in partnership with Al Tayer Insignia.

The opportunity is significant. Riyadh offers luxury brand coverage of 65 percent, compared with 90 percent in Dubai. The viral success of Dubai chocolate is a reminder that the region’s vitality is deeply rooted in sensory pleasure and experience. Luxury has a natural resonance in Saudi Arabia, and according to Malik, the Kingdom “is building its own gravitational center, and luxury brands that approach it on its own terms will be best positioned to earn both trust and longevity.” There has never been a better moment for luxury brands to expand their horizons.

Kohls: The Robin Report Retail Miss of the Week, 2.21.26

Warren Shoulberg — Sat, 21 Feb 2026 05:01:00 +0000

The idea of full price retailers setting aside a dedicated promotional area in their stores goes back at least to the famous “O” tables (opportunities) merchandised by up-and-coming junior buyers at A&S including Allen Questrom and Mike Gould. And then there were the Blue Light Specials at Kmart in its heyday. The best manifestations more recently were the Target Bullseye Dollar Spots, which have since lost much their luster and focus like so much else in the store. So, Kohls’ introduction of a similar merchandising concept called the Deal Bar doesn’t get any kudos from us. In fact, what worries us is Kohl’s chronically poor execution at the store level. Why can’t they get this right; it’s not rocket science. This could easily turn into a pile of leftovers, markdowns and irrelevance. We hope not but Kohl’s track record on such programs continues to be pretty dismal.

A Store Is Not a Fulfillment Center

Chris Niesen — Tue, 17 Feb 2026 05:01:00 +0000

Many of today’s retail leadership decisions are smart, timely, and grounded in real customer behavior. They respond to competitive pressure, unlock new revenue streams, and make sense on management dashboards. The challenge is not the decision strategy itself. The challenge is the consequences when those decisions reach the store level.

The Risk of Quiet Erosion

Across big-box, specialty, and dollar retail, store operations and customer experience are quietly deteriorating. Store formats are not keeping up with the pressure of executing additional strategies. The teams aren’t failing, but stores are being asked to absorb a growing level of complexity without the physical space or operating models required to support it. New initiatives are layered onto formats that have not meaningfully evolved for decades. Store leaders and associates are asked to do more with less. Over time, the physical environment, operational execution, and customer experience all begin to fray.

This is the cost of asynchronous decision-making when strategy advances out of step with the store and operations designed to carry it. The impact of this disconnect is rarely dramatic. Stores do not collapse overnight; instead, erosion sets in gradually.

Do high-level strategic decisions always make retail better? And the answer is: When decisions are asynchronous, operations at the store level can implode.

Supporting the Retail Ecosystem

A store is a living system. Design, operations, labor, and experience are interdependent. When one system changes independent of the others, pressure builds. This may sound like a retail fundamental, but in practice, it is increasingly ignored. Strategy teams launch initiatives, operations teams adjust processes, store teams absorb the changes, but the physical box stays largely the same.

As complexity accumulates, many stores stop feeling intentional. Visual clarity diminishes, stores become cluttered, and service thins. Customers may not consciously recognize the problem, but they feel it. Shopping takes longer, and finding help becomes harder. Experiences that once felt intuitive now feel compromised.

Retail leadership can no longer treat store design, labor, and operations as downstream considerations. When space, staffing, and execution are misaligned, even good strategies become counterproductive.

Solving One Problem, Creating Another

Flexible fulfillment illustrates this tension clearly. Drive-up, order pickup, and same-day delivery fundamentally reshaped retail convenience. For many brands, including Target, these programs drive loyalty, frequency, and trust. They have become table stakes; the business impact is real and necessary.

Inside the store, however, the consequences are increasingly visible. Selling space has been repurposed for staging. Carts, bins, and coolers interrupt the front of the store. Key destination categories are pushed deeper into the building. What was once a clear shopping journey becomes a hybrid environment, part showroom and part distribution hub, without being fully designed for either.

For shoppers, this creates friction. Pathways are less intuitive. Visual storytelling is compromised. The store feels busier but less engaging. For associates, the challenge is greater. They are asked to maintain service standards, support fulfillment, and manage additional tasks with fewer labor hours and without additional space. Flexible fulfillment efficiency may have solved the transaction, but the store absorbed the operational burden. The issue is not that fulfillment can live and operate successfully inside the store; the issue is that the format and operating model did not evolve alongside it.

The Cost of “Yes”

This pattern is not isolated. Michaels offers a timely example of how additive strategies compound inside a fixed box. Following Party City’s bankruptcy, Michaels moved quickly to expand balloons, party goods, and in-store celebration offerings. Strategically, the move made sense. Demand shifted rather than disappearing. These categories drive traffic and align with existing customer missions.

Soon after, Michaels acquired key intellectual property from Joann Fabrics and reintroduced fabric, sewing, and yarn through its Knit & Sew Shop. Again, the logic was sound. The customer overlap was real. The category demand existed.

Individually, these decisions were smart. Collectively, they created strain. Each addition brought new fixtures, replenishment cycles, training needs, and service expectations. Balloons require labor-intensive fulfillment, yet most stores lack dedicated service space. Customers wait in the same old checkout lines, slowing the journey for everyone. Seasonal transitions take longer as the store struggles to flex between celebrations, craft, and core assortments. More than one colleague shared their frustration from this experience with me and described waiting more than 30 minutes to get a few balloons filled with helium.

The result is not a strategic failure. It is operational overload. When store teams prioritize speed over polish, service becomes inconsistent. The environment feels crowded rather than curated. The experience suffers not because the ideas were wrong, but because the system was never redesigned to support them.

When Stores Become Catchalls

Retailers consistently underestimate how quickly complexity compounds at the store level. Every new initiative brings operational weight. When these are layered without subtraction, stores become catchalls for strategy rather than expressions of it. This directly affects customers. In-stocks soften as backrooms strain. Visual clarity disappears as adjacencies blur. Associates are harder to find because they are fulfilling, resetting, or troubleshooting. The shopping journey becomes fragmented.

This is not an argument against innovation. Retail must evolve. Categories will expand. Services will change. The risk is not ambition. The risk is accumulation without editing. Too many retailers add without asking what must be removed, what deserves dedicated space, and whether labor and operations can realistically support the change.

What It Looks Like When It Works

Some smart retailers are proving that complexity does not have to degrade experience. Dick’s Sporting Goods is an example. The House of Sport concept is not just about size or spectacle; it is about intentional design and operational alignment. Dedicated zones allow shop-in-shops and brand partnerships to thrive without disrupting the core format. Customers are clearly directed to go for what is new. Store teams execute major resets when stores are closed, reducing friction and improving quality. New concepts integrate seamlessly into the broader environment rather than competing with it.

Alo Yoga demonstrates similar discipline in far smaller spaces. Seasonal transitions and color shifts happen quietly and cohesively. The store never feels in flux, even as product focus changes. The experience remains calm, intentional, and thoughtfully curated. This doesn’t happen by accident. Thoughtful assortment decisions curated for the space, space planning transition plans that are highly organized, and the team is deployed at the right time bring this to life flawlessly every time.

Walmart offers another instructive example. Through its Store of the Future initiative, the company redesigned up to 650 locations last year. These remodels expand pickup and delivery capacity, modernize pharmacies, widen aisles, and reconfigure checkout and service zones. Crucially, operational functions are pushed back of house rather than spilling onto the sales floor. By evolving the format and operating model alongside new strategic priorities, Walmart protects the customer’s experience while enabling associates to work more efficiently. This thinking supports where the business is headed, not where it’s been.

These retailers share one thing in common: they redesigned the system, not just the strategy.

The Discipline Retail Needs Now

Retail is entering a phase where the hardest work is not ideation. It is editing. Winning retailers will not be those who launch the most initiatives, but those who decide which ideas deserve physical expression and redesign their stores and operating models accordingly. That means making explicit tradeoffs, investing in space where service is required, and aligning labor models with the reality of execution.

The store is where strategy becomes real. If it cannot absorb decisions cleanly, those decisions are incomplete. The future of physical retail depends less on what brands say yes to, and more on how intentionally they build environments and operations that can sustain those yesses every day.

Curate or Get Curated

Rich Honiball — Thu, 05 Feb 2026 05:01:00 +0000

We live in an age of abundance: more information, more options, more products, more channels, more noise. On the surface, this abundance appears to be a gift—greater access, freedom, and personalization. But beneath that promise lies a growing tension: complexity fatigue.

Choice as No Choice

Consumers are surrounded by choice, and increasingly exhausted by it. They download dozens of apps but use only a handful. They fill closets with clothing but rotate through the same limited number of familiar pieces. They buy groceries with good intentions, only to discard a third of what they bring home. They scroll endlessly, browse extensively, and yet often procrastinate before committing to a decision.

These are not isolated behaviors. They are signals. Signals that challenge the long-held retail assumption that more choice equates to more value. These signals also suggest that the future of retail is not about expanding selection endlessly, but about refining it intentionally. These are signals that point toward a deliberate focus on curation.

Is customer value in retail unlimited choice and abundance? And the answer is: Curation wins loyalty and relevance, aligns customers’ wants and needs, and diminishes complexity fatigue.

Complexity Fatigue

The average smartphone today holds roughly 80 installed apps. Yet only about nine are used daily, and fewer than half of those 80 are used even once a month. The rest sit dormant, available and irrelevant. Consumers don’t delete them because they no longer provide value, but because it requires too much effort. Whether busy, lazy, or overwhelmed, we all naturally seek the path of least resistance.

The same overabundance issue appears at home. The average American single-family house now exceeds 2,100 square feet, yet daily life typically takes place in a small fraction of that space. Entire rooms exist only for occasional use. Space is abundant; its utility is not.

Closets tell a similar story. Studies consistently show that people regularly wear only 50 to 60 percent of the clothing they own. The rest sits untouched. Many garments are worn fewer than ten times before being discarded, oftentimes with regret. The flip side is the upcycling apparel market, but it still doesn’t solve the habit of over-purchasing.

Often, aspirational buying doesn’t align with real behavior. Across categories, ownership exceeds usage and wants exceed needs. This is a mismatch between human psychological reward-driven yearnings and the conventional assumption that more is always better.

What Research Has Been Telling Us for Years

This wants and needs tension is nothing new. Behavioral science has been studying it for decades. One of the most cited examples is the well-known “jam study,” conducted by psychologists Sheena Iyengar and Mark Lepper. When shoppers were presented with 24 varieties of jam, they were more likely to stop and sample. On the other hand, shoppers presented with just six varieties were far more likely to stop and make a purchase.

That finding became a cornerstone of what later came to be known as the “paradox of choice,” a concept explored extensively by psychologist Barry Schwartz. His research demonstrated that excessive choice increases anxiety, regret, and decision paralysis. People fear making the wrong choice, so they delay making any choice at all. Subsequent studies reinforced this across many categories: retirement plans, consumer electronics, apparel, and even healthcare decisions. When options proliferate beyond a manageable threshold, satisfaction declines, confidence erodes, and conversion is sidelined. For years, marketers and the CPG industry have been aware of this research, but too often they continue to march in the opposite direction.

The Endless Aisle

Digital commerce unlocked the paradox of choice on steroids. The infinite shelf space of endless digital aisles became a competitive advantage. More SKUs delivered a broader reach and theoretically higher odds of appealing to individual preferences. For a time, this worked. Search was an exercise in discovery filtered by algorithms that promised personal preference relevance at scale.

But scale brought its own problems. As assortments ballooned, discovery became more opaque. Search results expanded beyond comprehension. Comparison shopping turned into an exercise in fatigue with cart abandonment and surging returns. Too much choice transformed into supply chain nightmares. Add to that, a significant percentage of shoppers now cite “too many options” as a reason for abandoning purchases, particularly in categories like apparel, beauty, and consumer electronics. What was once framed as an empowerment tool has increasingly become a burden. The conversation requires a shift away from “endless aisles” to curating “best aisles.” The goal is to no longer offer everything, but rather to offer the right things, replacing maximum choice with meaningful choice.

Technology Is a Steward, not a Substitute

While many frame AI and human curation as a tug-of-war, the real opportunity lies in partnership and harmony. Technology serves as a powerful retail steward—managing redundancy, detecting assortment drift, and supporting complexity at scale—but it cannot decide what matters. There is a critical distinction: AI and predictive analytics excel at forecasting what might happen based on the past. But the past is not always a prelude to the present, and often what worked in the past is no guarantee of what will work in the present. When it comes to curation, default prediction is high risk. The pathway to innovation isn’t to simply anticipate trends; it is to set them. This requires the human expertise—instinct, cultural nuance, and emotional drivers—that dashboards cannot replicate. Curation is a retailer’s foundational skill; waiting for a perfect technology to streamline that process is an abdication of leadership. Technology and specifically AI should be viewed as a partner to human judgment, with tech as a tool, not a proxy for human beings.

The Human Touch

Perhaps most importantly, curation re-humanizes retail. Historically, retail thrived on trust. Loyal shoppers return not for endless choices, but because the selection makes sense. The modern practice of curation is supported by data, scaled by technology, and guided by human judgment. The irony is self-evident. When consumers have access to everything, they increasingly reward those who offer fewer choices, provided that fewer is better. Healthy retail will not be decided by those who carry the most. It will be led by deft curation, because in a world overwhelmed by abundance, relevance wins.

The implications are clear. Retailers that continue to compete primarily on product breadth risk becoming background noise. Availability doesn’t equate to value. Curation isn’t a niche strategy reserved for luxury brands or personal shoppers. It is becoming table stakes for relevance in a crowded, fatigued marketplace.

What’s TikTok Shop’s Future?

Jasmine Glasheen — Wed, 04 Feb 2026 05:01:00 +0000

The joy of discovery is TikTok’s competitive advantage, so it doesn’t have to have the perfect product for every consumer. It doesn’t try to be Amazon. Consumers don’t go to TikTok Shop to buy Clorox Wipe refills, but 83 percent of shoppers have discovered a new product on TikTok Shop, and 70 percent have discovered a new brand.

The growth of TikTok Shop in 2025 is a case study in consumer interest versus international trade policy. Despite tariffs having cut profits from Chinese companies by the Peterson Institute estimates averaging 47.5 percent on Chinese imports, American consumers still provided the largest chunk of TikTok Shop’s quarterly revenue, which more than doubled from the previous year to reach a projected $15 billion in U.S. sales for 2025. On a global scale, TikTok Shop moved $19 billion in the third quarter of 2025 alone.

Will TikTok Shop U.S. change under American ownership? And the answer is: The platform will carry on with its successful, personalized feeds and has its sights set on behemoths Instagram and Facebook to scale and steal marketshare.

TikTok Rising

Much has been said about TikTok Shop gaining on Amazon. TikTok Shop’s U.S. revenue grew by 128 percent year-over-year through April 2025, whereas Amazon U.S. ecommerce retail sales rose 7 percent in the same period, and its growth is decelerating as Gen Z and millennial consumers shift to social commerce over online marketplaces.

Let’s look at how TikTok is leading engagement-driven retail, how the carve-out of TikTok’s U.S. business into a separate entity could change both its own retail strategy and the U.S. retail landscape overall. A consortium of investors is acquiring its U.S. operations. This group includes tech company Oracle, private equity firm Silver Lake, and the investment firm MGX. As part of the deal, Larry Ellison, the co-founder of Oracle, is leading the consortium. The deal is expected to be finalized by January 2026, making the U.S. division a separate, American-controlled entity.

Leading the Engagement Economy

TikTok wasn’t the first app to give users algorithmic suggestions based on their engagement habits, rather than shopping behavior alone. But TikTok Shop did turn engagement-driven selling into an art. With over 70 million products, a strong coupon strategy for next gens’ value consciousness, and a July “Deals for Days” promotion that rivals Amazon Prime Days, TikTok Shop has revolutionized the way users engage with brands.

Rather than offering a categorical search (where users type their search intent into the bar at the top of the screen and the app provides recommendations), TikTok Shop’s algorithm automatically provides engagement-driven product recommendations. Content users engage with videos watched, creators followed, time spent hovering, etc., all of which inform the content sequence shown to users.

TikTok Shop harnesses the power of interest-driven impulse shopping through entertainment, rather than consumer necessity, like Amazon. This phenomenon is (obnoxiously) called “shoppertainment,” a phenomenon in the retail industry pioneered by QVC and the home shopping network. But using “shoppertainment” to lock down Gen Z consumer loyalty is where TikTok Shop excels. The idea of shoppertainment isn’t giving consumers exactly what they need; it’s incentivizing consumers to buy by creating desire. Instagram and Facebook each generate 3-4 times the GMV of TikTok Shop, and Instagram’s image-based search and heavy influencer presence make it TikTok’s main competition.

Discovery or Consumer Targeting? It’s All in the Algorithm

The joy of discovery is TikTok’s competitive advantage, so it doesn’t have to have the perfect product for every consumer. Since it doesn’t host the household name brands of its U.S. competitors, TikTok Shop can’t compete for U.S. consumers based on specific product assortments. So, it doesn’t try to be another Amazon. Consumers don’t go to TikTok Shop to buy Clorox Wipe refills, but 83 percent of shoppers have discovered a new product on TikTok Shop, and 70 percent have discovered a new brand.

So, how does TikTok Shop “shoppertain” (apologies) notoriously frugal Gen Z consumers into spending on products they don’t need? The surprising product selection is innovative; my feed shows stick-on camera holders, k-beauty serums, hair styling apparatuses, powdered yerba mate tea, etc. often advertised by influencers I know offline. TikTok Shop harnesses the power of its micro influencers and macro influencers to create a sense of safety around imported products. (You’d think Kim K’s diet tea snafu in 2018 would’ve awakened consumers to the fact that the celebrities foisting products upon them don’t always use said products, but here we find ourselves.)

The team behind TikTok understands the discovery-driven niche in the burgeoning arena of social commerce. The platform’s new growth framework is “ACE,” which stands for “Assortment, Content, and Empowerment,” and is focused is on giving sellers the free tools to produce content to attract their audience. And these efforts aren’t lost on prospective sellers. TikTok recently reported 171,000 local and small businesses on the platform, and sales to U.S. SMBs grew by 70 percent YoY.

Federal Pushback on Chinese Social Media

It’s hard for the federal government to make a case against TikTok. Since it hosts so many small and local businesses, the idea that TikTok Shop is stealing sales from U.S. retailers doesn’t stand up to fact. The positioning of data centers and customer data is a data sovereignty issue. The sale is a move to ring-fence U.S. data and commercial activities within the borders of America.

The era of governmentally ascribed consumer behavior has come to an end. TikTok’s fame doesn’t just seem impervious to trade policy; it benefits from the headlines even when those headlines are about the forced sale of its parent company, ByteDance, to U.S. investors. We will be waiting to see how or if the new owners alter the online marketplace.

Far from the sale driving U.S. shoppers back to Amazon or another national seller, TikTok Shop now commands 18.2 percent of total social commerce in the U.S. and that share is expected to hit 24.1 percent by 2027. Now that TikTok Shop is partially owned by a group of heavy-hitting millionaires, we might see it have the investment power to grow from a disruptive underdog into an influential architect of American retail.

Washington’s attempt to curb the influence of Chinese retailers reveals a fascinating disconnect between what consumers want to purchase and the actions of their elected officials. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Retailers can no longer remain neutral. The TikTok controversy wasn’t about a social issue like Eugenics that impacts all marginalized people, like American Eagle’s “Great Jeans” campaign this year. Consumers’ indifference to the government’s drive to abandon the platform evidences a greater shopper shift towards the non-geopolitical. While the government’s issue was, ostensibly, data protection from foreign entities, it hasn’t stopped next gens from using TikTok Shop.

For now, the data is clear: If the TikTok algorithm continues to deliver discovery and entertainment, we’re predicting consumers will keep choosing the “For You Page” over the Google search bar or their Amazon feed. And that is proof of a larger competitive ecommerce challenge, regardless of geopolitical issues.

If You’re Not Watching Grocery, You’ll Miss the Future of Retail

Chris Walton — Thu, 29 Jan 2026 05:01:00 +0000

According to Brick Meets Click’s Grocery Shopper Survey which it conducts in partnership with Mercatus, “Monthly U.S. online grocery sales experienced a dramatic acceleration in November, with total sales surging 29 percent year-over-year (YOY) to finish the month at $12.3 billion.” Wait, what? During a period of tight budgets and inflation? How can that be true? Ah, but it is.

“Online share of weekly grocery spending in November 2025 ended the month at 17.1 percent, climbing 340 bps versus November 2024,” the survey reported. Moreover, all three fulfillment options that the survey tracks –delivery orders (aka orders from third-party services like Instacart), pickup orders, and ship-to-home orders (aka direct orders from Walmart and Amazon) – increased across the board. Ship-to-home sales increased 12 percent over the prior year, pickup gained 11 percent, and delivery brought up the rear at a still remarkable 8 percent increase year-over-year.

But again, how can this be? How can a consumer that is reportedly so budget-constrained be purchasing his or her groceries in a relatively more expensive way across the board? Albeit pickup doesn’t cost more, ship-to-home and delivery certainly do, especially when one factors in shipping and membership fees.

How is the K-shaped income disparity feeding the grocery business? And the answer is: Customers who are more open to agentic AI commerce, pragmatic shopping, time as currency, and values-based consumption.

The Haves, the Have-Nots, the Have Everythings

So, what on earth could be driving it? Well, the answer comes down to two words: rich people. A Brick Meets Click press release stated that “The (online) share expansion was fueled largely by higher spending rates in large metro markets, by the 30-44 age group, and by households earning $100K or more annually,” a fact later confirmed to me by Brick Meets Click Partner David Bishop. And that data point adds all the context one needs to understand the full impact of what this report could mean, both now but also in the future. Or, said another way, seismic change is coming to the grocery industry, and these latest survey results likely are just the beginning.

Now, before anyone gets their pitchforks out, let me clarify something. When I say, “rich people,” I’m not talking about yacht owners and trust fund babies. I’m talking about households earning $100,000 or more annually (i.e., households that earn more than 60 percent of the U.S. population). In many large metro markets, that’s a dual-income household with kids, a mortgage, and maybe enough left over for a Costco membership and a family vacation once a year.

These aren’t the 1 percenters. These are the people who need convenience but still care deeply about value. And that’s what makes this data so fascinating. Because here’s what’s really happening: The 30- to 44-year-old group, aka the core users, posted the strongest increase in order frequency, surging over 20 percent compared to last year. They’re placing an average of 3.1 orders per month. That’s a record high. These aren’t people experimenting with e-grocery. These are people who have fundamentally changed how they buy groceries.

The Value Equation That Makes e-Grocery Work (For Some People)

So why are higher-income households driving this surge? Four principal reasons could explain the increase.

The time-value equation.When you’re a dual-income household in the 30-44 age range, you’ve likely got kids, careers that demand constant attention, and maybe aging parents. The hour you can save by ordering groceries online isn’t just leisure time. It’s the hour you need to make dinner, help with homework, or actually see your family. For these households, paying $10-15 extra per week to reclaim that time is a value-laden trade-off.
The price transparency and loyalty program effect. When you’re reordering the same items week after week from a place you trust, like Walmart or your local grocer, you develop loyalty. Platforms like Walmart+ with their cash-back incentives make that relationship even stickier.
What’s actually happening in stores right now. The in-store grocery experience has degraded significantly. Staffing shortages. Out-of-stocks. The general chaos of trying to navigate a crowded store with kids in tow as you try and elbow your way around an Instacart driver. When you order online, you know immediately what’s available and what’s not. No wild goose chases down the aisles. No asking three different employees where something is. For busy professionals, that certainty alone has to be worth something.
Younger high-income households are simply acclimated to buying everything online.For these consumers, ordering groceries from an app is as natural as ordering an Uber. There’s no psychological barrier to overcome. And they have relatively more disposable income to make the behavior stick.

But What About Everyone Else?

If higher-income households in large metro markets are driving the e-grocery surge, what happens with everyone else? What happens to the budget-constrained families in smaller markets who can’t justify the premium? What happens to the traditional grocers who built their entire business model around serving those customers?

Here is where the story gets really interesting … and also complicated. The data suggests that we’re witnessing the beginning of a bifurcation in the grocery market. You’ve got one segment, affluent, tech-savvy, time-starved, rapidly moving online. And you’ve got another segment that’s still shopping primarily in-store, either by choice or by economic necessity. This is another K-shaped economic ecosystem.

And the uncomfortable truth is that the segment going online is the one with the most purchasing power and the highest lifetime value. They’re the customers every grocer wants to retain. But they’re also the customers who are learning to shop in ways that fundamentally challenge traditional grocery economics.

Take a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese. There’s no difference between buying it at Store A versus Store B, all things being equal, particularly when the price is the same. The product is identical. So, what happens when we layer agentic AI on top of this existing behavioral shift? That is the question the industry needs to be asking itself.

The AI Acceleration That’s Coming (Whether You’re Ready or Not)

If we’re already seeing this kind of explosive growth in e-grocery with today’s technology, just imagine what happens when agentic AI enters the picture. We’re now talking about far more than incremental improvements. We’ve got consumers who are already comfortable ordering groceries online. We’ve got loyalty programs that understand their purchase patterns. There’s greater price transparency online. There’s the time savings. Now add an AI agent into the mix that can scan every retailer’s prices in real-time, then apply a consumer’s preferences, factor in dietary restrictions, optimize for a budget, and automatically reorder staples at the best possible price across multiple retailers. All of a sudden, every income demographic is jumping into e-grocery. That’s not science fiction, either. That’s all coming in the short-term, like in the next one to three years. Open the pod bay doors, HAL.

The Ultimate Irony: Grocery Pioneers Agentic Commerce

David Dorf, Head of Retail Industry Solutions at AWS, recently mentioned that UBS is predicting grocery will be the first industry hit by agentic commerce. Grocery, the category that was supposed to be the last frontier for ecommerce, the holdout, the one format that would always need physical stores because people wanted to see and touch their avocados, is now predicted to be the first industry disrupted by AI agents.

It’s the complete flip side of how ecommerce developed. Back in the 1990s and 2000s, we sold books, electronics, and clothing online while everyone said grocery would never work. The margins were too thin. The logistics were too complex. Customers would never trust someone else to pick their bananas.

But now? Now Dorf believes (and I agree) that the infrastructure to support e-groceries is different, and, most importantly, we are also dealing with new customer behaviors and desires. In other words, grocery shopping brings with it the perfect conditions for agentic AI to amplify what’s already working, with a little more budget and time savings sprinkled in for good measure.

David Bishop from Brick Meets Click put it well: “The online grocery customer pool continues to expand, order frequency has steadily grown for over a year, and spending remains resilient, which shows that e-grocery is evolving from just a convenient option to the preferred way to get groceries for many.”

Not just convenient. Preferred. Right now, it’s predominantly high-income households in large metro markets driving this behavior. But behavioral patterns established by early adopters don’t stay confined to early adopters. They diffuse. They spread. They become the new normal. The question isn’t whether e-grocery will expand beyond high-income households. It will. The real question is what happens when it does, and whether traditional grocers will still be around to compete when that day comes.

The Seismic Shift Hidden in Plain Sight

In my now almost 30 years of retail experience (yes, I am getting old), I have learned that you can take one simple idea to the bank – by the time a behavioral shift becomes obvious to everyone, it’s too late to catch up. The infrastructure investments, the technology platforms, the loyalty programs, and the customer data, all take years to build. You can’t flip a switch and suddenly compete with Walmart’s fulfillment network or Amazon’s delivery infrastructure.

So, yes, relatively more well-off people are driving e-grocery growth right now. But they’re not the endgame. They’re the early warning signal. They’re showing us where the entire retail market is heading. Moreover, if Dorf and UBS are right about grocery being first in line for the agentic commerce revolution, then that future is coming faster than most people realize. Seismic change isn’t just coming. It’s already here. 2025 November’s numbers may just be the tremor or foreshock before the earthquake, revealing an ignored fault line.

Editor’s note: This is a modified reprint from Omni Talk.

It’s Walmart 4,606, Amazon 1

Warren Shoulberg — Wed, 28 Jan 2026 05:01:00 +0000

Is Amazon ever going to get its physical retail right? We have written for years about its Achilles Heel: lack of experienced retail leadership. Our namesake founder Robin Lewis always made the point that Amazon’s big problem was that they didn’t have any merchants, only tech wonks. So they could never figure out how to operate a retail business…much less physical stores. It’s why they open stores and then close them. This week, all Amazon Go and Fresh stores are being shuttered. It’s an Amazon roller coaster made possible by deep pockets and the willingness to fail.

And now there’s all the hoopla about Amazon’s plans for a new giant store in the Chicagoland market that is expected to lean heavily on grocery and online fulfillment as a billboard for a direct challenge to Walmart’s dominance in physical stores. But please, let’s not forget one thing: this is ONE friggin’ store. Walmart has 4,606…as of this morning.

And just to put a finer point on that discussion, it is yet another attempt by Amazon to find the right formula for physical retailing. Up until now, those efforts have been pretty dismal with more dead ends than a suburban residential development. Why should anyone think this one will be any different? Maybe the fulfillment part of the store will save it, but it’s another gamble.

Can Amazon ever make it in its own physical stores? And the answer is: Unlikely.

The Big Store

This new Amazon store, when it opens in 2027, is, in fact, big: 230,000 square feet. It’s twice the size of the typical Walmart and even more compared to other category competitors like Costco and Target. You can forget about supermarkets like Kroger or Jewel-Osco brands, which are perhaps a third or a quarter the size. Located in the Chicago suburb of Orland Park (about 25 miles southwest of downtown), the store will devote about half its space to conventional retail, dominated by the grocery sector, although there will also be general merchandise. The rest of the space will be used as a fulfillment center for digital orders, either placed online or in the store itself.

The model follows other retailers like Target and Walmart that use physical stores as online fulfillment depots. The difference in Amazon’s case seems to be that online orders will be picked and packed from the warehouse side of the building rather than from store shelves. That also follows Amazon’s strategy of setting up fulfillment centers closer and closer to where its customers live rather than just having giant DCs on the outskirts of towns. So far, so good for a plan.

But Then There’s This…

Amazon always seems to have plans that have failed for expanding into physical stores. Whether it’s been small and mid-size grocery stores under a dizzying assortment of banners, general merchandise outlets like its Four Star or bookstores, or any number of pop-up locations with a variety of merchandise mixes and assortments. To repeat, the only constant has been that most have failed. By one estimate, Amazon has shut down at least 100 different stores, and now it will add to that total with the closing of its Fresh and Go locations, about 70 in total between the two nameplates. It plans to convert some of them to Whole Foods.

This circling the wagons around the Whole Foods name would seem to be long overdue, rather than this bizarro brand fragmentation strategy the company has pursued in the grocery business. Amazon bought the upscale foodie in 2017 and now operates about 530 locations, with a track record of having opened and closed stores along the way. This was supposed to be Amazon’s ticket to the grocery sector, as a learning curve to master the business and serve as its base to become a big player in food. It hasn’t worked out quite as they envisioned. Amazon has clearly spent a lot of time, resources and money trying to find the right hook for groceries.

Wouldn’t you love to see how much money they’ve lost trying to figure out the store business? One of the few times it said anything publicly was in 2022 when it posted a $720 million “impairment charge” for store closings in its fourth quarter. All together, what they’ve lost has got to be a lot more… and a lot more than a rounding error, even for a guy like Bezos.

And now this focus on the Whole Foods name would seem to run counter to plans for this new ginormous store in Chicago. Why restart the Amazon name in food when clearly it hasn’t worked, and you’re now saying Whole Foods is your meal ticket in grocery? Are we missing something here?

Do the Math

Amazon is believed to control somewhere around 40 percent of the entire ecommerce sector; food has been anointed as the holy grail of expansion. Along with fashion, it’s the only category that will provide the size and scale it needs to move its $635 billion needle further to the right. Adding another frying pan or a pack of batteries is just not going to make that revenue grade.

Across the retail landscape, Walmart is pursuing its own strategy. With in-store revenues growing at a slower pace than in its heyday, the Boys from Bentonville see ecommerce as the way to build its total sales. To be fair, Amazon has had its struggles in physical retail; it’s taken Walmart quite a while to figure out its online strategy with its own collection of dead ends and wrong turns—anybody remember Bonobos or Moosejaw? Once Walmart finally figured out that it was grocery where it should be putting its digital emphasis, things began to click…literally. Still, it is miles behind Amazon in ecommerce with its market share still roughly in single digits.

At its current rate of digital growth, it will take Walmart years—decades, in fact—to get close to Amazon in ecommerce. In fact, projections are that Amazon will pass Walmart in total corporate revenues, although this does include AWS web services, Prime streaming and whatever else is in the company’s bag of tricks. Then again, Walmart also has an increasingly bigger business in non-retail sectors like online advertising, so comparisons are getting harder and harder to judge.

So, it’s a moving target, and that’s the problem Amazon faces in the grocery business. Even if this new Chicago store is the absolute best thing since sliced bread, and sells a ton of it every day, it has a daunting task to catch up to Walmart, or even smaller players like Kroger or Costco. How long? If by some crazy push, Amazon opens 30 or 40 giant supermarkets a year, that’s at least 100 years before it gets in Walmart’s league. See you in 2127 if you want to mark it in your datebook.

We get it that every retailer is going after market share and trying to expand into classifications where it is not a big player. That’s just good business. But before everyone gets bent out of shape on this new Amazon store, let’s remember their track record on new store formats. And let’s remember to have our calendars handy too.

We might have seen this movie before.

The Chinese Are Coming

Mark Faithfull — Mon, 26 Jan 2026 05:01:00 +0000

While President Donald Trump continues to flip-flop on tariffs, the message coming out of this year’s MAPIC event in Cannes on the French Riviera was clear: Asian brands aren’t waiting around. They’re heading West, and they’re planning to scale up fast.

Westward Ho

The standout theme from MAPIC 2025—Europe’s biggest retail real estate event—was the surge of Chinese and Asian brands setting their sights on the U.S. and Europe, with aggressive expansion plans and a long-term outlook. “When it comes to the U.S., Chinese brands are in this for the long haul. They’re not chasing short-term profits. These companies are showing real confidence, creativity, and design strength,” said Sam Foyle, London-based Co-Head of Global Retail at broker Savills. As a result, he added that most Asian retailers appear to view tariffs as a temporary setback rather than as a deal-breaker.

Should U.S. and European retailers welcome the influx of Asian retail brands, or fear them? And the answer is: When it comes to expansion Chinese brands are in this for the long haul. They’re not chasing short-term profits. These companies are showing real confidence and most Asian retailers view tariffs as a temporary setback rather than as a deal-breaker.

Breakneck Expansion

Things are moving fast. As recently reported by The Robin Report, Chinese online giant JD.com is set to reshape the consumer electronics retail sector in Europe after it launched a takeover offer for Ceconomy, the parent company of German retail giants MediaMarkt and Saturn. The deal is valued at about $2.5 billion and is expected to be complete in the first half of 2026. Out of the gate, this positions JD to challenge Amazon’s dominance in Europe’s consumer electronics market.

But much of the activity is coming from brands with extraordinary aspirations. One of the fastest-growing is Miniso, a Guangzhou-based lifestyle retailer that’s been on a rapid global expansion streak. Founded in 2013, Miniso now operates around 8,000 stores across 111 markets, debuted in the U.S. in 2017 and has nearly 500 stores in Europe. Many American readers might first have taken note when it opened a flagship Times Square store in New York.

After breakneck expansion, Miniso has turned its attention to large-format superstores in high-traffic areas, leveraging partnerships with well-known IP brands like Marvel, Disney, and Barbie. After testing its Miniso Land concept in Shanghai, the company launched its first Miniso Land stores outside China in Madrid, Spain and Bangkok, Thailand and most recently at the West Edmonton Mall in Canada.

“The Miniso Land format averages about 10,000 square feet, much larger than our standard 3,000 square foot stores,” said Vincent Huang, Miniso Group Vice President and General Manager of Overseas Business. “They’re designed for experience, fun, and engagement, especially for younger shoppers.” According to Huang, one Miniso Land store in China has generated roughly $14 million in sales within its first nine months. While the company expects to slow its overall store openings slightly after years of rapid expansion, it plans to continue rolling out large flagship stores across major U.S. and European cities, focused far more on experience and engagement.

“While our store expansion pace may slow a little after some incredible years growing the brand around the world, we want to open more of these large stores where we can really showcase our IP collaborations and also our own IP,” he added. “I think that if you bring together products that really resonate with shoppers and then you are able to sell them at a great price, then you have a fantastic proposition,” he stressed.

Malaysia Joins the Road West

Another relative unknown in the West is Malaysia’s home improvement chain Mr. DIY, which continues to grow at an astonishing pace. Since launching in 2005, the chain has opened more than 5,200 outlets across 14 markets, including 1,000 new stores last year and another 1,200 expected by the end of 2025. The retailer is currently focused on expanding across Europe, including Spain, Poland, Turkey, and soon Romania, the Czech Republic, Hungary and perhaps Greece. “Germany and neighboring markets are a key focus for us as we maintain our current growth momentum,” said Mr. DIY Chief Operating Officer Leo Gann.

Children’s apparel brand Balabala, part of China’s Semir Group, has also been pushing international growth and debuted in California in November. With over 4,500 stores in mainland China and Hong Kong and 100-plus overseas, the company has opened its first U.S. store at the Stoneridge Shopping Center in Pleasanton, CA and its debut European stores will open in Italy in 2026, with three sites identified.

Nicole Zhou, Senior Director of Semir & Balabala’s International Division, said that as the global fashion market faces new challenges, brands are increasingly being driven to look beyond traditional boundaries to find growth opportunities. “Over the next year, we’ll strengthen our Asian presence and expand into markets where we don’t yet have a physical footprint,” Zhou said. “The Middle East remains a strategic focus; our store count there is expected to double within the next 12 months. We’ve finalized a development deal in Italy and are preparing for broader European entry.” Zhou added that North America is currently in a “test phase,” both online and offline, as the company studies consumer behavior to shape its future expansion plans.

China’s Answer to Urban Revivo?

Urban Revivo, often compared with Spain’s fashion powerhouse Zara, is also making waves. Founded in 2006, the fashion chain has been expanding into major capital cities, opening flagship stores in New York, London, and other fashion-forward markets to raise global visibility. “Tariffs have minimal impact on consumer retail,” said Urban Revivo CEO Leo Li. “Still, we’re optimizing our cost structure and sourcing strategy to offset any potential increases.”

Meanwhile, tech and electronics powerhouse Xiaomi, best known for cell phones, is setting its sights on opening about 10,000 new Mi Home stores globally within five years and has recently entered the electric vehicle space. “We’re building on our brand recognition and moving quickly to open EV showrooms and stores across Europe and the U.S.,” said Eva Niu, Xiaomi’s Head of Retail for Western Europe.

The Shein Paradox

The influx of Chinese retailers and Asian products has not gone without controversy, and a lot of that has swarmed around the November opening of super-cheap fashion retailer Shein within the BHV Marais department store in central Paris.

The run-up to Shein’s debut ignited a political, cultural and industrial backlash in France that has touched on questions of national identity, ethical consumption and the future direction of French fashion. Yet despite the furor, the store attracted “more than 50,000 visitors” in its opening days, according to Frédéric Merlin, the unapologetic President of Société des Grands Magasins (SGM), which owns BHV. He reported an average basket of over $52 for customers and said that “nearly 15 percent of them went on to shop in other departments” of the department store.

Yet in the wake, Galeries Lafayette pulled its name from four more department stores licensed to SGM that were also set to introduce Shein shop-in-shops. As a result, those plans were cancelled, while a string of brands including A.P.C., Agnès b, Aime Cosmetics, Figaret Paris, Le Slip Français, Maison Lejaby, Maison Serge Lesage and Odaje pulled out of the Paris BHV Marais store.

France’s parliament is also debating a proposed €2 ($2.15) levy on low-cost fashion imports, which could take effect in 2026 and would precede a similar European Union-wide tax that is not expected to be in place before 2028. The French initiative, intended as a stopgap ahead of the economic bloc’s delayed plans, would mark one of the first national attempts to rein in the surge of ultra-cheap apparel and merchandise flooding European markets from Asia.

Lawmakers are also considering introducing an additional environmental charge of up to $5.40 per parcel, which could rise to $10.80 by 2030, reflecting growing political pressure to address the environmental and social costs of fast fashion.

Industry bodies such as EuroCommerce have also called on the E.U. to rally the European nations around a more rigorous implementation of current rules and regulations over product compliance, claiming that many products targeting the continent do not meet European standards.

Gen Z Key to the China Syndrome

What is unquestionable is the deep ambition of Asian retailers to create a significant physical footprint in the U.S. and Europe, bolstered by their breakneck expansion rates to date, proving that they can do it just because they’ve done it.

Will Gen Z’s insatiable desire for cheap chic flag? That’s the hardest question to answer; a conscientious consumer generation that continues to be sidetracked by rock bottom prices, this conflicted demographic could be the key to whether the west can be won by Asia.

Lululemon: The Robin Report Retail Miss of the Week

Warren Shoulberg — Sat, 24 Jan 2026 05:01:00 +0000

Will somebody at Lululemon please put up a sign in the product development department that says, “No more see-through pants! Stupid.” Once again, the apparel company has had to pull a new line of pants because of sheer body revealing problems, which even to us non-yoga types know is a big no-no. What is the matter with these PD people? Not to mention management for signing off on these products? Lululemon has been on a losing streak for some time—its stock is off by more than 50 percent in just the past year. This misfit isn’t going to help. Talk about a downward dog!