As teased in our most recent Canadian NRB, last week our team attended the NRF Big Show 2023 in New York City. This year’s show was MASSIVE, with:

15,900 industry professionals,
6,100 retailers, and
24% C-Suite representation.

With over 50 keynote sessions, 100 “big idea” sessions, and 950 exhibitors, it took us some time to absorb all the learning that took place over just 3 days at this year’s Big Show.

This year’s conference can be broken down into 3 main categories, which also align with this year’s Retail Innovations 18 book (sign up here). These key themes are:

Innovation for Hyper-Efficiency

This includes robotics, just-walk-out technologies, artificial intelligence, and supply chain efficiencies.

Innovation for Enhanced Experience

Expanding on the shoppertainment conversation, this includes human-centric design, web-3 created experiences, and creating micro-experiences.

Innovation for a Better World

There was significant conversation around utilizing resale, but more importantly on the integration of sustainability into all business strategies.

We will be looking deeper into each category, and how the NRF Big Show exemplified each through their sessions and exhibitors.

On top of all that, we stayed busy during our off time exploring the best retail that Manhattan and Brooklyn had to offer. Watch for more blogs highlighting our New York tour, and the learnings from these experiences. These stores include:

The Lucid Studio,
The Starbucks Roastery,
The Google Store Chelsea,
Work Café Santander,
R13 Denim,
The Canal Street Market,
abc carpet and home,

And many more! We will be discussing our personal favourites and trends seen throughout these tours in another upcoming blog.

Stay tuned to our blog for NRF Big Show, New York Retail Tours, and much more!

Real Estate & Community Master Planning

Your vision for a thriving business is integral to any economic infrastructure; your customers are at the centre of all planning and decisions. Creating a clear and concise roadmap that factors every facet of the customers’ experience is crucial for success. Your plan must consider vendors, tenants, landlords, developers, government agencies, and other facilities that your retail space will benefit or affect. Your collaboration with the JCWG team will ensure a detailed master plan that includes clear objectives supported by extensive research that considers every component of your business community.

Resources and Techniques:

Retail demand calculations
Trade area analysis
Market gaps and opportunities
Zoning and space requirements
Retail supply audits
Trade area psychographics and demographics
Pedestrian and traffic counts

Expert Witness & Advisory Services

There are many moving parts in a customer-centric business, and you may encounter legal setbacks and disputes at any stage of your business journey. Your collaboration with the JCWG team will provide you with expert reports and testimony in trials and hearings while advising legal counsel to ensure that you have the necessary resources required to manage and support litigation impacting every aspect of your case.

Resources and Techniques:

Discovery
Expert report preparation
Trial testimony
Business strategy review
Determination of damages

Concept Development & Space Planning

Concept Development services include background research, branding, right-sizing, capital budgeting all the way to detail design. JCWG can work from an idea or join a design process to enlighten, validate and support implementation. A vacant property can also be best filled from a concept development exercise.

It may be your idea, our research results, or both. Once a potential retail concept is identified is needs to be developed and validated. The JCWG team has the capacity to develop the concept characteristics from aesthetic & functional planning, design standards, location requirements, capital requirement and validation through demand, trade area and benchmarking analysis.

Resources and Techniques:

Functional planning and programming
Concept design and development of design standards
Detailed design services including base building requirements
Marketing plan and strategy execution
Management and staffing selection
Tenant mix and product curation
Short term and long term KPI definition and monitoring
Operational audits
Expertise sourcing and partnering
Site selection, design development and project enduring, operations human resources, start up inventories, and capital costing
Physical programming and concept design

Branding & Marketing

Winning brand equity must happen on so many platforms in today’s retail world with a consistent message and quantifiable return. JCWG understands comprehensive internal and external brand messaging that identifies the uniqueness and market advantage of a retail busines. Your collaboration with the JCWG team will strengthen your marketing strategy to build stronger connections with your audience through your brand.

Resources and Techniques:

Brand assessments
Unique selling proposition, noble purpose, and differentiation authentication
Brand and marketing implementation
Communications plans
Insightful transition to row market share from research
Customer feedback and product evaluation

Research & Insights

The amount of data available to customer-centric businesses can be overwhelming. Understanding the metrics’ influence on strategy is imperative to success. An experienced eye can save a lot of time and misguided investment to provide relevant and actionable insights.

The JCWG project team collaborative approach provides access to unparalleled experience to mine and capitalize on.

Resources and Techniques:

Custom market studies and benchmarking
Market sounding and listening
Case studies
Global resources through our International partners, The Ebeltoft Group
Demand assessment and market share analysis
Daytime population data, tracking, and analyzing where consumers are and when
Quantitative consumer data gathering, both published and unpublished, from various external sources and our personal database gathered from industry projects
Qualitative data gathering and insights
Interviews (consumer and executive), focus groups, online surveys, and social listening
Employee and customer motivational metrics
Research validation and interpretation to insights

Retail Strategy

JCWG supports retail-related businesses with a proprietary approach that is based on a strategic model developed through nearly 50 years of experience guiding clients. Retail strategy must translate vision into a plan which addresses the client’s resources to implement. JCWG focuses on delivering strategies with vision and is supported by a ‘nuts and bolts’ approach to operationalizing. JCWG applies strategic thinking processes and market research to develop or revitalize your strategy.

Resources and Techniques:

Definition and prioritization of client goals, needs and wants
Thought starter and results oriented workshops to enhance planning team input and integration of JCWG research and expertise
Current situation snapshot, trade area analysis, market gap, and competitive audits (physical and digital)
Tenant and product curation, clustering, and right sizing
Tailored processes to match client cultural, operational, and financial needs
Productivity metrics and comparisons
Active, fun, and energized learning, sharing, and strategizing experiences
Financial modelling incorporating research findings
Risk analysis and mitigation
Threat and opportunity analysis
Omnichannel platform harmonization
Stakeholder and financing approval support

Three Key Takeaways from the NRF Big Show 2023

Innovation for Hyper-Efficiency

Innovation for Enhanced Experience

Innovation for a Better World

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