In this week’s Omni Talk Retail Fast Five weekly retail news roundup, sponsored by the A&M Consumer and Retail Group, Ownit AI, Avalara, Mirakl, and Ocampo Capital, Walmart and Amazon takeover the headlines in their ongoing innovation duel, as Chris and Anne discussed:

• Walmart starting its holiday promotions earlier than ever, with a digital twist (Source)
• Amazon’s new Shark Tank-style TV show, “Buy It Now” (Source)
• Walmart’s latest e-commerce innovation, aka “Shop with Friends” (Source)
• Amazon’s new AI image generator for sellers (Source)
• And closed with a look at the brilliance of merging Sam’s Club and Walmart’s supply chains (Source)

There’s all that, plus AWS’s Scott Langdoc joins us for 5 Insightful Minutes, the Schwan’s song, why Chris and Anne love the Minneapolis airport, and to whom Anne would send her resume attached to a Pizza Hut pizza box.

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I mean, to give people an idea of how the sausage is made, we had, we had no intention of doing that this week, but as we looked at the headlines, we're like, Oh my God, all the innovation is coming from Walmart and Amazon. It's, it's, it's, it's getting kind of ridiculous, actually. Which you said to me the other day, like you're like.

Yeah. It's no surprise. Like, I don't know. I feel like, I mean, you and I talk to so many people every week and it's the consistent theme is like, Walmart is just killing it. Amazon is popping up there too, but, um, but especially Walmart, man, we've got some exciting stuff to talk about today, but this is, this is definitely the first time this has happened in our history.

First time ever. Yeah. First time ever. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We were a little trepidatious about doing it, but we're like, yeah, I mean, let's do it. We're like, let's call it out. But, but yeah, it's interesting too. Like what is, who wins the week too? We could do that at the end potentially. Like who wins the week, Walmart or Amazon on the actual innovation that matters question as well, which is kind of interesting.

I think I know which way you and I are both going to lean on that one too. For sure. For sure. I think though the one The one thing that still is like, I've, I've still been trying to do tons of research that almost made it in was the Costco housing story. And even though my dad is very thrilled about the possibility of living at a Costco, um, I think that that's still to me is.

Um, there's still some more work to be done. So Amazon and Walmart, congratulations, very deserving of this total takeover today, Costco, we'll catch you the next time around. Yes. And coincidentally, our guests on five insightful minutes is also from AWS. So it's just, it's just a totally random week, but all right, today we've got news on Amazon's new shark tank style game show, Walmart's new shop with friends, innovation.

Amazon's AI powered ad generator for its sellers. My personal favorite headline of the week, Sam's club and Walmart's supply chain teams are merging together. And AWS is Scott Langdock stops by to give us five insightful minutes on how retailers can maximize their use of the cloud. But we begin today.

With big holiday news from you guessed it, it's got to be Walmart or Amazon. And, but this time it's Walmart. It is all right. Headline number one, Chris Walmart has unveiled its holiday plans, replete with early shopping deals and affordable meals, according to a Walmart press release, Walmart is kicking off the holiday shopping season early.

Earlier than ever unveiling its plans to help customers have a memorable holiday season with consistently low prices and a convenient experience. No matter when, where, or how they choose to shop all season long. So what does this mean, Chris? It means that customers who want to get a jumpstart on some of the best deals on top holiday gifts don't have to wait until November.

Walmart will offer some of its hottest deals of the season with its first Walmart holiday deals event, October 8th through 13th. What a coincidence, uh, with deep savings across electronics, home fashion, toys, and more both. Owned and Walmart marketplace assortments. Um, and beginning on October 8th at 12 AM Eastern on walmart.

com and on the app, Walmart plus members will also get exclusive early access to shop the most wanted deals 12 hours earlier than anyone else. That's not all Chris. There's more. I feel like this is like, I feel like I'm reading the Walmart press release right now. Like when I put this together, this is the longest read ever, but it's all important information.

It is important information. Um, there's more. And this one I think is most important. Walmart is also offering its inflation free Thanksgiving holiday meals weeks earlier this year to give customers even more opportunity to save Walmart's holiday meal offering serves up to 10 people and includes 28 customer favorites.

Everything from Turkey, Under 1 a pound and trimmings to dessert for an incredible value of less than 7 per person, which is unbelievable in my mind. Uh, but Chris, what do you think? How significant is it that Walmart is kicking out the holidays in just two weeks from today? I know that's nuts. I mean, was it October 8th?

Yeah. That article you wrote. Yeah. I remember. Yeah. Which was seven years ago. We said this was going to happen, but second, and I think this is the more important aspect of this story, despite how fun it is to take a victory lap. The press release again, to me highlights what is becoming a key theme on this show every week.

And that is how is extending its reach primarily through digital. So for example, you have advanced deals for Walmart plus members. You have one click buying on Thanksgiving meals. And what you didn't talk about in the press release, because we had to edit some of the things out is that we did, this will also be the, yeah, right.

I know I did believe it or not. This is also the first holiday season where Walmart will have early morning and express delivery available and in its arsenal. So I'm going to make a prediction here. And I'm going to go out on a limb. And I'm going to say this is going to be Walmart's best holiday season ever.

Walmart's caught lightning in a bottle. And again, it's because of their digital strategy. Yes. Yeah. That's holiday season ever going out on a limb. Okay. I can't wait to see, I mean, I don't disagree with you. I think everything that you said makes sense. Of course, it makes sense that they're going to match up with prime days in October and that they're kicking this off on the same day, but you know, Chris, for me, I think what really.

Stole the show in this announcement for me is that. It gets going back to the fact that Walmart's can, uh, stealing more of the consumer's grocery basket. I think they are in a much stronger position here with Amazon. And so these deals that they're offering this inflation free Thanksgiving, I think is a really smart pivot for them or, or not pivot, but like focus area for them.

Because I think when you, when you look at needs, okay, what do consumers still looking at? You know, inflation being an issue, what do you have to do? Yeah, they have to get food. Right. And so you're driving customers with digital, more digital offerings, especially on food. And then I think you start to go to other needs that happen.

Like once I'm getting my Thanksgiving meals there, well, I need to start getting winter clothes and boots and things for my kids if I live in a cold state. So now I'm looking at other needs. At Walmart, where I'm also getting these early advanced deals. And then I think you start to get to some of those other things that are more the want States or the gifting opportunities, you know, scoop the new products from scoop that they've been doing, that they launched at New York fashion week, I might see a deal on toys or things like that.

And the list goes on and then you're captured in this Walmart universe. And I feel like, you know, what. At that point, what do you need Amazon for? So that's, that's to me, like they're getting you with those needs and then they're going to start to bring you into the wants. And next thing you know, your, your full holiday basket is at Walmart.

Yeah, it's a great point. Grocery is always the trip driver. And by the way, segue, did you see some of the promotional videos for that, that Walmart fashion, uh, event that they had? I mean, the first thing I, did you think the first, this is what I thought of first, I was like, Hey, uh, uh, Walmart target called, they want their cash back.

I was like, Oh my God, like, look at this. And that's, that's kind of a subtle point too is I think the marketing team at Walmart is doing a bang up job too. And so I'm really anxious to see what they do for the holiday season as well. Yeah. Yeah. Some of the teasers we've already seen are leaps and bounds ahead and definitely, I mean, back to school was a good kind of, um, Uh, like vision of that, just what they did, what Walmart did versus what target did, and now holiday is going to be even more banger for sure.

Wow. Okay, so cool. So we're out on a limb, at least one of us is on that one. All right. Headline number two, Amazon has unveiled a new shark tank style show that gives its winners top building on Amazon. There's a lot to read here too, folks. According to the wall street journal, the e commerce giant plans to introduce a new competition show next month in which entrepreneurs pitch their products to a studio audience, as well as to judges, including Amazon executives and celebrities like goop co founder Gwyneth Paltrow and designer Christian Siriano.

S. ad sales. The company decided to use Amazon executives as judges to give the audience a better sense of how it works with smaller retailers, according to Lauren Anderson, head of brand and content innovation for Amazon's MGM studios. In each episode of the show, Ann, Which is scheduled to debut on October 30th and is hosted by comedian J.

B. Smoove of Curb Your Enthusiasm fame. One of the greatest shows of all time. Entrepreneurs will have 90 seconds to pitch their invention to a studio audience and the audience then votes on whether the product should go to the judges. And yes, do you think Amazon's I'm done? Do you think Amazon's new buy it now show is must see TV?

Oh my God. Yes. I love it so much. You do. Interesting. I was a huge, huge fan. If you'll remember of making the cut, the fashion show, the, like the, um, the project runway ask fashion show where they had like Amazon, um, merchants who would like put the, the, um, Apparel right on the platform right after the show was done.

Like I loved that show. I love that. That didn't work very well, right? It didn't. No. And so I, but, but I think like you look at one, Amazon has a platform with prime video to get this out and just like, they don't have to leave Amazon to like make this happen. I think the other benefit is that, you know, It's, it's another thing that, that Amazon can offer sellers on the platform right now, that no other retailer can offer on their marketplace.

Like Walmart can't really do this. Um, at least yet. Um, so I think this is definitely worth the experiment. Now, to your earlier point, like making the cut did not work because A lot of fans like me got disappointed because I wanted to buy the stuff and it, it was just not ready for, for prime, right, right, right, right.

There was a major issue with, you know, products already being sold out or like very limited quantities, the quality of the products, because they were trying to manufacture them so quickly. Um, but I, so I think the biggest thing is here, like, How many up and coming brands that are going to participate that are ready for that kind of volume for that kind of attention.

Um, and if they can't do that, they can't pay this off. And unfortunately, I think this could see the same fate as making the cut, but I I'm hopeful that they learn from that and they're moving forward. But are you, are you Chris going to make this must see TV? You know, I, I'm on the side of, I don't think this is gonna work, honestly.

Oh, why, why I, well, here's what I like and here's what I don't like about it. Okay. Um, I like the angle of this is how our buyers review products, our Amazon buyers review products. Okay. Although. Although when I say that, I take that with a grain of salt because from my understanding, Amazon pretty much takes everything.

So I'm not really certain how much insight anyone's gonna get into how the sausage is actually made true. And gle anything from that, you know? True. Um, the questions that they would likely ask are to be more like, why are you ready to sell on Amazon? Which is pretty much how they vet their, their products assortments now.

So like, sure. So I'm curious what. What added value there's going to be there. The celebrity angle doesn't really get me all that much. Like you're not excited for Gwennie to goopy Gwennie to come on here and tell you what great product you have. Yeah. And then it's hard to do that over and over again too.

And then you get the B list celebrities do. I don't know. But anyway, but, but the whole thing leads me to the point that I don't like about it, which is the whole intent of the show is so blatantly obvious that it's basically an infomercial. For people selling on Amazon or want to sell on Amazon. So will people keep coming back for that infomercial?

Yes. I maybe, I don't know, but people watch live video all the time right now. Like it's. Yes, I think that Amazon's tried the live video thing that hasn't worked either. I mean, to a degree, but so like, my, my point is just like, they're pitching it as like Shark Tank style, but people call, I call the reason I come back to Shark Tank.

I don't want to say people in general, but the reason I think that people come back to Shark Tank is because you learn something. You learn something by watching how the entrepreneurs interact. with the judges and the questions the judges are asking. You're not coming to the show to be sold something.

Um, which I'm curious to, and maybe we close this out on this, but I'm curious too, as you were watching that, making the cut, did you also learn something about the product? And that was also what you found interesting about the show. So that's where I'm, I think you've got to put an educational angle in here.

If it's just an infomercial, I don't think it's going to I think that's for you. I, I think it's entertainment. Like I w I watch shark tank for the entertainment. Uh, like I'm not really paying attention to like the percentage of the deals that Mark Cuban's offering somebody. Like, I don't really care that much.

I, I think it like the people presenting and like busting out of like, you know, windows and stuff like that to talk about my product, like that's charisma, the judges, all that. Yeah. I mean, I think there there's value. There's, there's something for everybody. And I think that you will, I assume. I assume that you will also learn, and that could be very valuable for somebody considering to put their, considering putting their product on Amazon is you will kind of learn from watching this programming, like, okay, what do I need to be thinking of how much of a cut is, does Amazon take, like, what is the process?

Do I have to store in an Amazon facility? Like. I imagine that some of those questions will come up, but I mean, time will tell. I have no idea. That's just me assuming that that's going to be part of the, yeah, that's interesting too. Like how much does Amazon let, uh, America under the covers of how it operates too.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. My hunch is not at all, but, um, we'll see. You never know. You never know. Right. Um, all right. Let's go to headline number three, Chris. Walmart will now let you shop with friends from your home. I know you're waiting with bated breath for this one. Um, according to fast company, Walmart shoppers can now get advice from friends on new clothes they're considering without ever setting foot in the store or even trying anything on.

Or becoming a Walmart, uh, logged in member. I will also note, um, a new website feature called shop with friends currently in beta lets users choose from a set of models to find one that looks like them, then assembles a virtual fitting room of outfits. They're potentially interested in. Then they can see how the outfits look on their chosen model and generate a link to their fitting room to share by text, email, or social media.

Letting friends weigh in on which outfits they should get. Once they've assembled their virtual fitting rooms, they can share the link through any messaging or social tool they choose. If they're on a desktop or laptop, the Walmart website will generate a QR code. They can scan making it easier to share through whatever apps they have on their phones.

Friends who get access to the link can provide their name and virtually like as many of the outfits in the virtual fitting room as they wish. For their shopping buddy to see users deliberately don't need to install any Walmart apps to create fitting rooms. And they don't need to create Walmart accounts in order to vote.

Finally, in order to keep the experience feeling positive, users can only upvote outfits. There's no way to give negative votes. Or more detailed comments, though users could of course text their friends separately about particular outfits. Future versions may have more feedback options, but the company wants to make sure it can avoid negative trolling, especially since users may share their fitting rooms with large audiences on social media.

Chris, are you buying or selling Walmart's new shop with friends feature? Yeah, I, I think I'm buying this one, Ann. I, I, I, I kind of like it. You don't like it, huh? I I want to hear your, your logic though. Like I could be wrong. Well, I'm buying the testing of it. A hundred percent. I'm buying the test of it because I think it's this, you know, we talk about there's good experiments and there's bad experiments, right?

I think this is a smart experiment. Um, because, well, for one thing, I was amazed at how much the article talked about the user experience design and the flow of the experience Oh yeah. Unprecedented for an article about a technology innovation, honestly. So I think that's 'cause that this is, that's the best part of this is the UX is really nicely created.

But I mean, it seems like it's really well thought out for sure. So it tells me that Walmart's giving this whole thing a lot of thought both now, but also in the longer term. See that's the other thing too. It's a smart experiment. 'cause you're gonna learn here, not just for today, does it work today? But also what could work down the road in the future, especially as more sure.

Virtual fit tech and AI tech comes into play in this conversation. So the big question for me is always the same, right? And you've heard me say it a long time. You probably sick of me saying it's like, it's great, but how do you get traffic to it? How do you get people to use it? And the other thing too, is the test could actually just be a little too early.

And so the question will become how much does Walmart, how Walmart's leadership. Give to evaluate it, but I don't know. You're you're, you're much more in this market than I am. So like, yeah, it sounds like you're negative on this one, but why so? Um, cause I don't see the value of it. Like this to me feels like tech for tech sake.

I get your point. And I, and I do give Walmart an A for effort in like the UX is great. You know, this is putting a new product in front of consumers and they will learn things from it indefinitely. So that's fine. But. I just, I feel like if I like something, I think about my experience right now. So just me as a consumer, if I see a product that I like, I'm just texting it to a friend and sent, and we're having a conversation back and forth about it again, to your point.

I don't know that I'm going to Walmart to do this. And the second point, Walmart, that was going to be my next question. Like Walmart keeps honing in on this, like, find a model that looks like me. Like, no, who cares at that point? Like, that's such a waste. I think of that tool. I mean, I know they made this a big investment in Z kit.

So I know that they're trying to figure out other alternate use cases. So I understand it. I just, I don't think that's have any value. Um, and so I, you know, the point that I did. Pull out of this is that the Walmart executive talking about this said that her daughter, she really noticed that her daughter is shopping in this way.

And so I think that that's something that, you know, I'm just old. So maybe this is how the, the kids are. The next generation of shopper is really preferring to shop where they're on the platform and on Walmart and sending things. I just, I don't think that that makes sense. And then the last thing I'll say.

I don't like that. You can't thumbs down something like that. Seems ridiculous too. I get you're sharing it with a lot of people, but like, isn't that the whole point for me to like, give you honest feedback. Like my girlfriend, Danielle just sent me a pair of boots and it was like, am I too old to wear these thumbs up thumbs down?

Like we, I mean, you, you want all the feedback. And I don't think that. Yeah. You know, starting this journey on Walmart, having to send it through a Walmart platform. Like it also isn't getting me to sign up for a Walmart, like login or anything. So Walmart's not getting any information from me. It just, it seems like the wrong way to approach this, but.

Oh, interesting. Interesting. Um, so my last, my final question for you though, is. Is if, if this was being done, like you just shot a video of Abercrombie and how much you love all the new clothes there. Like if Abercrombie was doing this, would that change your opinion of it? No. Cause I, I think all the same things apply.

Like I'm, I send, I send a link to the pair of jeans on the model to my friends, like the, you know, or the pants that I love from there. Like, I'm not putting it on a model that looks slightly more like me is not going to have any impact. I don't think so. I'm just not a fan. Yeah, no, I'm not talking about that.

I'm talking more just like the, the sending it to your friends so they can upvote it or, you know, not download it, but upvote it. No, I've searched the product and I've sent it to them. Like, I don't need, I don't need to Abercrombie involved in this necessarily outside of the product link. Like you don't need them to facilitate the conversation.

I'm not going to Abercrombie. So you can just put your wardrobe choices on social and have the entire world upvote, whatever they think you should buy. No, no, I have Google for that. I have my phone. I have messages like they're all of the things already exist and I'm much more it's much simpler for me to get to the that end goal than to have to go through Walmart or Abercrombie or any of these other retailers to do that.

All right. Okay, so let's, let's segue here then from, uh, AI or not AI, but, uh, new, uh, fashion innovations to the cloud. And so let's bring Scott from AWS onto this podcast. Joining us now for five insightful minutes is Scott Langdock. Scott is the global head of all grocery chain drug and convenience retail strategy at Amazon web services.

Scott, what is taking place in the grocery drug and convenience space right now in terms of. What is also top of mind for retailers and how do their concerns pertain to the cloud? I'd say, you know, kind of top of the list, uh, for what's, you know, a challenge for grocery and fast moving consumer good retailers is changing consumer behaviors.

I mean, that hasn't necessarily been a new, uh, concern, but I think, uh, you know, both pre and post COVID, you know, buying patterns have changed, demographics are shifting. And so trying, uh, to stay ahead of that, trying to adapt. selling models, channel strategies, product availability, product assortment, you know, to match those changing buying behaviors is, has really been a challenge.

And while retailers have been spending a lot of energy, uh, both operationally and technically on customer facing and data driven projects, uh, what we've seen over the last 18 to 24 months is a real focus on cost reduction. Um, and so a lot more emphasis on. areas of the business where they want to drive cost out things like loss prevention, labor optimization, um, you know, reducing the cost of fulfilling online orders.

So while there's still the focus on a number of those, uh, those revenue generating projects, that cost reduction focus has been kind of key, uh, of late. Um, in terms of the cloud, I think retailers are realizing just the cost advantages of shifting a number of their workloads to the cloud, and now they're kind of looking for those additional solution capabilities that will, you know, drive both.

efficiency and top line performance. So Scott, you bring up a really important point because within the drug and grocery and convenience segment, we know that the margins are thinner than any other industry. So as retailers are thinking about AI investments that are really going to drive, you know, those cost reductions that are going to boost profitability, like you were talking about, what factors do they need to consider?

Margins are thinner, but one of the things that we're always, uh, intrigued to see is a really measurable wedge between segment leaders and segment followers, um, driven by the fact that we see leaders investing in both top line innovations, those that help to drive top line revenue, drop, drive, top line growth and a focus on those optimization and cost reduction, you know, bottom line initiatives.

Um, examples of like the top line initiatives we're seeing a lot of focus on is in the area of like using demand forecasting to drive proper pricing recommendations to see that same demand forecast and customer intelligence drive a new level of personalization in terms of the, um, the offers being generated to customers.

Uh, we have a large grocery customer that in implementing that hyper personalization. saw 98 percent growth in market basket size, some overall growth of two and a half times in offer related revenue. While at the same time, the offers were intriguing enough to increase the conversion, meaning those opened and reacted to offers well over a hundred percent.

So we've, you know, when you see those kinds of benefits, that really helps to improve margins from both the top line and the bottom line perspective. Before we let you go, Scott, I want to take a longer term view. I want to get your opinion on, on the longterm. So as we consider that, what would you suggest retailers need to take action on today to drive more value in the future?

In support of a lot of the innovation initiatives that I talked about earlier on the top line and the bottom line, there's still that need to focus on, um, the, the infrastructure, right? Making sure that you've got the proper level of maturity in your data, your product data, your customer data, your operational data.

Because that's the information and insight that's going to be necessary to drive the kind of efficient and accurate insights that come out of these AI driven applications. So a focus on the infrastructure is important. Um, another area is when you're building out new capabilities like personalization.

Asking yourself the question, am I making investments that truly influence purchase behavior? Am I helping drive a customer's trip frequency, their basket size? You know, those kind of important metrics that we all know are related to the fact that they're responding to kind of the offers and engagements that a customer is making.

Um, And and one of that's one of the big areas that we see generative AI having an opportunity to help with, um, at at Amazon Web Services. One of our approaches is to give a wide variety of large language models to customers so that they can choose. the right LLM for the right use case. We embed kind of the appropriate guardrails for security and privacy into the building of those applications.

So that's something that we want to continue to contribute to as these retailers are identifying the critical generative AI use cases that they have. And then lastly, um, with all of this new insight and all of these new business signals, how does it, how do we make sure that that retailer is tying together That analysis with the required action, what levels of improvement and automation are they doing to ensure that when they get a business signal that that business signal is reacted to measured and responded to in the most agile way possible, because ultimately, those retailers who can stay agile and stay respondent to the different market market signals and customer signals, I think, are going to be the ones that win in this, uh, in this hyper competitive world.

Wow. Great stuff. Thank you, Scott.

Headline number four, Amazon has launched an AI powered video ad generator ahead of the holidays. According to retail dive, Amazon unveiled a new solution that uses generative artificial intelligence to convert product images into video ads. The video generator currently in beta is part of Amazon's sponsored brands, campaign suite.

And available to add partners at no additional cost. Jelle Frares. Did you like that, Ann? Those are pretty good friends for now. Jelle Frares. How do you even say G E L L E? Is that how you say that name, Jelle? I have no idea. I'm just going with it. Because it sounds right. Like Jelle with Jeuge in front of it?

Jelle Frares. But anyway, Jelfrares, for those that are not familiar, is a French skincare company that has reportedly been testing the offering as it prepares for the Black Friday rush. To use the video generator, a retailer on the sponsored brand's platform can submit their product page and go to a drop down menu selecting, quote, choose an AI generated video, end quote.

The tool will then show several video options to choose from that the brand can edit to their liking in a demo video. A lavender scented lotion is fed through the video generator, creating ads that show sprawling fields of flower. For example, in that demo video, the user then adds additional copy to highlight the product's qualities.

And yeah, how long do you give it until Amazon's new ad AI ad generator moves out of its beta phase? Oh my God. I think this thing is going to fly off the shelves. I think it's going to be, yeah, I think it's going to explode. I mean, every. Every person selling product on Amazon has product images. And with this, every person selling product on Amazon now has product videos.

It's as simple as that. I mean, they can share that on more platforms. They have more, you know, social media content. It'll turn up on more search engines. Like everything is, is plused up now for every single person who has this capability and ultimately that. Results in, you know, more exposure for that brand, more exposure for Amazon.

And I think a willingness back to what we were talking about earlier, like gives, gives sellers a willingness to pay Amazon a cut of sales for something because they're getting this in return. They're getting more content for their brand and they don't have to do a thing or lift a finger. So. I think it's going to explode.

How about you? Demo video is pretty cool. So you're thinking Gilles Frere is onto something. That's what you're saying. Oh yeah. They're, they're a smart early adopter. Yes. Yeah, for sure. I mean, yes, there's going to be the same thing with like the image generators or the background generator that they created with, for the still images a few months ago, like there's still going to be things you're going to have to double check or whatever, but I mean, you're, you're pressing a button and now you've got double the content.

Triple or quadruple the content. Like it's just, it's amazing. That's a great point. This might be the core of the show, but double checking is always faster than creating it yourself too. Yes. You know, I mean, you know, a hundred percent it is. So yeah, I mean, I agree. I, I, I'm just amazed at how quickly and easily tools like these are now coming to market.

I mean, if you're in the content game, yeah, no, for sure. I loved it. I just, it's so fun, but like, you know, if you're in the content game, which digital commerce is clearly a content game, people are just going to want tools like this. I mean, I absolutely love it for that reason. And I think the small and medium sized brands, which from your experience, you know, really well, They don't have the budgets for photo shoots to, to, to juj up, juj up their content in this way.

So this makes a ton of sense. And it also finally, you know, I'd say it also reminds me or highlights the podcast we did with avatar at the beginning of summer, where if you haven't watched that, I encourage or listen to it. I encourage people to go back. And check it out because this is just one step in this evolution.

Like you'll, you'll listen to that podcast. You go, Oh my God, things are going to change even more rapidly than this headline just described too. Yeah. Especially, I think, you know, as we're, as we're looking at the, the larger enterprise brands and how they're using avatar to kind of take this and really level it up and, you know, Save so much money.

I mean, that's the big thing. And that was obviously the big part of this press release from Amazon was like, you know, you don't have a hundred thousand or 150, 000 to create this video. It, this, this takes less time, less money. Like all of the things are better for that Amazon flywheel. Like you're the product, the sellers are doing better.

Amazon's doing better. It just keeps going and going and going. So yeah, it's, it's huge. All right, let's get to headline number five, Chris. Uh, according to Supermarket news, Sam's club and Walmart are merging their supply chain teams. Uh, Sam's clubs, corporate supply chain team plans to merge with the supply chain team, a parent company, Walmart, according to a memo that was obtained by business insider, David Gugina, head of supply chain operations at Walmart, who we also got to interview at NRF last year, uh, wrote the memo, which was sent to the Sam's club supply chain team in the note.

Gugina expressed his excitement for the collaborations. Stating that it brought together a quote, supply chain that is future ready to serve both Sam's club and Walmart for the long term end quote. Additionally, a Sam's club spokesperson told business insider that the merger will give employees seamless access to Walmart's enterprise resources.

And we'll provide a clear path within the company. No jobs are expected to be lost in this transition as well. We might point out, um, Chris, this is also our A& M put you on the spot question for the week. Okay. Are you ready for this? I am man. Okay. Of course. I knew this quote was going to come back to haunt me.

They're quoting me from a couple of weeks ago when I made the very brilliant remark about no duh. Um, they want to know a couple of weeks ago when the CRG colleagues were on with us. And I said that this falls into the no duh category. What was that in reference to? I don't remember. It was, it was Simon.

Um, Oh, the Simon properties thing. Simon properties, like a mall having a marketplace, like no duh. That makes sense. So they want to know, does this fall into the Noda category for Walmart and Sam's, or is there something more complicated to consider for this union? Chris, what do you think? Oh, that's wow.

That's really interesting. Um, I think. I think to say it's a no duh, does it a disservice? Uh, for the most part, I think when, I think when you step back from most things in disservice, no duh. Well, yeah. Yeah. From a pundit commentary standpoint. Yes. A hundred percent. Not the most articulate comment, but no, but anyway, but Hey, that's our show.

And we're not, we're not always big on articulation. Um, both of us. So, but, so I think it does it a little bit disservice, but, um, but with that Said. You could look at it, you could look at it, you can stop, step back, 30, 000 feet, you're like, yeah, this is just really smart to do. It's kind of a no doubt thing.

But at the end of the day, It's probably pretty complicated. And then you also have to ask Sam's club has been around for 30 years or at give or take, why hasn't it happened? If it's a no duh, right? So it takes, it takes some vision and leadership to make something like this happen, because quite honestly, the operations are different.

And the article for those listening is also what prompted John Furner, who is then the CEO of Sam's club to request a meeting with us. We didn't request it with Tim Fox. He wanted to meet with us and he gave us 30 minutes of his time to talk about the insights that we presented in that article. And so in it, for those of you who may not have read it, I posited that Sam's Club and Walmart would eventually use their supply chains together.

Because really, why not? You know, it is kind of a no duh. If I'm shopping at Sam's or Walmart, why wouldn't I also want access to bulk buys or single item purchases, purchase options online, right? It just makes sense. It's a state of the world too. Here's the other point that's important. It's a state of the world too, that only Walmart can do because only Walmart has these two things under its stable, but it takes out working the logistics.

Behind the scenes to make it happen on the back end and make it happen. But long term the organizational structure sets up this incredible point of differentiation. And also I would add Walmart now has the digital tools on the front end, particularly via Walmart plus and the very strong scanning go usage at Sam's club.

At the front end to compliment it. So say you're in sales club, you find something you don't want, you can have it shipped in an, you can have it shipped in an each if you want. You don't have to buy it in bulk too, right? That is absolutely brilliant. And that's where I think this is going. So sorry, I took some time there, but, but I just really love this story.

Yeah. No, I, I think that you, all the points that you outlined are incredibly smart. I mean, at the end of the day, this results in customers of both Sam's club and Walmart saving more money and living better. And that's the main goal here for this entire organization. Um, the only other thing that I'm, I'm curious about from this is will, will this also help, uh, Sam's club and Walmart learn throughout this process?

Things that can be shared then with other retailers down the road via like Walmart commerce technologies. Like what do they learn about combining some of these services or bringing in bulk ordering and, you know, each is ordering, like how do, how can they potentially use that as fuel down the road to, you know, boost that Walmart commerce technologies business that they've been really, um, promoting and talking about and working with retailers, especially over in Europe, um, to help them kind of bolster.

I don't know if that's something that. Is even in the roadmap yet, but I think they'll, they'll be learning so much, um, from one, how to set this up the 30 years that it's taken to get that those supply chain channels merge, but then also to figure out like how they can, they can use that, what they've learned and, and really make things better for customers all over the world.

Yeah. It's a great point. You know, at the end of the day too, you know, Digital success comes from great back end execution. It's what, it's what enables you to do the flexible things you want to do on the front end side of the experience. And, uh, yeah, I thought your point too is like, it's about. Continue to help people save money and live better.

And hopefully they can find some cost efficiencies here and plow that money back into their continued approach to innovation. So, so does Walmart win the weekend? Who wins the week? Cause you kind of poo pooed, you kind of poo pooed the shop with friends and went all in on the, the buy it now thing. So who wins the week?

I mean, we did do three Walmart stories versus two Amazon stories, too, but we had an Amazon five insightful minutes. Yes we did. You're right. So it was a fair balance. It's a fair balance and equitable show this weekend. I'm going to give it to Walmart. Yeah. I think Walmart wins because of the supply chain thing, the holiday.

Yeah. I think I, I, Walmart by a narrow, narrow lead. But yes, I think we'll continue to, we'll continue to watch these two. We need to have like a scoreboard up or like a bracket. We need brackets for this. I need another bracket. This week was like Walmart 1A, Walmart 1A, Amazon 1B, rest of retail. Yeah, exactly.

Come on folks. Give us some headlines to talk about. My God. Oh my God. All right. Uh, let's get to the lightning round. Chris question. Number one comes to you. Uh, MSP airport, our hometown airport was named travel and leisure's number one airport in the country. What would you say is the best thing about MSP airport?

Oh my God. There's so many things to choose from. I think, I think there's two things that come to mind. Well, number one is wayfinding. That is the most easy airport to navigate in the United States. 100%. And then secondly, and which, you know, is important to me, the bathrooms, the bat, they have the Minneapolis Airports has the cleanest bathrooms in the country, in my opinion.

Yes, they are very, very well maintained. Also the new Delta sky lounge is amazing. But I was sitting outside is really nice. I like that a lot. Okay. Yes. All right. Question number two and frozen meal delivery service. Yellow formerly known as Schwann's will be permanently parking. It's yellow trucks this fall.

The company announced on Monday, what is the best thing you remember you or your family ever purchasing from Schwann's? We never bought from Schwann's. It was too rich for, um, for our blood. We just, we, we were not a Schwann's family, but our neighbors did get it. And they always had those orange push pops, you know, like in the tube, those frozen, like dessert treat things.

I think it's like orange sherbet or something. And those were always so delicious. I would steal like three of them and bring them over to my home. I'm sure our neighbors love that. Yeah, right. Um, A little theft. Who doesn't want a little theft? No big deal. And also, Anne, I have a question for you. Would you call this the Schwan's song?

It's a, it's the Schwann song. Yep. It definitely is. Schwann song headline. Good job. Yes. Um, all right, Chris, question number three this weekend, the power went out multiple times in one of our favorite local grocery stores, Jerry's foods. As someone who's managed target stores, when, and if the power goes out, what are the first food items that you're saving or getting on generator power?

Like, is this a supermarket sweep thing where you're like grabbing the hams from the freezer or something? Get them in a basket and get them out somewhere. Like what happens? God, if memory serves, like you got like a 20 or 30 minute grace period where you're just hoping the power comes back on. Yeah. Like you can't, you can't like leave the stuff in the freezers for very long.

And so, yes, you're, you're prepping the coolers in the freezers. If you got to take action, it sucks when this happens, it's just totally awful. And you hope your generator is working too. Um, yeah, it happened to Target recently when I was, when I was there too. It was just, I've been having a lot of power outages here in the Minneapolis area.

All right. Pizza hut has launched. Rez za maze, which is spelled R E Z R E S Z A M E S, Rez za maze, trying to get pizza into resumes. It's a little bit of a stretch, but it's a new offering aimed at helping professionals stand out in today's competitive New York City job market by delivering their resumes to prospective employers in a way that is sure to turn heads via Pizza Hut's iconic pizza boxes.

Were you, and my question for you is, Were you to send your resume to a prospective employer via a pizza box, who would be top of your list and what type of pizza would you send to them? I would send it to the team at Amazon for this buy it now show. And I would want to be one of the judges on there. And I would just say, I am the one for your one pizza team.

And I would just send them a straight up pizza. Like you only need one person for this one pizza team. And it's me. Pick me as a judge. But would it be cheese, pepperoni, throw some anchovies on there? Like what would you do? Oh, I don't know. I guess I do. I do my favorite pizza right now, which is pepperoni, jalapeno, and hot honey.

Oh, yeah. Nice. I'm all in on that. I'm always in on anything with jalapenos. Gotta love that. What kind of pizza would you send? What kind of pizza would I send? Oh, yeah. If I was trying to get that. Who would you send your pizza to? Oh, who? I didn't, I didn't think about my own answer to this, Ann. Oh my god. Uh, what was it?

I, I don't know. I think, you know, maybe because we're local, I'd send it to Target and be like, do your own show and let's, let us be the judges, you know? That would be my thing, you know? Give him a big ol slice of some pepperoni. All right, happy birthday today to Catherine Zeta Jones, Michael Douglas, end of the star God, I love doing this.

End of the star of the Corvette Summer. To the star of Corvette Summer. Wait, they have the same birthday? Michael Zeta Jones and Yeah, they do! Catherine Zeta Jones and Michael Douglas? Yeah, I do. Yeah. I feel like this has happened on the show before. There's a big birthday date, Will Smith's birthday today too, but you know, but I had to sing off the star of Corvette Summer.

You might know him for his lesser known movie, Star Wars, Mark Hamill. And remember, if you can only read or listen to one retail blog in the business, make it Omniton, the only retail media outlet run by two former executives from a current top 10 US retailer. Our Fast Five podcast is the quickest, fastest rundown of all the week's top news, and you can tell we have a ton of fun doing it.

And our daily newsletter, the Retail Daily Minute, tells you all you need to know each day to stay on top of your game as a retail executive, and also regularly features special content that is exclusive to us, and that Anne and I take a heck of a lot of pride in doing just for you. Thanks as always for listening in.

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