retail therapy
Here’s what’s killing malls
Long before Amazon and internet retail, malls were already in trouble thanks to competition from big box stores. | learn more
Category: retail therapy
retail therapy
Brandless shuts down operations
The best-funded online retailer that aimed to cut out brand premiums and sell everything direct-to-consumer has shut down. They had raised $290 million, mostly from SoftBank, but couldn’t get the economics of the business to work. Some of the investment […]
retail therapy
Important attributes of modern consumer brands
From True Ventures, investors in Blue Bottle Coffee, Fitbit, Madison Reed, Peloton, and Ring. “From these experiences, we’ve developed a list of attributes they embody that we find essential when evaluating investment opportunities in next-generation brands and products.” | learn more
retail therapy
Startups raising a bunch of money to take on packing waste
It’s hard not to pay attention to, and feel a bit bad about, product packing these days. “There are at least seven recently-funded startups in the eco-packing space that have individually raised $20 million or more, per Crunchbase data. We […]
retail therapy
Walmart’s secret weapon to fight off Amazon: the supercenter
“Walmart is betting on a future where its giant stores will quickly get groceries to your door, replace the doctor’s office and rent out computing power to passing drones and autonomous cars.” | learn more
retail therapy
What’s Amazon’s market share?
Is it 35% or 5%? “Amazon is a big company, but what does that mean? How big is ‘big’? What does ‘dominant’ or ‘scale’ or ‘huge’ mean when US retail is $6 trillion every year?” Written by VC Ben Evans. | learn […]
retail therapy
The man who makes Amazon logistics happen
“Dave Clark has twin challenges: ensuring packages arrive on time and keeping workers safe.” He’s also the guy who fired FedEx. | learn more
retail therapy
Let the holiday resales begin
From Deloitte: “With the resale market growing 21x faster than the retail apparel market in the past three years, we wondered if holiday shoppers would be willing to gift a used item. We found that just over a quarter (27 […]
retail therapy
A list of 81 bankruptcies (so far) in the retail apocalypse
The list includes all the big ones since 2015, including commentary. Turns out high debt + online competition + lack of tech investment is a bad recipe for solvency. | learn more
retail therapy
How Amazon has transformed the Hasidic economy
“Amazon has become a lucrative place to do business for many Hasidic Jews, offering anonymity to a largely insular community and allowing women to work from home.” | learn more