Join us at Glossie's Beauty and Wellness Summit from November 11th through 13th in Napa, California. Influential beauty and wellness leaders will meet to discuss strategies and pain points, discover innovative tech, and ultimately make valuable business connections through one-on-ones and casual networking. For a limited time, we're offering $200 off with promo code GBS24, No Spaces. Again, that's GBS24 with No Spaces. Go to glossy.co/beautysummit for more information and to secure your past today. Hello, and welcome back to the Glossy Weekend Review Podcast. I'm your host, senior fashion reporter Danny Pirese, and I'm here with our editor-in-chief, Jill Manoff. Hello, Jill. Hello, what good morning? Good morning. I'm glad to be back after I had a long hiatus because I was off getting married, but I am back. Thank you so much, Jill and Zophia, for holding down the fort here while I was gone. I was going to be like, "He is a mister when you're on Mrs." Anyway, you've always been a mister of congrats, though. We're happy to have you back. I am now a husband. Yes. The podcast is going to be totally different now that I'm married now. But this week, we have a couple of fun things to discuss. First, we're going to look at Nordstrom's earnings. There was a bunch of earnings this week, but I particularly wanted to talk about Nordstrom's just because of the ongoing story we talked about. Like department stores and luxury retail and all the stuff going on there. So we'll look at how Nordstrom fared and what that says about that whole sector. Next, we will talk about Calvin Klein going back to the Jeremy Allen Whitewell with another very viral, very thirsty campaign that just came out. And finally, we will talk about Walmart making the unexpected move of getting into resale and specifically pre-owned watches, which I think is kind of an interesting thing to buy on walmart.com. I don't know if I would do it, but we'll talk about that move. But let's start talking about Nordstrom. So, like I said, on Tuesday, Nordstrom reported earnings. I was very keen to listen in because we've talked a lot about luxury retail and big department stores and kind of like all the changes happening there, especially with Sax Fifth Avenue and Marcus merging. It's just like that whole world is kind of in an interesting spot. Luxury retail is down generally and there's been a lot of pressure on these department stores. Nordstrom's earnings actually were pretty good though. They went past analysts expectations. Revenue was up to almost 4 billion from around 3.7 billion a year ago. And the profits were also up. They had a loss of 67 million in the first half of 2023 and now a profit of 83 million in the first half of 2024. It's not like the most stunning results ever, but I think given some of the issues that the sector has been having, I thought it was interesting and I thought we should talk about it. I have some thoughts, but Joe, why don't you go first? What do you make of Nordstrom's kind of performance? I mean, I liked it. Go Nordstrom. The investors liked it. There was a nice boost in stock after that, but yeah, it just shows the power of a diversified business model because Nordstrom, the mainline store, also saw an increase in sales, but the majority of the boost came from Nordstrom Rack, which is a competitor of TJX and all of those off-price brands at a time when the consumer is really budgeting or watching inflation hit everybody. So that's the majority of what I think, really. They opened 11 new Nordstrom Rack locations this year. I think there will be 23, 20-something open by the end of the year. And great to see the other categories that are proving popular, again, no surprise, women's apparel, activewear, beauty, kids. Interesting that beauty was one of them. Nordstrom Rack, we did some stories about the beauty assortment where they really take a different approach than other off-price retailers, and they put a lot of full-price beauty brands and products out on the floor, and that's working, it seems. But yeah, it was great to see, and meanwhile, like you said, other department stores are flailing like Macy's and Dillard's recently reported less than stellar results. So this is a bright spot, I would say, in the landscape. Yeah, and I also specifically was thinking of Nordstrom Rack and how I have the exact results here, but full-price Nordstrom sales were up 1% this past quarter, and Rack sales were up 9%, or nearly 9%. So it's a pretty significant split, and I think discount retail in general has been, I just saw, I think women's wear daily had a story about discount retail has been outpacing full-price retail, I think, for most of this year. I just did a story, or I'm working on a story, I should say, right now about kind of luxury pricing and how that's affecting the whole kind of luxury sector, when a lot of brands are focusing on the highest end and their most affluent customers, and like, are we losing something if there's not, if there doesn't continue to be some sort of entry-level way for people who are maybe new to some of these brands to get in there, and I think Nordstrom Rack is one of the things that's doing really well, because of that, it's like one of the ways that somebody can get introduced to some of these brands if they maybe haven't bought it before and maybe can't afford it full-price. So I think that's very valuable, and maybe undervalued sometimes aspect of luxury and retail is like, there should be some way for people to get this stuff at a slightly lower price just to continue creating new customers for them. Heck yeah, for sure. We always come full circle in these conversations, but some similarities to what we're going to talk about on the Walmart side, I think, where an analyst in regard to Walmart talked about basically like, well, they're going where the money is, or they're going where they're seeing traction, and Nordstrom too, proving that they're nimble, they knew the traction with Nordstrom Rack for a while, this has been happening, so opening those additional stores helped, there was a comment in the earnings call that there are more consistent offerings of the brands that shoppers want it most plus more newness and depth in those areas, they're moving, they're listening to the customer, they're looking at the data, and some other changes that they made beyond those Nordstrom Rack stores, they talked about more full-price selling, again, I think that's actually across both companies because we, again, the beauty and other things that, who's to say, I don't know that for sure, and their private labels gaining traction, interesting, there was talk of some inventory data management via some technology, I won't get into the fancy words, but anyway, it's great to see, and they also tried, again, like Walmart, like a marketplace model, they didn't try, they recently introduced, and it brought a ton of new inventory onto their online channel, and yet, it was something was said on the earnings call, it's too soon to tell the impact of that, I think it launched in March, but, again, they're nimble, it's department store, and yet it's evolving, so it's not stuck in that stale model. Yeah, and one important thing you should say about Nordstrom, when I wrote that story a couple weeks ago about Stacks with Avenue, not paying their brands, which they don't do for months at a time, if ever sometimes, I talked to a lot of brands who have had this frustrating experience of not getting paid for their stuff, a lot of them mention it's not just Stacks, a lot of retailers are really slow or late, or they kind of bully you a little bit, and they're like, we'll pay you when we feel like it and stuff, and one thing that came up multiple times is that Nordstrom doesn't do that, several brands told me Nordstrom is great about that, they always pay on time, they're very respectful, and I think that goes a long way in gendering some loyalty, some good vibrations from the brands to sort of continue working with them, and we've talked about how a lot of brands have a business model that's DTC plus Nordstrom, it's like we are only direct except for Nordstrom, and so I think Nordstrom has done a really good job of cultivating relationships with big and small brands and treating them all well and not kind of pushing around the small brands, at least to the degree that maybe some other retailers do, and so I don't know the exact impact on their revenue, but it just from talking to a lot of people, the feeling toward Nordstrom from brands I think is more positive than some other retailers. Yeah, I agree, I was going to mention that too, the direct-to-consumer, next step into retail, they've built some big retail businesses for some of the brands that we talk to all the time, like Bays, Loggage, and some others, you know, they welcomed Glossier early on, so again, nimble and moving, I like it, I have nothing more to say. Me neither, let's move on and talk about Jeremy Allen White, so I wrote it in my notes, Sarah, maybe you've got those. Jeremy Allen White is back and he's wetter than ever. In January, we talked about that very viral Jeremy Allen White Calvin Klein campaign and which he was in his underwear and very extremely muscular, and it kind of took over the world for a few days, obviously like sex sells, we know that, but something about that campaign I think really like touched a nerve in a good way and people were obsessed with it. That was only in January, I felt like it felt like longer ago, Jill, you mentioned that it felt like it was just yesterday, but it was like six or seven months ago, and Calvin Klein now has a new campaign with Jeremy Allen White that's more focused on denim, I think the first campaign was for underwear, and instead of in New York as like the first campaign was, it's like shot in LA, and he's in a pool and he's very wet, and it's just like, I feel like it's having the exact same reaction, like people are obsessed with it, I've seen lots of talk about it, I don't know, what do you, do you think that's a smart move for them to just like make a sequel, basically, like the first campaign was so successful, what do you think? I think so, I think it was good, but yeah, it's different, you're like, he is in a little more clothing jeans, he's got some denim vests, but yeah, those muscles are out there, there is some underwear, there's some socks, but yeah, I mean, looking at the numbers, they, there was some great data whenever the first campaign came out where it said the campaign for the first 48 hours generated over $12 million in media exposure, reached more than 40 million folks on the brand's Instagram, the CEO of PVH talked about, he called it the biggest cut-through campaign in all of the fashion history, so I guess these numbers far exceed any other campaign, I mean, I'll take his word for it, we'll see, but in total, drove earned media value over $74 million, this was so far, actually, in April, and then 134 million engaged brand fans on Instagram, they had 60% more followers compared like year over year because of that campaign, it did a lot for the brand, it got eyes on the brand, it drove engagement, it drove excitement, it was not everyone would maybe say the Calvin Klein campaign, and maybe they would say the Jeremy Ellen White campaign, you talked about like not, there was a lot of branding on it, but I mean, everyone knows that like, tidy widey type of underwear, that's Calvin. True, no, you're right, I was saying the other day that first ad is kind of like, you see it, you're like, wow, that's amazing, what was the ad for again? I don't even remember, I mean, but you're right, it's like that, even just like seeing that photograph, even if you didn't see like the label, you would be like, that looks like a Calvin Klein ad, but I will say the second campaign that just came out does put more emphasis on the clothing, like I feel like it makes me want to buy those jeans more than the first, because actually, especially as a guy, like looking at the first campaign, I was like, it made me not want to buy the underwear because I was like, I'm not going to look that good, whereas the second campaign did make me want to buy the jeans because I was like, I could wear those jeans, you know, so it felt a little bit more like emphasis on the clothing, obviously he was wearing more clothing. And also, so those numbers I think are very valuable because PVH, you know, despite having that amazing campaign, not doing super great in terms of their most recent earnings, they also report earnings this week and their sales were down around 6%. So that's like, not great, you know, it's like they hit the, they broke the emergency Jeremy Allen White glass, they were like, if in case of emergency photograph, Jeremy Allen White shirtless. So yeah, I think a campaign like that can really do a lot for a brand, I guess is what I'm saying. Agree. The contract is with Jeremy, he has worn the brand for several large media events, like when he won the Golden Globe, he was wearing some Calvin and also the recent premiere of the bear. I guess it was at some event he wore the brand again. So it could be a year, it could be longer that they want to work with him. But yeah, it's one take, like they, I know the CEO talked a lot about like tapping into culture and reaching the audience that way. They also have this like large roster of folks are working with now, including Kendall Jenner. They call them like mega talents, their roster of mega talents, which again is nothing new for the brand. But a while ago, if you don't follow our link to newsletter, you should, but I did a story. It was just basically saying like the, the underwear brands are killing it and it was talking about the media impact of the Jeremy Allen White campaign and also at the time and all the time talking about Skims approach to, I would say like they're more so like moving at the speed of culture, like if somebody mentions, call her daddy is a hot podcast and there's like a deal like they'll have Alex Cooper modeling and Megan Fox, whenever the whole questioning the relationship with Courtney Kardashian was happening, like Megan Fox showed up, Sabrina Carpenter, like whatever celebrities hot top of mind, they show up in a Skims campaign, like within the week, which is wild. But um, yeah, those two brands are really doing something right. Yeah, a different take for Calvin, but I think it's the take they've done in the past that has been iconic. We see gap like reverting to their old iconic ways and it's proving effective. I think it's smart right now. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Last thing I want to talk about Walmart, so you alluded to this earlier, Joe, but they have been putting a lot of emphasis on the kind of their marketplace. Um, I think I saw that in the last four straight quarters, I think their marketplace revenue was growing 30% and the most recent thing that they did is that they have started to allow the sale of pre-owned luxury watches. I was doing a little browsing and like you can get a used Rolex, like you can get Omega and other stuff through Walmart, which is obviously like there's, there's a lot of pre-owned watch kind of platforms online. There's obviously eBay is a big one. And then there's lots of specialty ones like Chrono 24 and wrist check and I just recorded a podcast with Quaid Walker from bezel yesterday and we talked about this. It's a growing space and there's obviously a lot of revenue there and, and in terms of marketplaces like Amazon and eBay, like they all make a lot of money from allowing third party sellers. I think it's a little bit of an interesting move though because a luxury watch is such a big purchase and it's already a little scary, I think to pay several thousand dollars for something that you haven't seen and like hope and especially when like authenticity and the realness of it is a big element and like, I don't know if I would do that through Walmart when there's so many other options that kind of like specialize in it and the prices seem pretty much the same personally. But I don't know. What do you, what do you think of that? Yeah, I need to delve into their authentication promises because I don't know what they say. I know you, you looked at watches. Yeah, you looked at watches, the first thing that I did when I looked at this new marketplace, they call it resale at Walmart, resold at Walmart. Anyway, the fact matter is when I first looked, I looked at, you go to the page and there's an ad up top and it has a photo of Louis Vuitton bag. And so I went to the categories and the first category that they spotlight is what they were already selling on resale, which is like refurbished electronics and then the second one is fashion. When you click on fashion, I mean it is Hermes Kelly's and Louis Vuitton bags. There's a $6,000 Supreme Fanny pack. There were a couple of items. The first couple of items that I clicked on were by this company called e-lady, e-lady. And they sell. I see it. I'm looking at it right now. I see e-lady. They sell actually resale, but that company within the description describes their own approach to authenticity and how they're like verified. So maybe it's like bicellar and yeah, how safe is that? I guess you have to do your research. But it's interesting. I also clicked on beauty because I was like beauty, resale, gross, but it wasn't what you would think. And also it wasn't maybe what is classified as beauty in most people's minds, but they're like scales like you weigh yourself on a scale. There was like a muscle massager, but some things that were actually cool were like a dice and air wrap and hopefully it works. I am sure it does, but like shark tools, like the hair tools, things like that. But it is kind of like the new standard. Everyone's launching resale, Ikea, a different model. It's not like luxury, but just lunch resale. We just talked about blooming, dales, lunching, luxury resale via rebag, which also Neumann Marcus has done via fashion file. It's exciting. Amazon does sell luxury resale via what goes around comes around. And there's just a battle. It's Amazon versus Walmart. Amazon's way ahead and yet their growth has stagnated. And so Walmart is growing, growing, growing. It'll be interesting to see what happens and also interesting to see what happened. All these changes that Walmart just made, including adding resale at the same time they introduced premium beauty brands, all these great stats about beauty and who's out to win beauty. And I just have to drop this in here because we have a large beauty audience. But I just mentioned it to the team. Modern Retail just wrote a great story which talked about all Walmart's new announcements. And it said Walmart is the leading beauty retailer in the US now, but it's expected to be dethroned by Amazon by 2025. Meanwhile, they just launched all of this premium beauty product. So obviously they're like, it's a move to maintain that position, which is important. It's a huge category right now, so valuable, less risky than luxury. But go ahead. And so, okay, so I also looked into a little bit of like the resale at Walmart's like authentication kind of guarantees and stuff. Basically, from what I saw, Walmart doesn't guarantee anything. And like you said, it's up to the individual seller, clicking around to some watch list things there. I saw like a couple from the same seller, Chrono store, and then you can go to the Chrono store website and it's like a legit place and everything. But I don't think they really say much about authentication there. So it's like purely just up to the seller, I think. And I think Walmart sort of just hands off. It's like if you have a problem, like take it up with them. And I think that's kind of like the whole trade off with like the marketplace model at both for like the person operating the marketplace and the buyer is like, you get way more options and like bigger scale and everything. But it's kind of like a Wild West kind of place, you know, Amazon has tons of issues with counterfeits and knock offs and crappy cheap product that kind of floods the place. And like, it's always a little weird to me when you're on like a marketplace and you see the identical product from like 18 different sellers with different names. It's with the same imagery and stuff. I'm like, what is even going on there? It's like, it's a little sketchy. I'm sure that there are very legit sellers who are selling through Walmart. I think a lot of them are probably selling through multiple marketplaces and then they just like set up an account of Walmart. But as a buyer, you kind of like have to do a lot of research yourself. You have to dig through and like follow the link to the seller details and then see if they have a website and then go to the website and assess like what you see there. Whereas you could also just go to like bezel or like a place that kind of specializes in it. And I think, like I said, I think the prices are pretty comparable. You may pay a little more for a place that like definitely does their own authentication and stuff. But I don't know if I was spending $5,000 on a watch, which I don't normally do, I would want to be like super sure that I'm getting something legit. I did see that Walmart offers like the sellers often have like return policies and that's against something that differs by the seller and you can check. But Walmart also offers like buyer protection that you, you know, you pay a little extra for insurance or something. So there are ways to kind of protect yourself, but it puts a lot more of the onus on the consumer to sort of protect themselves and figure things out. And then maybe at something that's not a marketplace with like tons of third party sellers. It maybe the price is more, but you also get a little more security, like it's not all on you, the buyer to like figure everything out. You know, so I think that's a trade off that a lot of like big marketplaces or retailers that are adding marketplaces are going to have to figure out how to make it not so terrifying to show their, you know, I agree. It is a risk. I would say like Walmart, it's interesting that they haven't sat back while all of this resell action was happening when I was looking this up. At one point, they had a partnership with thread up in 2020 where thread up was powering some resale offerings on their site. I don't know what what came of that, but this is next level. This is much larger. And another one of the categories that is very huge, which collectibles and trading cards and you see what it's done for like fanatics and all of those other sites, that's an opportunity for Walmart too. It's interesting. You know, you have to wonder where these sellers are selling like now they're at Walmart. I've never heard of e-lady, but like, I know there are like ways to automate your product sales, like get your product on every resale channel or the ones that you choose, but like where else are they selling? And does the retailer care about like adjacencies like to have our product on my store versus your store? And I see this on like, I've been shopping furniture as you know, but I was like thinking like there's Uber and Lyft and I was comparing it to like first dibs in Cherish like there's a lot of the same product. I don't see anywhere else, but I do see like the same product on those two resale sites. You just splash it out there and take cool by it. I think it's smart, but I feel like it's risky for the buyer, not going to one place, maybe for the retailer. I know I was going to say, I was going to say the exact same thing that like definitely there's risk for the buyer because you're, it's like a little less regulated. There's risk for the retailer if you end up kind of like diluting or degrading, maybe like the quality or the perceived quality of your options. And then maybe the least risk for the seller because you could just be, like you said, just selling it on a bunch of different places. And it's like, because like if you've got the same product up on Walmart's marketplace and then also up on Amazon, it doesn't really matter to you, I guess, which I'm sure there's differences in terms of like the cut that each marketplace takes and things like that. So I don't want to say there's no risk, but it does feel like the seller maybe has the most to gain from, from that. And I guess the retailer as well because they're making money off all those purchases. So yeah, it's interesting. I think that's maybe all the time we have this week, unless Jill, is there anything else you wanted to say about Walmart? No, but you won't be buying a watch there. It seems it's, it's official. Probably not. Probably not. Well, this was a great conversation. Thank you. As always, Jill. And for those of you listening, don't forget to give us a rating and a review on Apple podcast or Spotify. Wherever you listen to this, I say it every week, but that really does help us a lot. And don't forget to subscribe to the glossy podcast because you'll hear interviews with industry insiders every Wednesday and we can review episodes every Friday. Jill, do we know who our next guest on the podcast is? We do. We've got Felita Harris. She's the CEO of RAISE Fashion, which will have a presence at New York Fashion Week starting next week. And their whole mission is to bring equity to BIPOC designers in the fashion industry. And they're doing some, some great things working with a friend of glossy Charles Harpison, among other folks. Check it out. Have some fun fashion week content on the pod. More to come on that in that area. Absolutely. Well, look forward to that. And if you subscribe, you'll get all this stuff directly into your feed. Thank you again, Jill, for being here. And thank you all for listening. Thank you. [MUSIC]
