Comment: NRF - Big ideas for a small world

The retail year had its usual big start in the Big Apple last week with thousands attending the Big Show of the National Retail Federation.

Big data was the main focus but globalisation remained a key theme, with the digital age continuing to make the big picture even bigger.

But this picture is painted on a gallery of small canvases, with social networks, tablets and mobiles combining to narrowcast messages and execute transactions on and from our personal screens.

Last week, the big guns headed for Financo’s 24th annual CEO Forum. The panel, chaired by the new president of Saks Fifth Avenue, Marigay McKee, shared some high-profile insights into these same issues.

Andrew Rosen, founder of fashion brand Theory, marked out the turf: “It’s critically important to have a global business. It’s not possible to be just in America,” he said.

Tommy Hilfiger, founder of the eponymous clothing label, was on the same pitch. “Our brand is growing in Europe and Asia faster than it’s growing in the States, and our business is much larger [overseas],” he said.

Brands will further extend their global presence while many of their landlocked retail partners stay at home

The third panellist, Aerin Lauder, is at the start of a similar journey. With her new brand Aerin, she aims to emulate the wanderlust of uncle Leonard as he built the Estée Lauder empire.

All three speakers were brand owners rather than retailers and this highlights the challenge that retailers have in keeping pace with brands when crossing borders.

All the retailers at the show were obsessed with omnichannel - but omnipresence is another matter. One, of course, can lead to the other, since ecommerce is a far more nimble and less costly route to expansion than bricks and mortar.

In the digital age, distribution is no longer the preserve of the retailer, and brands will further extend their global presence while many of their landlocked retail partners stay at home.

This is not to say retailers will only flourish if they open stores in other markets - indeed some have over-expanded and rightly scaled back. But ‘click and export’ should not just be an incidental feature of online sales reports.

There were two, seemingly unconnected, announcements in the US last week. First, brand house Cherokee reported its acquisition of the worldwide Tony Hawk and Hawk apparel brands.

These will continue to be licensed exclusively to department store chain Kohl’s in the US, but Cherokee will use its skills to globalise them alongside its portfolio of other renowned brands in more than 40 countries.

Secondly, department store chain JC Penney reported that 33 of its 1,000 US stores are to close. Even JC Penney’s exemplary ecommerce operations (in more than 80 countries) cannot offset the trading challenges of its domestic retail market.

Yet all is not lost for national retailers that have yet to venture overseas. The key is to offer customers a unique, personal experience. And customisation was the other buzz word of the week. It’s simply big data writ small.