Tucked away in the back corner of Madewell’s flagship location on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, there’s a wall of striking coffee-table books that could be mistaken at first blush for an interior design prop. But look closer and you’ll see a message stenciled on the wall above the shelves: “Curated by McNally Jackson.”

That’s because Madewell created the display in partnership with the local bookshop chain, and customers can scan a QR code to buy the books online.

“What Madewell was asking us to do was co-curate a selection of beautiful art books so they could have them in their store,” Kat Pongrace, director of outreach at McNally Jackson, told Retail Brew. “It was really mutually beneficial.”

Madewell, she added, gave McNally a general sense of what kinds of books it was looking for, and then the bookseller put together a list of 100 titles that “felt a little newer, very aesthetically pleasing” with “multiple points of access for many different kinds of audiences.” Fifty of these titles are now featured in the display.

While shop-in-shops are becoming more popular—particularly in big box retailers such as Kohl’s, which is leveraging them to lure in new customers—the pop-up bookstore has yet to go mainstream. But along Broadway in midtown Manhattan, at least two higher-end retailers have tried it out. The other, Filson, sells premium outdoor clothing just a few blocks away.

Keep reading here.—AV

A retailer’s life is a constant juggling act. They’re competing for customers (and employees), navigating an ever-changing market, and handling allll the administrative tasks.

Don’t add an outdated HR and payroll system to your load. Paylocity’s new guide walks you through common obstacles many retailers are facing and how a streamlined HR function can help. Find solutions to help your business overcome:

• time-consuming manual tasks
• disconnected business systems
• a competitive labor market
• high employee turnover
• the lack of effective company-wide communication

Paylocity’s solutions are built to fit retailers’ unique needs—not the other way around.

Face retail challenges head-on. Read more here.

When Retail Brew spoke with Olly’s new CRO, Bryan Ferschinger, in January about the brand’s innovation pipeline, he could only vaguely preview the 10-year-old vitamin brand’s move into the “cognitive space.”

Today, that innovation is coming into focus—literally—as the Unilever-owned company debuts a new cognitive supplement range for adults, teens, and kids, adding to its wide product portfolio addressing areas like stress, sleep, immunity, and complexion.

The five-product Brainy line, nootropic (or cognitive enhancing) supplements made to address memory, creativity, motivation, and attention will be available at Target and on Olly’s website on April 8.

Keep reading here.—EC

On Wednesdays, we wear pink spotlight Retail Brew’s readers. Want to be featured in an upcoming edition? Click here to introduce yourself.

Gregory Ng is CEO of Brooks Bell, a consultancy that helps brands improve their approaches to marketing and customer experience.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in retail? People send signals to companies all the time about what they want and how they want it. We help companies get quicker and smarter at picking up those signals and turning them into more relevant experiences.

One thing we can’t guess about your job from your LinkedIn profile? Whether I am in my office or at my home office, at 1:00, my calendar is blocked off for a nap.

What’s your favorite project you’ve worked on? Without a doubt, it is the launch of our insights accelerator tool, Illuminate. It fills a necessary void in the market by cultivating a culture of experimentation, curiosity, and insights generation for retailers. And best of all, it’s free forever.

Which emerging retail trend are you most excited about right now, and why? Definitely it is the progress being made to create a more seamless experience from offline to digital and vice versa.

Keep reading here.—EC

More sales, more problems? Retail’s on the up and up in 2024, but that’s making the already complicated month-end close process even more . More merchant fees + more reconciliation processes get complex fast—especially when done manually. Fortunately, Trintech’s April 16 webinar on financial close challenges has solutions. Sign up here.