When Lauren Stevens began her reality TV career, helping Flava Flav, Bret Michaels, and eventually even Travis Kelce, find “love” as a producer on some of the century’s most memorable—and often infamous—shows, she said many believed the nascent genre would simply be a fad. Now, she’s swapped reality for retail, focused on producing content for another new industry: social commerce.

In 2020, losing her excitement for the ever-changing TV industry, she co-founded Orca, a social commerce company producing shoppable livestreams, along with paid and affiliate content, with fellow producer Max Benator. Orca offers brands livestream studios and on-camera hosts and advises brands on their shoppable content, and even debuted its own livestream shopping beauty boutique, Bleu Beauty, earlier this year.

Social commerce is still in its early days, and live shopping particularly so, especially compared to China. But it’s starting to grow. TikTok, which boasts 35.8 million social buyers, has seen shopper growth rates surpassing Instagram and Facebook, per EMarketer, with overall US retail social commerce sales projected to pass $100 billion in 2025. Coresight Research estimates livestream shopping will reach 5% of total US ecommerce sales by 2026.

“A lot of people said live shopping wasn’t going to have a place here in the US, but it’s keeping us very busy,” Stevens, also Orca’s chief content officer, noted. The company produces 400+ shoppable videos every month, working with brands like E.l.f., Nestlé, Estée Lauder, Unilever, and P&G. Stevens shared how it’s working with brands to capture consumers’ eyes and dollars and how her entertainment experience prepared her for the gig.

Keep reading here.—EC

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Deloitte is heading to Las Vegas as the Global Accelerator sponsor for Oracle CloudWorld from September 9–12. Don’t miss the Deloitte IndustryAdvantage: A Future Marketplace, a customized retail experience where you can learn about the transformative power of AI, smart inventory planning, retail automation, and what’s next for the retail space. Chat with the specialists about:

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Learn more.

While a number of retailers have struggled to make off-price retail work online, Nordstrom is breaking the mold. The company’s digital sales increased 6.2% YoY in Q2, and CEO Erik Nordstrom is attributing some of the gains to its off-price banner, Nordstrom Rack.

“The Rack banner’s digital business is a differentiator in off-price retail, enabling our customers to shop when and how they want,” Nordstrom told analysts in an earnings call on Tuesday. “We’ve built and refined industry-leading digital capabilities at NordstromRack.com, which delivered strong results in Q2.”

Keep reading here.—AV

Ulta Beauty reported lackluster second quarter results yesterday, as cooling demand and increased competition pressured sales.

Net sales were up 0.9% YoY to $2.6 billion, but comparable sales dropped 1.2%, as transactions dropped 1.8%. Though the retailer anticipated challenges from Q1 to continue, the results were “short of our expectations,” CEO Dave Kimbell said on the company’s earnings call. “We do not believe these results reflect the strong engagement with our brand, the strength of our operating model, or the performance I know we can deliver over the longer term,” he said.

Keep reading here.—EC