STORES

Ulta’s Expanded Efforts

Ulta Beauty is ramping up diversity and inclusion efforts with a $25+ million investment. It’s an effort that ranges from the store’s shelves to employee training and development.    

Ulta’s shelves: The company promises to double the number of Black-owned brands it stocks by the end of 2021. It’s unclear what percentage of Black-owned brands Ulta currently carries. 

• $4+ million will be allocated for marketing support and sustaining growth of Black-owned brands within the company’s collection.
• About $20 million is earmarked for media investments on multicultural platforms to fortify connections with Latinx, Black, and other communities.

Ulta’s staff: In March, Ulta will begin investing $2 million in quarterly, mandatory training sessions to reinforce inclusivity and address unconscious bias. 

• The beauty retailer is also bringing on actor Tracee Ellis Ross, CEO and founder of Pattern Beauty, as its D&I advisor, a role focusing on BIPOC brand development. 

An industry movement 

The Black Lives Matter protests last summer prompted a number of retailers to reexamine their diversity and inclusion commitments. Some have taken the 15 Percent Pledge, an initiative to dedicate 15% of shelf space to Black-owned businesses. 

• Retailers that’ve committed to increasing shelf space include Sephora, Crate & Barrel, Bloomingdales, and Macy’s.
• Retailers that specialize in singular brands have found other ways to get involved with the pledge. Gap Inc. said it would expand its career pipeline programs, like internships and apprenticeships, by 15%.

Further commitments: Ulta’s one of many retailers to address D&I commitments without specific targets for shelf space.

• Nordstrom aims to increase Black and Latinx representation among its managers by at least 50%, and reach $500 million in sales from brands owned or operated by those communities. 
• Walmart and its foundation distributed $14.3 million to 16 nonprofits as part of its $100 million, five-year pledge to boost company diversity and tackle systemic racism. 

The bigger picture: Major retailers across several categories are renewing commitments to diversity and inclusion. Only time will tell if these changes will satisfy employees and shoppers in the long term. 

E-COMM

All in on Alcohol

Uber’s helping more customers turn their living rooms into dive bars with its acquisition of alcohol delivery service Drizly, in a $1.1 billion stock and cash deal. 

No need to delete Drizly yet: The acquisition integrates Drizly’s marketplace into UberEats, but keeps the Drizly app live for now. 

Looking ahead: Uber is hoping to capitalize on Drizly’s success, which includes a 300% YoY increase in gross bookings, and using its own reach to expand Drizly’s geographic presence and global footprint, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said. 

From the grapevine: Mobile wine app Vivino closed on a $155 million Series D, which  brings the company’s total funding raised to $221 million. The service has 50 million customers and 700 worldwide partners. 

• “This round and its capital will help us expand our team to go deeper into new and existing markets, add more merchants to our marketplace, and enhance our AI to make an even more personalized tool,” CEO Heini Zachariassen told Retail Brew. 

Why it matters: Delivery and e-commerce services are evolving to include categories that used to be stuck offline. Regulations made alcohol a little late to the delivery game, but now there’s no turning back for our bar carts.   

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TECH

AI Sees Your Value

This is the rare artificial intelligence story that won’t scare you into quitting the internet. Rebag, the luxury resale platform, today launched an AI-powered appraisal tool—the first in the world, Rebag claims.

How it works: “To some extent, Clair AI feels like a Shazam for handbags,” Rebag CEO Charles Gorra told Retail Brew. After shoppers download the Rebag app...

• Shoppers scan the bag they’d like to appraise with their phone camera.
• Clair AI then taps six years’ worth of handbag data across 50+ brands to ID the designer, bag model, and typical resale price.

Ideally, Clair AI will have more use cases than aiding and abetting Emily in Paris outfit repeaters. Gorra said the image recognition tech will eliminate pricing guesswork, making the resale listing experience quicker. 

But Clair’s still learning. In the past, human error reportedly helped fakes slide onto other resale sites. Naturally, we wanted to know if Clair could tell the difference between the RealReals and the fakes. For now, it’s a no: Gorra said Rebag still finalizes authentication with human staff. 

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• Capri beat profit estimates after easing off discounts. 
• Impossible Foods slashed its grocery store prices by 20%.
• Gelmart, a private label manufacturer, launched a DTC brand incubator.
• PGA Tour Superstore reported record sales growth in 2020. 
• Kitchen United will operate ghost kitchens for restaurants in a Westfield mall.
• CVC will acquire Shiseido’s personal care unit. Price tag? $1.5 billion.

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SWAPPING SKUS

All we know for certain about Jeff Bezos’s post-Amazon future is there will be far fewer Congressional hearings on his iCal. As for the company he built? These reads set the scene for what comes next. 

• Amazon’s Q4 earnings may have been slightly overshadowed by the c-suite switch up. But retail pros should pay close attention to the other takeaways from Amazon’s latest results, like its emphasis on tech services and the success of its third-party sellers. (Modern Retail)
• The question topping Google searches today: Who is Andy Jassy? Conveniently, bigger outlets than ours profiled the former Amazon Web Services head and CEO heir apparent days before the big reveal. (The Information and Insider)
• Official statements on the c-suite switch fail to mention next week’s worker vote to unionize at Amazon’s Bessemer, Alabama, warehouse—the first in company history. Here’s what’s at stake. (NPR)

COMMUNITY

It’s time for our segment highlighting the best part of Retail Brew: you, the readers. Want to be featured in an upcoming edition, or nominate a coworker? Hit reply to share who you think we should spotlight. 

We’re taking a road trip up I-95 to Maine, home of lobster bakes, Stephen King, and Sea Bags. This being a retail newsletter, we’ve only got room to dive into that last landmark with Sea Bags’ VP of Retail Stores, Paul Gori. 

Give us the 10-second explainer on your role: I'm the guy who’s fortunate enough to oversee and support all of the retail stores and teams in our company. And I get to scout and open new store locations.

Favorite project you’ve worked on? Our first store opening in Florida. We brought Maine to Florida by turning a display window into an iconic Maine lobster shack. 

One retailer everyone should follow? Anthropologie. I love how creative their visual team is in bringing their front windows to life.

Your dream retail collab: Sea Bags and Starbucks. I love coffee and would enjoy seeing our bucket bags used for Starbucks coffee gift packs and featured in every Starbucks store.

ICYMI

Catch up on the Retail Brew stories you may have missed.

• Nordstrom Introduces Monthly Vintage Drops, Powered by Goodfair
• 6 New Brands for Retailers to Watch in February
• Bravo Sierra Expands from DTC and the Exchange through Target Partnership