BFCM Leftovers

Welcome to the first edition of The Maze Group newsletter. It won't be as delicious as Thanksgiving dinner, but it's hopefully way better than that week old half-serving of green bean casserole you've forgotten about in the back of the fridge.

In this monthly (maybe more) newsletter, you can expect to find content specifically about and targeted to partners who are working with Enterprise brands. You’ll find out what’s in the news, trends, partner insights, new tech and general items of interest.

Let’s get started.

BFCM

• Shopify saw $9.3 billion in sales, up 24% from the $7.5 billion in sales in 2022. Shopify reported Black Friday sales of $4.1B (online + offline).
• Adobe saw $9.2B across all ecommerce for Black Friday, a rise of 7.5% compared to last year.
• Buy Now Pay Later overall saw a 20% increase while Klarna saw a 30% increase.
• Ordergroove noted in their BFCM takeaways that Subscription sales were up 63% compared to last year’s BFCM and 171% over 2021. Average order value (AOV) jumped 20%.
• Salesforce released their Cyber Week figures analyzing shopping data from over 1.5 billion shoppers across its Salesforce Customer 360 platform. Notably, about 17% of global online sales were influenced by AI in areas such as targeted offers, product recommendations, and generative AI-powered chat services.
• Klaviyo found that repeat purchases made up nearly half of all BFCM sales.

In The News

• Shopify's AI ties run deep with their Board Member, Bret Taylor, now also Board Chair of OpenAI.
• Bobby Morrison at Shopify thinks B2B is the biggest commerce opportunity of 2024: "(B2B and DTC) aren’t two different categories of buyers. They’re just people, looking for good products and a great shopping experience."
• Returning holiday gifts may be harder this year - An estimated 44% of retailers now charge customers a fee to ship something back, up from 33% in 2021. Processing returns costs companies ~$165 million for every $1 billion of merchandise they sell, according to NRF. Free returns are also disappearing. (Morning Brew, Axios)
• WSJ and their bold headline on Tiktok: Will Livestreaming Be TikTok’s Amazon-Killer? My take: Sigh, no.
• Shein’s US IPO and what it means for the ecommerce industry. Pretty much the exact opposite of brands like Patagonia or Rothy's, who just appointed a VP of sustainability. (RetailBrew, RetailDive)
• Survey: Most consumers say brands engage in 'greenwashing'. The overwhelming majority of consumers believe that brands aren’t being truthful with their environmental claims. (ChainStoreAge)
• Forbes: Luxury Retail At Risk Of A Downturn In 2024. However, the overall luxury market is around 25% above 2019 levels, with recent growth rates well above averages for most companies.
• Macy's is bringing in a Caesar's Entertainment exec as their new CMO. (Retail Touchpoints)
• True Classic talks about why they're accelerating their move to brick and mortar. It's all about experience. (Retail Touchpoints)
• Cookware brand Caraway is now selling all its products at The Container Store. (ModernRetail)
• Speaking of experience, Walmart and others are experimenting with sensory-friendly shopping hours. Things like dimmer lights, no music and no overhead announcements. If it can prevent more George Michael songs I'm all for it. (ModernRetail)
• JD Sports has partnered with Instacart to offer delivery in as fast as one hour from more than 500 JD Sports and Finish Line stores nationwide. (Retail Touchpoints)
• Aurelius Acquires The Body Shop for $254 Million. (Retailbum)
• How Curated Assortments and Wholesale Are Driving True Religion’s Comeback. They talk about collaborations and experiences. (Retailbum)
• Ralph Lauren veteran takes CFO job at Vince. (Retail Dive)
• Academy Sports + Outdoors is continuing its expansion efforts as it eyes opening 120 to 140 new stores by the end of 2027. (ChainStoreAge)
• Foot Locker continued to decline, reporting Q3 sales of roughly $2 billion, down 8.6% from 2022.
• GNC unveils new Pittsburgh flagship store as it seeks to establish a new retail identity - it highlights their new focus on in-store experience. Our partner, Ordergroove , works with them and GNC uses their subscription with POS. (ModernRetail)
• LVMH is getting into the eyewear business. They’ve acquired Vuarnet and Barton Perreira in the past couple of months. (CNBC)
• Forbes highlighted Shopify’s celebrity partnerships and stories with Taylor Swift, Drake, MrBeast and Bad Bunny.
• Yotpo added Eli Weiss (ex Jones Road Beauty and Away) as VP, Retention Advocacy. He wrote a bit about it here.
• Allbirds begins selling on Amazon. (RetailDive)
• Amazon will start selling cars online in 2024 with Hyundai. Important point: Dealers opt in to list their inventory on Amazon. This will only be successful if dealers find there’s something in it for them. Count me as skeptical. (The Drive)
• Gen Z loves Snoopy. Something we can certainly all agree on. (Business Insider)

Events

• NRF highlights some brands talking in January: Croc's, Claire's, PacSun, Sephora, Tapestry, The Vitamin Shoppe and L.L. Bean.

Thank you to all our great partners. Special shout out to Taera Ebert from Loop and Elizabeth Bailey from Klaviyo for sharing content.

Until next time,

Nick