Past Speakers (2018)

Marc-Alexandre Risch is the Chief Retail officer of L'Oréal USA since June 2016. In his current role, he leads the development of the L’Oreal USA retail strategy, with a particular focus on world-class brands Kiehl’s, NYX Cosmetics, Atelier Cologne, Urban Decay. He is in charge of the real estate strategy, develops best-in-class retail operation solutions and procedures across various functions (retail HR, supply chain, technology), establishes seamless omni-channel experiences linked with e-commerce and CRM. 

Marc-Alexandre joined the L’Oréal Group in March 2005 as International Project Manager for Garnier and ascended quickly with numerous leadership positions. In 2010, he joined Garnier International and took over the responsibilities of Global VP / International Marketing Director (Fructis, Ultra Blends). In 2012, he was appointed General Manager of The Body Shop Canada. Under Marc-Alexandre’s leadership, The Body Shop Canada has become one of the best performing markets for the brand, delivering strong and consistent growth, focusing on retail excellence and the transformation of the brand’s real estate portfolio.

Rosie O'Neill is a newbie entrepreneur with a major sweet tooth. In August 2012, alongside her co-founder and fiancé Josh Resnick, she launched her first company, Sugarfina, a luxury candy boutique. Inspired by a third-date screening of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Rosie and Josh dreamed up a “candy boutique for grown-ups” featuring the finest sweets from artisan candy makers around the world.  Named to Fast Company’s “100 Most Creative People” list, and Goldman Sachs’ “100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs,” Rosie is disrupting the sweets space with an innovative approach to confections and retail.

Before candy, Rosie played with dolls for 7 years as Director of Marketing for Barbie, where she led a global business unit that sold more than 50 million Barbie dolls annually. She received her MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Management and a BA in Communication Studies from UCLA. Her favorite candies are Champagne Bears and Pink Flamingos.

Phillip Raub is the co-founder of b8ta, a software-powered retailer designed to make physical retail accessible for product makers and exciting for consumers. In his role at b8ta, he oversees the day to day operations of the company.   

Previous to b8ta, Phillip held executive roles at Nest, where he lead the Global Channel Marketing team.  Prior to Nest, Phillip spent six years at Nintendo during the height of the Wii phenomenon. In his role as Director of Retail Marketing, he was responsible for bringing Nintendo's brand to life across retail, with partners like Walmart, Target, Best Buy and Amazon. 

In addition to his years of experience at Nest and Nintendo, Phillip held various leadership roles in Marketing at Gap Inc.  

Ariel Kaye is the Founder and CEO of Parachute, the fast-growing home essentials brand based in Venice Beach. Long intrigued by the interplay of design and wellness, Ariel established Parachute to fulfill consumers’ needs for high quality bedding and a good night’s sleep.

Forbes declared that “Parachute Wins Over Millennials Tired Of Chain Store Bedding.” The brand has been called one of the “25 Hot Los Angeles Startups to Watch” by Business Insider, and has been featured in notable publications including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Architectural Digest and ELLE DECOR. Since it’s launch, Parachute has expanded into bath, Tabletop Linens, two storefronts (Venice Beach and Portland), The Parachute Hotel, as well as Baby. The brand’s has a projection of $30M for 2017. 

Prior to launching Parachute, Ariel spent ten years working in brand development and advertising in New York. Her experience yielded invaluable insight to consumer purchase behavior and the public’s growing interest in quality, craftsmanship and social responsibility – now tenets of the Parachute brand.

Ariel earned a Master's Degree in Media Studies from the New School, a Bachelor of Arts Degree from the Gallatin School at NYU. She is also a certified yoga instructor and aspiring surfer.

Brian Gill joined Nordstrom in April 2017 as the Vice President of Digital and Store, responsible for strategic planning, developing and executing the enterprise wide digital platform (including e-commerce, personalization, mobile, digital foundation, store operations, Point of Sale, payments and Omni-channel), store tech, and operational excellence initiatives for Technology. 

Prior to Nordstrom, Brian served as the Chief Technology Officer and Chief Scientist for Hotwire Expedia Inc. where he oversaw Web, native, and platform technologies - as well as data warehouses and data centers. Brian came to Expedia from GiftCertificates.com and started his career in the technology industry at H. W. Wilson. 

Brian earned his degree in English/Philosophy from State University of New York.

Shilpa was drawn to Cuyana for the opportunity to create products rich in meaning, quality, and story. Beginning her career in Interaction Design, Shilpa has over 15 years of experience designing web and mobile interfaces for Fortune 500 companies including Disney, AT&T, and Sun Microsystems. In 2012, she graduated with her MBA from UC Berkeley Haas School of Business. Shilpa is passionate about celebrating the the multifaceted spirit of modern women through creating a culture of empowerment.

Lisa Chudnofsky has 20 years of experience working as a content creator, innovator, and strategist. Since breaking into digital media in 1999, she launched (and relaunched) countless websites for major brands and magazines, such as Women’s Health, MTV, and AOL. In 2016, Chudnofsky took her editorial expertise to the retail industry, executing a vision for original content at The Vitamin Shoppe that boasts journalistic integrity and meets the customer right where they are in their decision journey. 

Jennifer Seyller is executive vice president – specialty retail for Hallmark.

In this role, Seyller leads the direct wholesale sales and retail operations across the nationwide network of Hallmark Gold Crown® stores, most of which are independently owned and operated.

In addition, she oversees the operations of corporately owned stores in both the United States and Canada. Seyller partners with product development, digital and marketing leaders in the evolution of the retail, digital and wholesale distribution business operations. 

Seyller joined Hallmark in 1997 and has served in a number of leadership roles including product management for gifts, greeting cards and ornaments, vice president season cards and vice president retail product development. In her career, she has been accountable for expanding the ornament category, including developing a premium ornament strategy and brand, launching a growing kids plush franchise and broadening distribution with partners in television home shopping and online shopping.

She is active in the Network of Executive Women and has held leadership roles with United Way and Harvesters – The Community Food Network.

Seyller earned a bachelor’s degree in international business from Drake University.

As a luxury market leader, Michelle leads the innovation and marketing team at TACORI.  For more than ten years, Michelle has helped build TACORI into one of the *Top Ten Jewelry Brands favored by Millennials through the Digital and Physical worlds, while also growing customer demand through B2B and B2C channels.  As part of the Tacori leadership team, Michelle oversees Strategic Future Planning and Innovations, Media & Influencer Outreach, the Omni-Channel experience, and the innovation to reach into “what’s next.”  Michelle’s formative Marketing experiences were built within the entertainment industry at Destination Films and Warner Bros. Pictures, followed by years working agency-side at NMA Entertainment & Marketing with clients such as Cadillac, Chanel, Netflix and Heineken.  She graduated University of Illinois, Chicago, Phi Beta Kappa via the Honors College on a full academic scholarship.

Current Responsibilities

Emily leads real estate, store design, store development, facilities, lease administration and procurement functions for Charlotte Russe, a fast fashion retailer of on-trend apparel, shoes and accessories at value prices for young women in their teens and twenties, with approximately 540 stores nationally, and their newest brand Peek Kids, an upscale specialty kids and baby brand with 11 stores.  She is responsible for establishing strategies, finding store locations, designing and building the stores, and managing and maintaining all corporate and retail assets. 

Experience

Prior to her current role, Emily spent 3 years with JLL, a global real estate services company, where she led the Innovation & Product Development function for the Corporate Solutions business.  She was responsible for focusing on developing leading edge services and products.  Some key innovation initiatives that she launched were innovation and critical thinking workshops to generate leading edge ideas which she facilitated for internal and client teams, a technology tool to capture and vet ideas and best practices across the firm, and many new revenue generating product lines.  She also led JLL’s national women’s employee resource group, the Women’s Network.

Prior to JLL, she spent 14 years with Gap Inc. in increasingly high-profile roles within the company’s store design, construction, and real estate departments, most recently as Senior Director of Real Estate Management & Operations. In this role, she was responsible for guiding the global asset management for the company’s brands with experience in all aspects of driving new initiatives (innovation, process, change management, training, technology, analytics) and managing the real estate lifecycle (portfolio management, strategy, site selection, planning & design, construction management, and asset management) for their 38-million-square-foot portfolio.  She was involved in facilitating organizational change efforts around process design, cultural initiatives, and onboarding.  She has also held positions at Gap Inc. in Construction Estimating, Gap Brand Global Store Design, and Architecture & Construction.

Education and Affiliations

Emily holds Masters of Business Administration degrees from UC Berkeley and Columbia University (joint Executive MBA program) and a Bachelor of Science degree in Architectural (Structural) Engineering from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. She is a Six Sigma Champion and Green Belt and an active member of the Center for Responsible Business at UC Berkeley.  She resides in San Diego.

Ruth Crowley joined Lowe’s in 2016 as Vice President, Customer Experience Design. Using Human-centered design methodology, she is responsible for leading her team’s efforts to create cohesive customer experiences that are emotionally and seasonally relevant and aligned with strategic company objectives.

Prior to joining Lowe's, Ruth worked with Entertainment Retail Enterprises with clients like Nickelodeon and M&M's World Stores, creating customized products, flagship stores and experiences in global markets. Ruth also has diverse experience with other iconic companies including Harley-Davidson, Universal Studios and Host Marriott (Airports), with a focus on design, retail, product and brand development. She describes herself as a continuing student of business.  

Ruth comes from Ireland and spends much of her free time there with her family including nine siblings as well as nieces and nephews.

Bill Lee is Vice President & General Manager of Retail Experience for SEA’s Consumer Electronics & Home Appliance business.  Bill oversees the overall retail experience & strategy working closely alongside Product Marketing & Sales Team leadership.  Prior to assuming this role, he was the Vice President of Samsung’s Smart Home Product Marketing and Television Product Marketing departments.

Before Mr. Lee joined the team at Samsung, he worked as the Chief Revenue Officer at Quirky.com, Vice President of Retail Marketing at Nickelodeon, Vice President of Electronics and Entertainment at Toys R Us, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing at D&M Holdings, and lastly, Vice President and General Manager of Sales and Marketing at Sony Electronics.

Mr. Lee resides in New York with his wife and their two children. He holds a Masters of Business Administration from the Johnson School of Management at Cornell University and received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Public Affairs Administration from the State University of New York in Albany.

U.S – V.P Retail Establishment in U.S. (3 years) Specialist in design, construction, and commercial planning of new stores. Leading the expansion of all physical store formats for IKEA in the United States.

Japan – Property & Retail Establishment Country Manager (9 years). Establishing IKEA in a new market. Leading acquisition of sites (Real Estate) plus above tasks.

Netherlands – Project manager & then Retail Establishment manager (7 years) in Global Franchising headquarters. Developing new global processes to design, build and operate new IKEA stores throughout the world.

Taiwan / U.K – Store and Project Manager for individual new store projects (7 years).

I started my Walmart career in January 2001 in Sporting Goods as a sales floor associate.  I also had inexperience as an In Store LP Associate, Market Asset Protection Manager (Seattle/Tacoma), Regional Asset Protection Director (Indiana/Kentucky/Tennessee), Regional Operations Support Director (Indiana/Kentucky/Tennessee), Market Manager (Northwest Indiana), Director of Operations (Chicago), Regional General Manager (Utah/Idaho) and Regional Vice President (Illinois).  I did these roles over the span of 13 years all within Walmart US.  Took a brief stint away from Walmart at a Pet specialty retailer and I am not back within the Sam’s Organization as the Regional Vice President for the Northeast.

In 2015 I left Walmart for an opportunity as the Vice President of Operations for PetSmart.  I designed a winning strategy of execution and focus through the field VP’s, Directors and Managers for an enterprise of $8B in revenue annually.  Managed expense budget of $1.3B.  Also was responsible for the annual delivery of record pet adoptions which exceeded 500k.  Also implemented a store level “Real Time” dashboard that called out key performance metrics by hour which aided in 50bps improvement in customer conversion.

I spent time in several geographies during my childhood.  My mother and step dad were in the military so I lived in Alabama, Washington State, Texas & Germany.  I played Division 1 Basketball at Washington State University and I also played in New Zealand and Brazil professionally after college.  I am also a concert pianist and got accepted to Juilliard out of high school, but took the sports route.  I truly value my faith and my family.  I am blessed with a wife and 4 healthy children.

As T-Mobile’s VP of Retail Experience and Strategy, Christie Sandoval’s org chart is a reflection of her obsession for T-Mobile customers and retail employees, which she has cultivated throughout her 15-year career with the company.  Christie’s purview is exhaustive, from Store Design, Merchandising and Retail Insights to Training, Communication, and Employee Engagement.  Her team supports a diverse portfolio of more than 5,000 stores, including six Signature stores and dozens of Mobile Showrooms.  T-Mobile has redefined the way consumers and businesses buy and use wireless services, which has sparked a shift in customer trust and perception.  Christie’s team seized that opportunity in Retail by helping to improve the company’s NPS score from 50 in 2016 to 65 in 2018 (and still rising).  Christie is also a passionate advocate for T-Mobile’s commitment to Diversity and Inclusion – she’s a member of their Women’s Leadership Network and a sponsor of their Multi-Cultural Network.

Jochen Schmidt is the Vice President of the Retail Real Estate and Store Development Department at 

Swarovski AG, a family owned crystal business run by the 5th generation of the Swarovski family. 

The Retail Real Estate and Store Development Department is in charge of all retail spaces and looks after the leasing and rental agreements, design and engineering of the architecture concepts, purchasing and production of the furniture and displays as well as the construction on-site and the subsequent maintenance. Jochen Schmidt has been with the company for over 10 years in Procurement, Roll-out and Architecture positions and was most recently appointed to the position of Vice President of the Department. Prior to that, he has gained extensive experience in Business Development and Sales.

Jochen Schmidt holds an MBA degree from the academy of economy and administration in Nurnberg, Germany. He has also completed a postgraduate degree at the International Real Estate Business School in Hamburg as Retail Real Estate Economist.

With over 2 decades of retail experience, Almira has seen and contributed to the evolution of retail operations first hand. She is currently the Vice President of Retail Operations for Roots, wherein she played a key role as one of the executive officers in the company’s recent IPO in fall 2017.  

Prior to her time at Roots, she was with Holt Renfrew as the Vice President of Sales Strategy and Business Development, and at GUESS + Mariciano as the National Director of Stores for Canada. In 2017 she was a contributor for the book YOUR TURN which recognized Almira as being amongst 150 most successful women in Canada.  

Outside of her work in Retail Operations, Almira has facilitated internationally and presented at the Visa Innovation Exchange Conference in Tel Aviv, in addition to multiple conferences in Beijing, Shanghai, Los Angeles, Miami, and across Canada.

Michael B. Reidbord is a technology and retail executive experienced in building companies in the U.S., Asia, Latin America, and Europe and involved in numerous start-up successes within the technology and consumer products sectors.

Mr. Reidbord founded technical apparel producer Brilliant Asia Corporation and was also President & CEO of Blue Dasher Technologies, an award winning location-based services provider. Michael has held senior positions in the U.S. and Europe with companies including Palm Beach and Bayer, and oversaw global manufacturing and operations for Lion/GSCM in Germany: a leading supplier of technical products to police, fire, and emergency response personnel.  

Before founding the Fashion Tech Consortium, Mr. Reidbord was Chief Operating Officer of Kloog, Inc., an IoT and Smart Cloud and Wearables enabling platform based in Silicon Valley that was acquired by Facebook.   Michael is a professor at The Fashion Institute of Technology and received his BA from the University of Pittsburgh.

Dean Handspiker is responsible for the overall vision, look and feel of INDOCHINO’s showrooms and assortment.

Over the last three years he has designed and opened 26 INDOCHINO showrooms across the United States and Canada with another ten planned in 2018. Dean has created environments that add value to the Made-to-Measure experience, environments that are both inspirational and accessible. 

Prior to joining INDOCHINO Dean has held senior Marketing, Visual Merchandising and Design roles internationally with Club Monaco in North America, Esprit in Germany, Bata Shoes in Switzerland and Gloria Jeans in Russia. With each brand he has led or contributed to new concepts and rapid expansions.

Srini Rajamanickam is currently leading the technology strategy & architecture for Tapestry /  Coach Inc – a multi brand / global upscale fashion retailer.    

He is currently leading the Technology Strategy, Architecture and Innovation for OmniChannel and Customer experience, enabling digital transformation across Stores (POS), Customer Engagement, Digital transformation, eCommerce, Mobile, Social and Customer Service  capabilities globally across multiple fashion brands.    His key accomplishments in the past include leading the architecture for Omni channel commerce capabilities @ Target Corporation for eCommerce, Omnichannel Order Management, POS modernization, Call Center & Mobile leveraging best of breed packages as well as custom solutions using open source / cloud technologies.

Carl Chang is Director, Retail Technology and Tools for Best Buy.  In this role he is responsible for representing the retail employee in the creation of technology solutions that support Best Buy’s strategic imperatives.   He is responsible for capabilities including selling and activation tools, customer relationship management, and customer appointment scheduling.

Carl brings over 25 years of retail experience across specialty, mass merchants, grocery, and online.  He has worked in both domestic and international markets in various capacities across operations, finance, and IT.  He holds a MBA from the University of MN. 

Credo is a clean beauty retailer. We live for discovering the best, cleanest indie and luxury brands around, and carry the largest collection of safe, non-toxic beauty products with over 100 brands. We hold ourselves and our products to high standards so our customers can experience the latest and greatest in beauty. First, our product are carefully vetted by our team who examines every ingredient. We have a strict “dirty ingredients” list that made of up chemicals linked to health issues. We evaluate the safety and sustainability of the ingredients they use. Then, we field test the products (up to 6 weeks) before stocking on our shelves. We stay up to date on everything clean beauty to deliver the best, most effective products around. We have 8 stores and spas across the USA.

Lydia Kandel is the Director of Marketing at Credo. Prior to Credo, she was Director of Merchandising for Artisan Connect, a social enterprise, and a Buyer for William Sonoma Inc.

Marc’s passion for in-store experiences began at Gap Canada in the 90s when his work in marketing and merchandising opened his eyes to the power of retail. With a focus on innovative and customer-centric experiences, he currently oversees retail design strategy for more than 1,200 brick and mortar stores belonging to Canada’s leading wireless brands – TELUS and Koodo.   

Prior to joining the TELUS team, he was brand and regional manager at Clearnet – a start-up telecommunications company which was eventually acquired by TELUS. Over the course of his career at Clearnet and TELUS/Koodo, he has gained diverse leadership experience in everything from store design, to in-store communications, merchandising, production, and fulfillment.

Marc’s passion for exceptional design and customer-focused retail environments is evident in his vision for the future of retail and its possibilities.  A champion of the role of technology in unifying commerce to drive success, he is eager to share his experiences, learnings and perspective with Future Stores attendees.

Gary Cornilles, Senior Manager, Retail Infrastructure for adidas Americas, is responsible for a fleet of 500+ locations in North and South America and Canada.  He oversees Infrastructure Operations and Projects including; New Store Openings, Remodels and various Global Initiatives.  Gary has over 20 years of experience in IT Project Management and Operations which has given him a unique insight into current and future network challenges.  In his free time, Gary enjoys camping, hiking and is a competitive cyclist, averaging over 6,000 miles a year.

Credo is a clean beauty retailer. We live for discovering the best, cleanest indie and luxury brands around, and carry the largest collection of safe, non-toxic beauty products with over 100 brands. We hold ourselves and our products to high standards so our customers can experience the latest and greatest in beauty. First, our product are carefully vetted by our team who examines every ingredient. We have a strict “dirty ingredients” list that made of up chemicals linked to health issues. We evaluate the safety and sustainability of the ingredients they use. Then, we field test the products (up to 6 weeks) before stocking on our shelves. We stay up to date on everything clean beauty to deliver the best, most effective products around. We have 8 stores and spas across the USA.

Michelle Connelly is the Director of Merchandising and Planning at Credo. Prior to Credo, she was Director of Merchandise Planning for Sephora Collection at Sephora. 

Dallas Luttmer is a Program Manager, Labor Scheduling at Nordstrom. He started with Nordstrom over 21 years ago and has supported a variety of functions during his tenure including store logistics and supply chain, inventory management, technology, and human resources. In his current role, he monitors the scheduling program to ensure forecasts and labor are in line with company expectations, helps develop best practices as well as training, and consults with various areas to explore new ideas of how scheduling can impact their business. Dallas currently serves as the leader of the JDA Special Interest Group for Workforce Management. He studied economics and architecture at University of Utah and lives in Seattle, WA with his wife and two dogs. 

Jonathan Kierman is a veteran retail operations executive with over 20 years in multi-unit and Store Operations experience. He began his retail career after graduating from Arizona State University in Macy’s executive training program and immediately fell in love with retail. After working in various roles at Famous Footwear, Roundy’s Supermarkets, Catherine's Plus Sizes, he currently leads the Factory Channel at Vera Bradley.

Keri Voke is passionate about connecting the digital and physical world. As a senior manager of multichannel strategy for Walmart, Keri is responsible for creating customer facing experiences that add value for both our customers and associates every day. She is currently focused on the Sam's Club member experience and using in-club technology to drive member engagement in multichannel. Previous to her current role, Keri worked on the mobile strategy team at Walmart, focusing on customer centric app features such as store maps, mobile checkin, and mobile payment.

Coury serves as the Northwest Regional Executive Director for ALSAC, where she is working to build a movement of St. Jude supporters in the Pacific Northwest, a hub for healthcare innovation and philanthropy. After teaching high school English as a Teach For America corps member, Coury entered the fundraising field at Teach For America, where in her last role, she had the opportunity to manage and lead the D.C. metro area region. At Teach For America, Coury developed a deep passion for sharing stories of classroom impact with supporters and community members and a drive to establish a sustainable and growing fundraising model for the region. Prior to joining the ALSAC team, Coury oversaw the largest share of Seattle University’s $300 million capital campaign and led her division to their strongest fundraising outcome to date. 

Sidd is a Snr Product Manager at Best Buy where he is focused on channeling the mobile app to solve some of the biggest problems faced by customers in Best Buy stores. He is a firm believer in “solving the right customer problem” and has a track record of delivering value to customers at various retail organizations having played a multitude of roles. Sidd has been a product manager for over 5 years and has been in the digital-retail industry for over 12 years. He has an MBA in Information Management and a degree in Engineering. Apart from working at Best Buy, Sidd teaches product management at the Product School on Saturdays.

Learn more about Sidd’s work at Best Buy here. https://corporate.bestbuy.com/online-shopping-best-buy-easy-convenient-video/

Mollie’s retail career started over 30 years ago at the NIKE Employee Store. She worked for NIKE through High School and College earning her wings as a sales associate and visual merchandiser. Upon graduating college she joined the corporate ranks at NIKE and was part of the team that pioneered the future of DTC, by rolling out a fleet of outlet stores, launching NIKE TOWNS throughout the country and setting high standards for the future of retail. Throughout her tenure at NIKE, she also spent time driving the retail vision for the NIKE Brand in the Golf Category and with NIKE’s key account partner’s, such as Dick’s Sporting Goods and Macy’s.   

After being at NIKE for 15 years, Mollie saw an opportunity to lead brands and retailers in a different capacity. 2Hemispheres was born out of this concept and the desire to bring a balance to each project by paying close attention to the details of both the business and aesthetics of the retail experience. Almost 20 years later 2Hemispheres is still at it, enjoying the rebirth of retail and the excitement of crafting memorable consumer experiences for our clients. In her current capacity at 2Hemispheres, Mollie acts as the Visual Merchandising Coordinator for Columbia.

Jackie Culp is an experienced Leader and Sales Driver in the world’s largest accessory business Sunglass Hut, Luxottica Retail. She has a proven track record of year over year comp growth and people development.  She is passionate about the customer’s experience, both internal and external.

Jackie Culp has served as a member of the OneSight Board of Directors, whose mission is to eliminate the world vision problem. Providing worldwide eye care and eyewear to those in need. She has led many projects for the Organization as Executive Sponsor, including the Luxottica Retail internal development program, Field Leader Development Program.

Jackie started her Field Leadership career in 1990 with Claire’s Accessories where she ran multiple market’s as District Sales Manager. She supported the company’s international expansion with Claire’s Nippon in 1996. Traveling to Japan to work with the leadership team to understand the day-to-day operations of the business and the initial execution of retail store openings. 

In 1997 joined Sunglass Hut as a District Manager of sales focused on integrating a new leased department store business along with the core business in the Chicago Market. In 2004 was promoted to the Director of Department Stores & Outlet Business prior to becoming Zone Vice President in 2005. 

Outside of work, our 2 children are very active in the sport of Hockey and that is where we enjoy most of our free time. 

Julia joined Arc’teryx in 2016 to manage retail Design and brand experience as part of the Retail team in the Marketing Department. She leads and collaborates with a team of creatives who develop innovative retail environments and immersive brand experiences. Her 26 year career has focused on creating and implementing inspiring retail concepts for global brands in the U.S., Canada, Asia and the UK. 

Prior to joining Arc’teryx, Julia managed store design and retail innovation at lululemon, Starbucks Coffee Company and her own consulting firm - j. brunzell design. Julia is a Seattle native and holds a BFA from Cornish College of the Arts. She also studied at the University of Washington, Academy of Art University in San Francisco and completed Seth Godin’s altMBA program in 2016.

She currently lives in Vancouver BC Canada with her husband and two children who attend university in British Columbia.

Ryan Smith is Founder & CEO of FTSY (‘footsy’), an A.I. service for matching people to shoes that fit. His company delivers outstanding customer experiences with footwear brands by solving the sizing/fitting issues that comes with this type of consumer good. As a lifelong athlete with narrow, high arch feet, Ryan is on a mission to match people to products that feel great no matter one’s body shape. Ryan started out in Physics, working in Hawaii in Volcanology, then Germany with MRI/3D scanning for brain tumors, before moving into enterprise software and business intelligence programs. Recruited into The University of British Columbia’s $1.5 billion fundraising campaign, Ryan led strategic partnerships, investments, and philanthropy for Science. It was during the UBC MBA program that Ryan and classmates started FTSY.

Bob is US Business Lead for Shopic, a Tel Aviv based start up now recognized as a leader in the mobile self checkout sector. Having worked with top tier applications and critical systems for two decades, Bob has applied this experience at Shopic in the areas of client acquisition and project management to further grow the North American market for their cutting-edge, mobile self checkout solution. As a veteran of enterprise sales of critical systems to Fortune 500 through Global 2000 organizations, Bob has most recently focused on representing innovative start-ups, such as Shopic, while becoming a trusted advisor to those clients throughout the client lifecycle. He is a veteran of the enterprise front and back office software industry where he has worked with the top tier applications, tackling some of the most complex implementation projects of their kind.

Elizabeth joined Sur La Table as the SVP of Marketing and Ecommerce earlier this year.  An experienced retail executive, she engages in the places where customers, brands and technologies connect to create meaningful relationships at scale.  

Prior to joining Sur La Table Elizabeth served in a number of strategy and marketing roles across Gap’s family of brands in San Francisco and Shanghai, China.  She gained online experience in product management at Amazon.com and Classmates.com (a pioneering social media company). Her early experience is rooted in technology as an IT strategy consultant with Booz & Company (now part of PWC) and an analyst with American Management Systems.

Kyrsten Laboda is a relative newcomer to T-Mobile, having joined the company in early 2018 as Director of Retail Design and Merchandising.  In this capacity, she leads new store concept design and visual merchandising for T-Mobile’s retail portfolio of more than 5,000 stores, including six Signature stores and a fleet of Mobile Showrooms.  Kyrsten and her team are guided by a single principle: to deliver fresh experiences which bring product, messaging, and interactive together to delight customers in retail stores.  A long-time student of retail, Kyrsten’s expertise is deeply rooted in visual merchandising, with stints at both Eddie Bauer and Starbucks. Most recently, Kyrsten was Head of In-store Experiences for Global Channel Marketing at Microsoft, where she led the team responsible for building 3rd party retail experiences for Microsoft consumer products around the world.  

WILLIAM BUTLER is the Vice President of Retail Services for Carnival Cruise Line. As the largest cruise line operator in the world, Carnival Cruise Line has 25 vessels positioned in 16 US home ports, Australia, and Europe; serving over 4.7 million guests per year, with 4 additional vessels on order including Carnival Horizon set for delivery April 2018 sailing out of Barcelona.

William is responsible for executing the global fleetwide strategy for retail. With direct ownership of five retail concessionaires and proprietary onboard retail stores, he develops and drives the strategic vision that delivers an experience in-line with the broader vacation experience onboard Carnival Cruise Line vessels. The multi-partner model involves levels of complexities unique to the cruise line industry and travel retail sector with the intent to deliver industry first retail experiences.

Previous to Carnival Cruise Line, William worked for FAO Schwarz in New York City. Serving as the Store Director for the world famous flagship on Fifth Avenue, William delivered an unparalleled shopping experience to over 4 million guests per year.

Preceding FAO Schwarz, William began his career with Hecht’s Department stores, a division of May Company that eventually merged with Macy’s Inc. Starting in their store management training program in the Northern Virginia area, William accelerated through numerous divisions before he became Vice President Store Manager of the Fredericksburg, Virginia store and eventually the Commack, New York store.

Graduating from Virginia Tech with degrees in Business Management and Real Estate, William served on several organizational boards and actively participated in the Blacksburg community.

Outside of the office, William is an avid runner and fitness enthusiast. He serves as a community leader with Big Brothers Big Sisters of Miami and participates with the Candlelighters Organization of New York City.

Melissa Cummings has over 15 years of digital marketing, e-commerce, digital innovation and project management experience. In her current role as Program Leader of Digital Retail Experience for Domino’s Pizza, she helps identify, test and implement in-store innovations to enhance the consumer and employee experience, including kiosks, iOT, and developing new mobile experiences.

Domino's Pizza is the largest pizza company in the world based on retail sales. It ranks among the world's top public restaurant brands with a global enterprise of more than 14,800 stores in over 85 markets. Its system is comprised of independent franchise owners who accounted for over 97% of Domino's stores as of the Q4 2017. Emphasis on technology innovation helped Domino's U.S. generate over 60% of sales via digital channels and has produced several innovative ordering platforms, including Google Home, Facebook Messenger, Apple Watch, Amazon Echo, Twitter and text message using a pizza emoji. In late 2017, as part of an industry-first collaboration with Ford Motor Company, Domino's began a meaningful test of delivery using self- driving vehicles.

Kristen is currently a Manager of Strategic Projects for Old Navy. She has 20+ years of experience working for Gap Inc. in various capacities from retail Store Manager to managing Strategic Initiatives for Old Navy. Working for Gap Inc. has given her the opportunity to develop business and leadership skills. From June 2012 – March 2016, Kristen lived in Shanghai where she lead Daily Operations for Gap Greater China stores. During her time in China, she experienced the brand’s growth and created operational best practices for stores. Her time in Shanghai was invaluable for personal and professional development.

Kristen received her B.A. in Sociology from UC Santa Barbara. In her free time, she enjoys traveling to experience new places and cultures, cooking a variety of dishes, running and rooting for her beloved San Francisco Giants.

Tiffany (Tiff) Liao is a retail strategy and operations consultant with extensive experience building retail channels from the ground up. Most recently, she lead retail operations for digitally native brands Cuyana and Warby Parker and was responsible for retail strategy, technology, and operations.

 

In addition, she has 10+ years of experience scaling retail businesses during high-growth periods at brands such at Kate Spade, Vince, Rebecca Taylor, and Valentino

Matt has spent 26 years building, scaling and running global businesses at some of the best brands in the world like Apple, Gap and Tory Burch. He is the founder of m2 Collaborative, a consultancy built to help brands unleash their potential through creating transformational internal and external customer experiences.

Rejean Roussy is the Store Operations Manager at Arc’teryx Equipment Inc. Founded in 1989, and located in the Canadian Coast Mountain wilderness. Arc’teryx designs products built on the principles of obsessive design, and timeless quality, and manufactures them using the most advanced technical fabrics for unrivaled performance in the outdoors. As Store Operations Manager, Rejean is responsible for overseeing the financial performance of the retail fleet, and also building and delivering branded programs to drive staff and consumer engagement.  

Melissa Calhoun is the Senior Manager of Field Communication at Justice where she is responsible for all inbound and outbound field communication, calendar planning, and task oversight. With a passion for finding innovative new ways to manage store communication and efficiency, Melissa has previously held positions with Henri Bendel and Limited Stores. 

Ashley Barey is a Sr Product Director for JDA overseeing Luminate Store Optimizer as well as several other analytic and SaaS products.  One part strategic retail thinker, one part self-professed type A execution maven, Ashley has enjoyed bringing new products to market for JDA like their mobile platform and business analytics for store operations for the past 6 years.  She is also an operational retail expert with over 10 years spent in both in resort management and QSR.  Ashley has a BA from Southern Connecticut, a MS from Colorado Technical, PMP and recently completed a graduate certificate in Design Thinking from MIT Sloan.  

As the founder of Natural Insight, Stefan Midford brings his vision and passion for the retail industry to leading the creation of a cloud-based advanced retail execution and workforce management platform. Midford has more than 40 years of proven experience in the retail industry and is dedicated to solving challenges and developing solutions related to retail execution, field management, and on-demand mobile workforces. 

A serial entrepreneur and innovator, Midford founded Natural Insight in 2005 out of South49 Solutions, a company dedicated to improving the connection between employers and employees through advanced technology. Since its launch, Natural Insight has expanded its customer base to include retailers, brands, CPG companies, and merchandising / retail marketing agencies around the world. He is focused on ensuring all clients possess the advanced mobile technology needed to improve retail operational efficiency while providing workers the tools to excel and adapt in a rapidly changing environment.

Stefan is a graduate of Mindshare, a forum of CEOs of the D.C. area’s most promising technology companies, and a member of Founders Corp., an invitation-only network of experienced entrepreneurs.

Andrew runs the Zynstra Americas business. Based in Seattle, he leads the Americas team, driving market growth for Zynstra’s retail edge software across enterprise retail businesses with a large distributed store footprint. Prior to Zynstra, Andrew spent 14 years with Microsoft in a variety of sales and business development roles, most recently as lead for the WW Channel Sales & Software Reseller businesses with Hewlett Packard Enterprise.

Matt MacInnis is Inkling’s founder and Chief Executive Officer. He founded Inkling in 2009 on a mission to make the world smarter with mobile technologies, and has built it into the market leader in workforce enablement. Today, Inkling is the leading field operations management system for retail, restaurants, and other industries.

Before Inkling, Matt spent eight years at Apple, where he ran the company’s education market development organization, based in Beijing. Matt subsequently returned to Apple’s California headquarters to coordinate Apple’s growth in education globally.
A native of northeastern Canada, Matt earned a degree in Electrical Engineering with a Citation in Mandarin Chinese from Harvard University. Both Matt and Inkling are based in San Francisco.

Leveraging 25 years of working with executives from many of the world’s best known retail brands, agencies, and technology companies, Sam’s expertise in connecting insights, corporate analysis and consumer behaviour is unparalleled. He is thrilled to be able to share his experience and insights at Future Stores 2018.

Sam is both a Board member and President of Unefi, the parent company for RMS - an enterprise retail management software and marketing automation platform that is leading the shift to technology as a critical element of unifying commerce. As President of RMS, Sam’s focus is on overseeing the leadership team, global sales and support teams.

Prior to launching RMS, Sam was focused on retail marketing as a Partner at CV Studio, where he was responsible for developing and driving strategy for global retail executions, marketing services, and data. Viewed as an innovative force in driving retail of the future, Sam has been – and continues to be – an active adviser and board member at various adtech and martech companies.

Alexa Fleischman is the co-founder and CEO of Strypes, a digital platform that empowers brands to collaborate with customers on personalized products. 

Prior to Strypes, Alexa founded Savvy Society, a line of customizable 3D printed shoes. Through Savvy Society, she developed expertise in product personalization and interactive shopping experiences. 

Alexa launched her career in technology with roles spanning product and sales at EMC and Box and is a graduate of Boston College.  

Chris Todd, President and CEO of Theatro, is responsible for leading Theatro’s overall direction, strategy, and growth plans.  Chris is a “roll up your sleeves” type leader who is passionate about the strategy of a business.  Chris believes that most every idea can be a winner…it’s all about figuring out the strategy angles to drive success!  As a co-founder, Chris has been instrumental in guiding Theatro from an early innovative concept into a fast paced growth company.

Chris has 25+ years of experience in senior executive positions with small start-ups and large multinationals in a diverse array of industries, including software, networking and apps for leading hardware and software companies including Cisco Systems, AppTrigger, Metaswitch, Extreme Networks and Newbridge Networks.  Chris graduated with a BBA from SMU.

Peter Wolf, is Glory’s Senior Vice President, Retail Business Development. Peter holds a Bachelor’s degree in Marketing and Computer Information Systems from Manhattan College, a Master of Business Administration from Rutgers Graduate School of Management and has deep experience across marketing, sales, business development and business management. Before joining Glory, he held executive sales and marketing leadership positions with retail technology companies Partech, Fujitsu and Triversity where he contributed significantly to their success in the retail technology marketplace. 

With a background of over 25 years in the retail technology industry, Peter leads Glory’s North America business development efforts dedicated to building their brand, as well as identifying and nurturing Glory’s strategic partnerships that enable Glory’s cash automation solutions in the retail space. 

Glory is a global leader in cash automation solutions. Glory technology helps optimize the retail cash chain from the front of the store to the back office through to the bank. By automating the movement of cash, retailers can release their staff to focus on customer service, reduce cash shrinkage and improve operational efficiency.

 

Craig Witsoe has been the Chief Executive Officer of Elo since 2012.  Prior to Elo, Mr. Witsoe led efforts in various aspects of retail technology for over 20 years, with global experience in digital displays and retail commercial lighting.

Building on Elo’s 40 years of touchscreen innovation and over 20 million global installations, Craig has led Elo’s latest generation of innovation focused on bridging the physical store and on-line shopping experience. Elo is making in-store e-commerce a reality with its industry leading commercial touchscreens, cloud-based Eloview content delivery software, and EMV payment integration.  Elo has also modernized the world of interactive POS technology with its aesthetically pleasing, yet durable, new systems.        

Working with some of the largest retailers around the world, Craig is in a unique position to see the best in-store digital interactive experiences, approaches to in-store on-line shopping and, more importantly, what retail will look like in the coming years.

Learn more about Craig and connect with him on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/craigwitsoe

Kris Hamrick is a seasoned global sales leader with 20 years of consultative sales leadership for a number of software and services companies. Kris is a Business Unit Executive for Watson Customer Engagement currently responsible for the performance of Watson Commerce in North America. This includes the entire portfolio of eCommerce, order management, and digital experience solutions. When not thinking about eCommerce, Kris loves spending time with his family, frequenting Lake Tahoe, or riding his bike in the mean streets of San Francisco.

Scott Adel is currently Vice President of Retail Innovation at Tulip. He previously served as Head of Omnichannel Retail for the Canadian lifestyle brand, Frank And Oak. With an extensive 20 year retail track record at some of North America's largest brands, he continues to drive innovation in the companies he serves by integrating technology and business processes in unique ways to drive engagement and business growth.

Mike Zorn is the VP of Workplace Strategy for Workjam. In his role, he works with client companies to develop strategies, using the Workjam Digital Workplace, to empower and engage their hourly workforce. With a focus on the emerging workforce it is essential that companies use a platform like Workjam to meet the demands and expectations of the multifaceted associates. Prior to joining Workjam Mike spent 30 plus years with Macy’s Inc. the last 15 as the Senior Vice President of Associate and Labor Relations. His responsibilities included culture and employee engagement development, internal branding and communications, employee and labor relations strategy for the Macy’s enterprise.

Kevin Swanwick has 30 years of experience in the retail technology and store systems sector, spanning multiple generations of technology and nearly all aspects of software sales, marketing, design and delivery. Kevin is currently senior director of retail solutions at Manhattan Associates, where he oversees stores systems and helps clients address today’s omni-channel retail challenges.

Chris Taylor is founder and CEO of Square Root, where he leads the company’s long-term growth strategy. Passionate about empowering companies to optimize operations and make smarter decisions, Chris founded the company in 2006 with the goal of making business data accessible, understandable and actionable. Under his leadership, Square Root developed its store relationship management (SRM) platform, CoEFFICIENT, which helps the world’s leading automotive and retail enterprises align their organizations, increase transparency, encourage collaboration and improve store performance. A testament to Chris’ commitment to culture, Square Root was recognized as the 2015 2nd best small workplace in America by Fortune magazine. Chris has more than 20 years of experience serving in operational and strategic roles for leading technology and automotive companies including Trilogy, CarOrder, TrueCar and Brighthouse. He earned his degree in Mathematics/Computer Science and Cognitive Psychology, graduating Phi Betta Kappa from Carnegie Mellon University. 

Scott Langdoc has 28 years of management and technology experience, including as a retail and hospitality IT executive, store systems vendor technology leader, industry strategy consultant, and global market research analyst.  Scott has held retail and non-retail CIO positions, including Raley’s Supermarkets, PDQuick, and USCS International.  He was CTO at retail vendors Fujitsu Retail and ParTech, Inc.  He ran the retail industry practices at AMR Research (acquired by Gartner) and founded both IDC’s global retail practice and the strategic consultancy firm RetailCENTRIC.  He specializes in strategic planning, cloud transitions, N-channel technology architectures, customer-facing systems, food safety, and consumer engagement.

Mike Tippets is vice president of marketing and organizational development, for the enterprise division of Hughes. Mr. Tippets joined Hughes in February of 2008, he is responsible for the creation of brand and product awareness and also for the engagement and development for Hughes employees around the world.

Mr. Tippets is a 25-year veteran of the high-tech industry and brings a dynamic and passionate vision of what digital media based solutions can provide for businesses in the 21st century.

Bob Radcliffe is a seasoned retail entrepreneur with 25-years experience collaborating with leading retailers and brands to create meaningful experiences. Radcliffe was one of the original pioneers in omnichannel retailing in the late 1990s, launching startup venture Mercanti Systems creating the first ‘buy online and pick up in local store’ purchasing platform. More recently he worked with Lumanext, a revolutionary DC lighting infrastructure that included using sensor technology to capture data that translates into actionable insights and customer benefits. Adhering to design-thinking methodology, Bob strives to deconstruct consumer behavior and identify practical solutions that provide differentiation, loyalty, and sales lift. In 2016,Bob joined Reality Interactive to explore technology platforms that provide optimized content with data capture and analytics tools that measure consumer behavior during the store journey. The result is a comprehensive understanding of retail performance correlated with POS and peripheral marketing data.

With his strong background in design and engineering and his deep knowledge of the retail environment, Radcliffe is often asked to speak on how to deliver effective digital retail installations for brands.

Scott Patsiga serves as President of Telaid, a provider of cradle-to-grave technology solutions and support to multi-site clients. A customer advocate, Scott directs a dedicated, hard-working team of professionals in the relentless pursuit of perfecting complex, multi-site deployments and delivering business objectives to Telaid’s clients. Over his 26-year career with the company, Scott has pioneered Telaid’s retail service division and developed Telaid’s innovative Proven Process methodology to deliver zero-defect deployments. As a result of his vision and drive, over the last 36 months, Telaid has earned a reputation as “the” go-to technology integrator for multi-site retailers, finance companies, healthcare providers and logistics companies. 

Scott holds a B.A. in Finance from Bentley University and is active in organizations including the National Retail Federation, the Loss Prevention Research Council, Retail Industry Leaders Association and BICSI, the professional association supporting the information technology systems industry. He can be reached at spatsiga@telaid.com. 

Bill Stutzman, Director of Strategic Initiatives is a networking industry change agent helping today’s Omnichannel retailers solve technology challenges and meet networking demand. Bill has shepherded Ventus’ positioning as a customer-centric provider of end-to-end Managed Network-as-a-Service solutions for WAN and digital infrastructure management needs.  Bill holds an M.B.A from Columbia University and throughout his career, including senior roles at Time, Inc’s Fortune.com,  Entertainment Weekly’s EW.com, and Sprint, he has demonstrated a talent for anticipating trends and capturing value at the right time. 

Tristan founded Concrete in 2003, with the ambition to help retailers manage their growth, and maintain control of their brand as they built new channels and partnerships. This mission remains unchanged today. Tristan is a regular speaker at conferences, and is passionate about the role that technology has in shaping how retail brands manage their in-store operations.

Nikki Baird is Vice President of Retail Innovation at Aptos, a retail enterprise solution provider. Nikki is charged with accelerating retailers’ ability to innovate. She has been a top global retail industry influencer for several years, with a background in retail and technology. She regularly draws on her experience as a retailer (store operations and supply chain), an ITer (point of sale and back office), a consultant (IT strategy), and a software marketer (for two different retail solutions).  

Jordan is a recognized technology entrepreneur who has worked with many of North America’s most prominent retail and foodservice brands to help improve the customer experience. With extensive experience in customer loyalty, rewards strategy and mobile technology, he co-founded Nudge Rewards to help brands find a better way to communicate, engage and reward frontline employees for exceptional performance.

Ned Gammell is Vice President, North America for Concrete.A regular conference speaker, and a specialist in retail technology, Ned has more than a decade of experience working in technology. At Concrete he has worked with retail brands - both regional and global - to drive greater efficiency into their store operations. 

Marc Gingras is the CEO of Foko Retail, a platform that delivers the science of retail execution and merchandising. He is an entrepreneur and angel investor, and sold his last venture, Tungle.me, to Blackberry. Marc holds an MBA from INSEAD, a MASc in Management Sciences from the University of Waterloo and a BASc in Mechanical Engineering.

Graeme has spent the past 20 years applying advanced technology to solve critical retail business problems. He has held leadership positions with Salesforce Commerce Cloud, Demandware, and Oracle Retail and has been a key driver of several successful retail-focused start-ups. He helped found CQuotient a predictive intelligence company acquired by Demandware; was an early employee and leader at ProfitLogic which pioneered algorithmic modeling for retail and was acquired by Oracle; and a top executive at Allurent, a groundbreaking merchandising solution for online retailers. Early in his career, Graeme was Director of Digital Convergence for Borders Group, Inc.

Melissa Wong is a retail veteran and consumer technology guru, having spent over 10 years focusing on the retail communication experience at Old Navy. During her time in one of North America’s largest retailers, she focused on improving how the company communicates with its stores to improve store execution, ultimately driving sales.

As the founder and CEO of Zipline, a leading provider of web and mobile retail communication and store execution solutions designed specifically for retailers, her solution is now used by over 25,000 users. Zipline has been called “the best thing to happen to retail communication in over 20 years.”

Melissa’s mission through Zipline is to improve the lives of 1 million users by 2020 through offering the most loved retail communication experience.

Gwen Murray is a retail and technology veteran with over 12 years of industry experience at leading companies including Sony, L'Oreal, Amazon and Staples.  She has held strategic roles on both the vendor and retailer sides of the equation.  Over the course of her career, Gwen has focused extensively on the omni-channel experience as it relates to driving customer satisfaction and delivering a stellar shopping experience.

In her current role at Shyft, Gwen maximizes retail growth opportunities for Shyft's industry-leading mobile workforce management platform.

Shyft's mobile WFM platform has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The Seattle Times, and The Boston Globe and was nominated by GeekWire for App of the Year.

Brett Patrontasch is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Shyft. Brett and his team have helped pioneer a new software category in the mobile workforce management space. Under Brett's leadership, Shyft has been adopted nationally by some of the worlds largest retail brands, substantially grown its team in Seattle, and developed the best-in-class mobile experience for shift workers. 

Shyft's mobile WFM platform has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, The Seattle Times, and The Boston Globe and was nominated by GeekWire for App of the Year. 

Brett participated in the drafting process for the Secure Scheduling Act in Seattle and was interviewed alongside other thought leaders in the Predictable Scheduling space on Fox Business News. If you see Brett at Future of Stores, don't be shy to say hi!

Christian Floerkemeier is the VP Product, CTO and co-founder of Scandit and is responsible for the execution of Scandit’s product strategy and roadmap. He is also the technical lead behind Scandit’s patented Barcode Scanner technology.

Before founding Scandit, Christian was the Associate Director of the Auto-ID Lab at MIT and a member of the MIT research team that developed the RFID technology which is today in use in major supply chains. Christian also co-founded Fosstrak, the leading open-source RFID software platform that implements the EPC Network specification. He was the technical program chair of the Internet of Things Conference in 2008 and IEEE RFID 2009 and general chair of IEEE RFID 2011.

Christian received a PhD in Computer Science from ETH Zurich and a Bachelor and MEng degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Cambridge.

Kristin Schoenstein has been a Program Director with Worldwide Business Research since 2010 and has been producing events since 2004. She currently specializes in the retail and eCommerce sector where she heads up the Future Stores portfolio and eTail East. She also successfully launched and grew WBR’s customer experience portfolio. In her role, she is responsible for market research, content creation and speaker faculty management for each event. Prior to WBR, she produced events in the healthcare and pharmaceutical sector and got her start organizing educational programming for physicians. In her free time, Kristin heads out to the East end of Long Island where she enjoys fishing, boating and days at the beach with her husband and two daughters.