Building a foundation of consumer trust naturally becomes a competitive advantage for retailers.

This keynote reframes inventory management beyond traditional supply and demand. It explores how portfolio complexity, shelf life, and delayed decision-making impact service, margin, and customer experience. Attendees will gain insights on simplifying assortments, acting earlier, and making smarter trade-offs to reduce waste, improve in-stock performance, and deliver more consistent, customer-centric outcomes in today’s dynamic environment.

Open any omnichannel deck and you’ll find the same slide: three boxes – warehouse, store, digital – and arrows everywhere, trying to connect them. But walk around to the customer’s side and the boxes disappear. They didn’t order from “a channel.” They ordered something. And it arrived – or it didn’t. Every seam they feel is one we built. The failures almost never live in the boxes – they live in the space between them. My take? The job isn’t to connect the channels. It’s to make them vanish.

Procurement in modern retail has evolved into a strategic function, moving beyond cost management to actively drive growth. This presentation will examine its pivotal role in fostering innovation, ensuring business continuity, and building competitive advantage. We will explore how procurement teams can empower in-house supply chain operations by optimizing vendor relationships through strategic partnership frameworks, robust performance management, and collaborative value creation, thereby enhancing overall supply chain agility and resilience.

The operational science of supply chain networks. The talk will cover anecdotes and insights from my experience practically implementing these concepts at Walmart. The stories will highlight nuances that relate to various retail topics of warehousing, assortment, trucking, parcel logistics and last mile delivery. In sharing my journey, I hope that the audience will avoid similar pitfalls as they build their networks.

AI will transform how we work, but servant leadership will determine how we treat one another. The future won't be shaped only by the intelligence of our machines but by the character of our leaders. As technology becomes more capable, our responsibility to lead with humility, compassion, and service becomes even greater.

Supply resilience isn't about predicting every disruption. It’s about minimizing the impact of inevitable shocks so your organization can mitigate the hit, pivot faster, and emerge stronger.

Building Organizations That Move at the Speed of Information.

In this session you will learn how to leverage new technologies in the direct mail space to not only increase traffic to your site, but significantly increase your conversion rates. 

I will cover the breadth of data associated with postal addresses, how to write copy that gets results and then how to combine direct mail with digital marketing to take your marketing to the next level.

You will walk away with information you can use immediately to start increasing your sales.

Discover how private label cleaning chemicals can unlock higher margins, recurring revenue, and stronger customer loyalty. Learn practical ways to create customer stickiness, bundle offerings, and stand out by competing on value—not price. Featuring insights from Ed Jacob of MISCO Products, this session shows how to build a private brand that drives sales, strengthens your market position, and helps future-proof your business with actionable, real-world strategies.

A powerful elevator pitch is the foundation of a strong personal and professional brand. In this engaging session, Michelle Vernuccio shares how to craft a confident, memorable introduction that sparks meaningful conversations, builds credibility, and creates new business opportunities. Attendees will learn how to communicate their value with clarity, stand out in any room, and turn everyday introductions into lasting professional connections.

Ecommerce isn't what it used to be- Brand builders are battling more competition, rising acquisition costs, and  thinner margins.

Subscription is the antidote, and supplements are the ideal subscription product. Gummies of course most of all: consumable, habitual, and easy to love.

This seminar covers building a subscription-first brand that compounds instead of crumbles.

Retailers are entering Q4 with the leanest seasonal labor market in over a decade. The systems designed to manage peak were built to track the plan, not what is actually happening across the physical supply chain as the pressure builds. This session shows supply chain and fulfillment leaders what AI sees in real time that traditional systems miss, and how leading retailers are using physical intelligence to close the gap before the cost is already sunk.

Retailers are entering Q4 with the leanest seasonal labor market in over a decade. The systems designed to manage peak were built to track the plan, not what is actually happening across the physical supply chain as the pressure builds. This session shows supply chain and fulfillment leaders what AI sees in real time that traditional systems miss, and how leading retailers are using physical intelligence to close the gap before the cost is already sunk.

Reinvention combining AI, advances in molecular science, digital transformation, and carbon optimization can enable alternative business models, economics, and superior generations of products. This session will describe critical proof points and the path Plant-42 and its partner companies and clients have already taken.

Reinvention combining AI, advances in molecular science, digital transformation, and carbon optimization can enable alternative business models, economics, and superior generations of products. This session will describe critical proof points and the path Plant-42 and its partner companies and clients have already taken.

Every purchase sets off a chain of experiences that can delight — or destroy — customer loyalty. This seminar examines the five pivotal moments across the purchase and post-purchase journey where operations and logistics missteps silently erode your brand. Learn how to identify the vulnerabilities, close the gaps, and turn your supply chain into a competitive advantage.

Packaging artwork is slow, manual, and high-stakes. A missed statement or a region-specific rule overlooked at the wrong moment can mean recalls, delays, and rework. AI can change that. 

It most definitely will not replace your team, but it can remove the repetitive checks that slow them down. James McMonigal, Pre-Sales Solution Consultant at Esko, walks through where AI genuinely helps in artwork compliance, content updates, and connected packaging workflows.

AI agents are already shopping, comparing, and buying on customers' behalf — McKinsey projects agentic commerce could generate $3 trillion to $5 trillion globally by 2030. Most e-commerce businesses aren't ready. This session walks through a 3-step tech readiness checkup — operational efficiency, cash flow speed and capital access, and agentic commerce readiness — to help you find the gaps costing you growth and fix them before they widen.

Climate action isn't limited to people with climate jobs. Every industry, including retail and e-commerce, has decision points where sustainability and regeneration can be built in. This session looks at how professionals can find real leverage inside their own companies and roles, and connect with others doing the same work. Attendees leave with a clearer sense of where to start and who to find support from.

Attend this seminar to gain a practical understanding of the current warehouse automation landscape, emerging technologies, and industry trends. Learn how to identify the right automation solutions for your retail operation, build a compelling business case, and avoid common implementation pitfalls. You'll leave with the knowledge and tools needed to effectively plan, justify, and execute a successful automation project that delivers measurable business results.

As AI agents move from co-pilots to executing real supply chain workflows, organizations need a new approach to orchestration, governance, and control. This session explores how supply chain leaders can determine which agent decisions can run autonomously, which require human oversight, and what infrastructure is needed to make autonomous operations reliable, observable, and accountable.

Winning a new client for a 3PL usually takes about a year. Most 3PLs sell space and picks, so every deal becomes a rate comparison, and a few points on rates never justify what it costs a brand to move: new integrations, re-labeled stock, two warehouses running in parallel, weeks of degraded service. Mildly unhappy prospects stay put until the pain outweighs the move. This session looks at what happens when a 3PL takes on its clients' forecasting and reorder decisions instead, and why that collapses the sales cycle to weeks. A 3PL with 300 clients is the working example.