reports
- Barbara Gray
THE UNITED REINDEER SERVICE
Brady and Adam had just finished hanging their "stockings by the chimney with care in hopes that Saint Nicholas soon would be there" when my iPhone buzzed and I saw an email from the North Pole advising me that there may be a delivery delay as the elves had loaded their gifts onto the wrong sleigh. So, instead of settling down for "a long winter's nap", I tossed and turned all night. I woke up early Christmas morning and was dismayed to discover Santa hadn't touched the milk and cookies and, eve...
- Barbara Gray
Experience Is the New Moat
Although Amazon's acquisition of Whole Foods blows open the dam protecting the supplier and structural channels, most of the value erosion has taken place along the customer channel, as evidenced by the year-to-date performance of the 289 companies lying in the 21 sub-industries along each of the three channels: ï‚· Overall: -2.6% versus +18.3% for S&P 500 (negative delta of 2,090 basis points) ï‚· By Channel: Customer (-13.2%), Supplier (+2.6%), Structural (+7.4%) To protect themselves from the...
- Barbara Gray
The Shopping Race
As we look to 2018, I am becoming more and more convinced that the secret for companies to survive the retail apocalypse will be for them to advance beyond the four traditional economic moat factors (i.e., low-cost producer, intangible assets, switching costs, network effect) to the experience moat. For as Amazon continues to innovate and push the edges of the consumer value frontier in terms of pricing, convenience, and variety of choice, companies are discovering they can no longer compete on ...
- Barbara Gray
The Experience
One of my favourite movies is the 1961 classic "Breakfast at Tiffany's", especially the famous opening scene in which Audrey Hepburn, dressed elegantly in a black gown and pearls, stands in front of Tiffany & Co. on Fifth Avenue, gazing wistfully through the store windows while eating a bagel. Hoping to avoid the fate of Lord & Taylor, which just surrendered its flagship Manhattan store to WeWork, Tiffany & Co. is opening a "Breakfast at Tiffany's" themed cafe at its flagship store while Chanel ...
- Barbara Gray
Movement
When I published my LinkedIn article, Ford No Longer Sees Its Future as Just an Auto Company, in early 2016, discussing how Mark Fields (the now ex-CEO) saw Ford's future as an auto and mobility company, I never dreamed that less than two years later we would see a major OEM re-brand itself from just a car manufacturer to a human movement company. But that's just what Toyota did — it wants to expand its capability into technologies that can help people move not just around town, but also acros...
- Barbara Gray
Canvas
On October 26, Amazon received approval for wholesale pharmacy licenses in 12 states (cnbc.com). Since then, prices of U.S. pharmacy stocks have plummeted by an average of 8%: Rite Aid (-14%), McKesson (-10%), Cardinal Health (-10%), CVS Health (-9%), AmerisourceBergen (-9%), Walgreens (-2%) and Express Scripts (-1%). As a foreshadowing of how Amazon could leverage AI to disrupt the pharmacy ecosystem, pharmacists could be the next professionals at risk of being displaced by robots. In China, Mi...
- Barbara Gray
The End of the Line
I remember first hearing about the automotive legend Bob Lutz when I joined Deutsche Bank's global auto research team in NYC in 2000. So when I came across the November 5 article he penned for Automotive News, I paid close attention. And I'm glad I did, as the candid views on the future of the auto industry he expresses in his article, Kiss the good times goodbye, make it a must-read for all investors.
- Barbara Gray
Sign of Times
When I was riding the elevator up to my WeWork office, I saw a headline flash across the screen that Hudson's Bay Company was selling the iconic Lord & Taylor's century-old flagship luxury department store on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan for $850M. And guess who the acquirer was? That’s right, WeWork; it will be converting the store into its new global headquarters. And apparently WeWork will also be leasing space within some of Hudson's Bay Company's department stores in Canada, including the fl...
- Barbara Gray
Two Pyramids
A year ago I hit publish on — ironically — Amazon. What I didn't expect though is how quickly dated some of the content in my Ubernomics book would become — Travis Kalanick is no longer the CEO of Uber, Mark Fields is no longer the CEO of Ford and Whole Foods has been acquired by Amazon. However, the "shell, heart, soul" customer value proposition thesis I discuss in "Chapter 5: The Value of Advocacy" is starting to play out. Interestingly, I came up with this framework back in 2010 based ...
- Barbara Gray
THE RACE TO ZERO
Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions, Zero Congestion. This is the title of a recent LinkedIn article published by Mary Barra, the Chairman & CEO of GM, outlining GM's strategy for the three concurrent vectors of change transforming the auto industry: autonomy, electrification, and sharing. It's fascinating to watch the transformation unfold as more and more companies join the race to zero. On the autonomy vector, we're seeing new developments from technology firms like Alphabet, AMD, Blackberry, Micros...
- Barbara Gray
The Playbook
After seven years of working out of coffee shops, I finally have an office to call home. But not an office in the traditional sense — rather I'm now one of the 150,000-plus members of the WeWork community, which work out of its 227 co-working office locations in 53 cities around the world. WeWork, whose inspirational mission is "to create a world where people work to make a life, not just a living", isn't just for coffee shop refugees like myself, but for companies — both big and small. Iron...
- Barbara Gray
THE UNSTOPPABLE AMAZON
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY We have detected three structural disruption developments in the Amazon river this year: ï‚· Rising water levels: The water levels along the customer channel have been rising over the banks, starting to submerge the department stores and apparel retailers, which have seen their stocks decline by an average of 25%. The waters have even started to flood the specialty stores and apparel, accessories and luxury goods companies, as their stocks have declined by an average of 10%. ...
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