Why am I excited about the idea of brands known for fairly narrow product categories launching curated marketplaces? For three broad reasons.

The multi-platform, multi-venue, multi-product program I’ve now seen over several weeks appears to be the result of the proven creativity of The Infatuation team and the risk-taking for which Nike has become admired.

All of the best customer experiences I’ve had recently involve product I wanted to buy, an easy-enough way to purchase it, and pricing I could justify. But the differentiator was the people behind it all.

Based on what I saw at MWC (fka Mobile World Congress), the themes, especially as they relate to commerce, can be summed up most succinctly as SPEED.

The technology I like best in retail can be summed up by thinking about the 3 Es:

What enables, expedites, and/or elevates the store experience for tasks a customer doesn’t  need a human to perform?

Last month at Verizon, we built an in-store AR use case and rolled it out to thousands of our stores. The activation was tied into Verizon’s holiday campaign and encouraged deeper engagement in the store by prompting customers to search for and “unwrap” exclusive promotional offers as they browsed.

Observations and analysis about Amazon‘s London pop-up from retail consultant Rebecca Smith and me.

On the way to visit the new Amazon 4-star store in Soho, I stumbled upon a Cartier pop-up at 120 Wooster (open until 11/4/18). Unexpectedly, I found both to be about discovery.

To recap, trends hit:

• Instagrammable

• New CPG sales channel

• Small format

• Self-checkout

• Shift in ad dollars from digital to stores

And those missed:

• Experience

• Service

• Product education

• Brand immersion

• The “chat” in chat commerce

If more stores can capture people’s attention in similarly-immersive ways, then reserved and tour-guided retail could be part of the definition that I think today’s “retail as entertainment” hypotheses sorely need.

Hitting so many DNVB stores in quick succession reinforced for me a story. The story is that these brands - unlike retailers before them - are not opening stores for pure distribution strategy reasons.

I’m headed to SF for a quick trip to NRFtech to emcee tomorrow morning’s session. Much of this year’s discussion will center on “why tech matters” in retail.

While I’m all for the product-free pop-up, I’m looking for more of a tie between brand and experience than this one.

New and established brands are focusing on tighter assortments.

A new Barneys beauty brand gives customers an effective takeaway.

Earlier this month, I visited Amazon Go and Starbucks Roastery. They’re at opposite ends of the technology/human spectrum.

“The living room is the new dressing room.” - Miki Berardelli, Kidbox CEO

I heard this shortly after telling someone that home is a shopping channel. If a fashion retailer doesn’t have a home strategy, it may be multichannel but I don't think I can say it’s omnichannel.

A number of companies are jumping in to build more distinct CPG brands and subscription programs and to prevent such categories from being forever solidified as commodities. Here are three I'm personally using and loving.