![\"Retail](\"https:\/\/dmsretail.com\/RetailNews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/RETAIL-ONLINE-TRAINING-728-X-90.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cIf your brand went away tomorrow, would anybody care?\u201d It\u2019s a scarily relevant question that many retailers are likely asking themselves in the wake of recent high-profile closures. It\u2019s also not a question to which many retailers could honestly answer \u201cyes,\u201d according to Matt Kaness, CEO, GoodwillFinds, who posed it during a session at Shoptalk last week.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we could also say that half <\/strong>the brands in retail today can\u2019t clearly say what they stand for, what their brand values are and what that means to the consumer,<\/strong>\u201d added moderator Ndidi Oteh, Senior Managing Director and Head of the creative group Accenture Song Americas at Accenture.<\/p>\n How important is it to know the answer to these questions? Very, according to Oteh, who shared research showing that consumers today are more lonely than they have even been, and in the absence of fulfilling human connections they are turning to brands.<\/p>\n \u201cDefining your brand values is the single most important action you can take as a brand to ensure that you\u2019re relevant, not only today, but tomorrow<\/strong>,\u201d she said. However, brand values go deeper than values-based statements around issues like DEI, sustainability and other of-the-moment social topics, she said: \u201cBrand values are the essence of who you are as a company. It is what you stand for. It\u2019s how consumers connect with you. I\u2019m sure all of us have a brand that we love, and sometimes you can\u2019t really explain why you love it. There\u2019s just a reason that you love it; it makes you feel a certain way.\u201d<\/p>\n Kaness has worked at many brands that fit that bill throughout his 20<\/strong>-year career in retail. Prior to his current role building an ecommerce offering for iconic charity Goodwill<\/strong>, Kaness held C-suite roles at Burton Snowboards<\/strong>, URBN<\/strong>, ModCloth<\/strong> and Walmart<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cI think a lot of brands right now are struggling as things are evolving because the world is shifting underneath them,\u201d said Oteh. \u201cThey\u2019re asking themselves, what does this mean for me? Do I say something externally? Do I shift who I am? Do I stay true to who I am? Those are questions that every single company should be asking themselves, because you\u2019re always going to have to evolve, but you have to make sure that you do it your way and actually live what your values are.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n Kaness and Oteh explored how brands can do just that in these turbulent times.<\/p>\n Many brands have a strong value foundation but haven\u2019t done a very good job of sharing it with their customers and the larger world. In fact, even Kaness didn\u2019t know the depth of Goodwill\u2019s mission until he joined the organization. \u201cI always thought of Goodwill as a cool place that you thrift shop and drop off donations,\u201d he said. \u201cBut as I got involved in GoodwillFinds and traveled the country to immerse myself in their culture, [I came to realize] that what they were doing was bringing dignity to people who the economy has overlooked<\/strong> \u2014 individuals who were previously incarcerated, recovering from an addiction, living with a disability or previously homeless.\u201d<\/p>\n Kaness realized that a key role as the head of Goodwill\u2019s new ecommerce venture was to translate that powerful set of values to online consumers eager for secondhand goods. \u201cThe lens that I brought, as an outsider, was how the consumer was interacting with them and the massive amount of growth that was occurring online in the resale arena,\u201d he explained. \u201cWe had to understand how to communicate this 100-year-old legacy and nonprofit values to a younger demographic online.<\/strong> There was a bit of a pivot \u00a0\u2014 it wasn\u2019t just the restating the mission of the charity; it was explaining how Goodwill has been pioneering circularity for 100<\/strong> years and having an impact with consumers, communities and the planet. We had to shift the internal conversation to an external-facing conversation that was commercially relevant.<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n Kaness had a similar experience when he joined Walmart<\/strong> through its acquisition of ModCloth (where he was CEO) in 2017. At the time, he also didn\u2019t know much about the history of Walmart and was surprised to discover the sense of purpose that permeated that company. \u201cYou can see the founder\u2019s fingerprints all over the internal culture in Bentonville, Ark. [where Walmart is headquartered],\u201d he said. \u201cThey love their brand, but they never communicated [the brand vision] externally because Sam Walton despised the media and Wall Street and said, \u2018If we take care of the customer, that will take care of the shareholders.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cThat, to me, is a pre-internet point of view,\u201d Kaness added. \u201cIn this attention economy, you have to participate in the conversation or, as in the case of Walmart, others might fill in a negative narrative.<\/strong> Walmart was doing all this incredible work that nobody knew about, and so in that case, [the job] was to explain the importance of telling the story and being proud of it and having a commitment to it. I think we\u2019ve all seen Walmart the last five years, how they\u2019ve really pushed in the brand marketing funnel in a way that they hadn\u2019t historically.\u201d<\/p>\n Some brands are founded on a clear set of principles and are able to maintain them, often because they find that their founding vision continues to align with consumer demand, as in the case of Patagonia<\/strong>. Sometimes, though, the world changes, consumer opinions shift and brand values need to be modified to account for those evolutions. This was the case at ModCloth, which was one of the first fashion brands to sell plus-size options alongside its other sizes.<\/p>\n \u201c[Founder] Susan Koger had pioneered inclusive fashion in the country before most of the big brands co-opted those words and the marketing and the messaging,\u201d said Kaness. \u201cBut when I got there, the market was confused as to whether ModCloth was a plus-size brand or not.\u201d<\/p>\n Not being a customer himself (given that ModCloth was a women\u2019s brand), Kaness approached the business through the viewpoint of his then-teenaged daughter. \u201cModCloth was the world that I wanted my daughter to live in, and it came to me that what we were really doing was trying to make women of all shapes and sizes feel included<\/strong>,\u201d he said. \u201cBut then it hit me \u2014 if you\u2019re telling half your customer base that we\u2019re identifying you based on the word \u2018plus,\u2019 how does that feel?\u201d<\/p>\n The company retired the term \u201cplus\u201d from its marketing and instead leaned into the inclusivity angle, and \u201csales just took off,\u201d said Kaness.<\/p>\n Identifying a brand\u2019s core set of values is an inherently limiting action, but it\u2019s necessary: a brand that tries to stand for everything will eventually stand for nothing. This was put to the test during Kaness\u2019 time at URBN, when analysts frequently questioned why the company\u2019s Anthropologie <\/strong>brand didn\u2019t expand into men\u2019s and kids like competitors such as J.Crew<\/strong> and Banana Republic<\/strong> had.<\/p>\n \u201cOur founder\u2019s response was, \u2018You don\u2019t understand what we\u2019re doing. Our Anthro customer doesn\u2019t want to be reminded of her husband and her children when she\u2019s shopping in our store,\u2019\u201d recounted Kaness. \u201cYou have to narrowly focus on and know your<\/em> values, but having a narrow focus means saying \u2018no\u2019 to a lot of things<\/strong>,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n At the same time, those brand values need to be present everywhere and in everything: \u201cFrom the consumer\u2019s perspective, your brand values are a promise to them, and you have to make sure that every touch point reinforces that promise<\/strong>.\u201d<\/p>\n Sometimes the pursuit of a brand\u2019s values can lead to practices that make consumers unhappy. Higher prices are one common example. At Shoptalk, the owner of an independent thrift shop raised this question at the session, saying that with the rise of online resale her team is frequently now accused of \u201cgate-keeping\u201d the better products in the store so they can be sold online at a higher price.<\/p>\n Kaness, who also has faced this criticism as he builds GoodwillFinds.com, advised the shop owner to avoid obfuscation and lean into the truth: \u201c[At GoodwillFinds] we\u2019re a charity,\u201d he said. \u201cOur mission is to make as much money off donations so that local charities can provide more support to their communities, and so it\u2019s my fiduciary responsibility to maximize the price and margin I can get for any donation that is given to us. My advice to you, if you\u2019re a nonprofit, is lean into communicating that the reason you\u2019re doing it <\/strong>is just to have more proceeds to support your mission and the community.\u201d<\/p>\n Essentially, \u201cTo thine own self be true,\u201d or put into modern parlance, define what you stand for and then own it, proudly. This tactic also has been central to Gap<\/strong>\u2019s recent turnaround, which has centered on returning that brand to its roots.<\/p>\n Boiled down, Kaness\u2019 ultimate advice is to \u201cfollow the customer,\u201d<\/strong> he said, adding \u201cI\u2019m constantly surprised by the customer, and with all the brands that I\u2019ve worked, one of the throughlines is we always prided ourselves as customer experts.\u201d<\/p>\n Editor\u2019s Note: In an interesting development, particularly considering Kaness\u2019 question that kicked off this story, it appears that GoodwillFinds has ceased operations<\/strong>. It\u2019s no secret that online resale on the lower end of the price point spectrum is challenging to run profitably, and GoodwillFinds faced many of the same challenges as its peers while also contending with the complicated nuances of being a nonprofit and the unique structure of the Goodwill organization. The company has not yet responded to <\/em>Retail TouchPoints\u2019 request for details, but we\u2019ll share more when we know it.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n1. Communication is Key<\/strong><\/h2>\n
2. Don\u2019t be Afraid to Evolve<\/strong><\/h2>\n
3. Have a Narrow Focus, but Broad Appeal<\/strong><\/h2>\n
4. Be Honest and Authentic<\/strong><\/h2>\n