Commerce Beyond Borders

Supply chain used to be treated as a cost center. Hans Elmegaard, who has held leadership roles at Agility, DSV, Maersk/Damco, Panalpina and Scan Global Logistics and is now co-founder and CEO of Moddule, explains why that has changed. Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker talk with him about why knowing when inventory will arrive now matters more than how fast it moves, where AI is delivering value in logistics and where it is still hype, and why retailers need their executives closer to supply chain decisions.   n this episode of Commerce Beyond Borders, hosts Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker speak with Hans Elmegaard, co-founder and CEO of Moddule and a global supply chain executive with experience across Asia, Europe and North America. Hans explains how retail supply chains have shifted from a back-office cost to a strategic advantage, why end-to-end visibility matters more than speed in an unpredictable world, and what it takes for AI to be useful in logistics. Key takeaways Supply chain is now a competitive advantage in retail. Retailers that invested in supply chain technology and flexible formats can keep stock available during a short selling window, while competitors selling the same product cannot. Predictability matters more than speed. Retailers that know where their goods are and when they will arrive can plan. Many still track this manually in spreadsheets, which is costly. Supply chain complexity feels harder partly because it is more visible. Hans notes that supply chain has always been about managing disruption. COVID, tariffs and port delays put it in front of consumers and executives. Chief supply chain officers are joining core decisions. Every organizational change affects the supply chain, so it needs to be part of the decision from the start. AI creates value when it works across fragmented systems. Logistics technology is spread across many systems, and AI can orchestrate workflows between them. Much AI in the industry is still fluff until it is tied to a concrete outcome. Data trust decides how much AI can decide. Today most AI output is a recommendation for a person to act on. Letting AI act on incorrect arrival data is costly. Siloed retail teams hurt the whole chain. Purchasing, shipping, sales and online teams often run on different KPIs. Hans recommends managing end to end, from factory floor to consumer door. Topics covered How retail supply chains changed with e-commerce, new sales channels and global access What COVID taught retailers about their dependence on supply chain Speed versus accuracy and resilience in sourcing Spreading sourcing risk across countries Supply chain as a retail competitive advantage AI, data quality and decision-making in logistics Why executives need to be closer to supply chain operations Frequently asked questions Is supply chain getting harder, or does it just feel harder? Hans Elmegaard says it mostly feels harder because it is more visible. Supply chain has always been about managing disruption, but the public now follows container ship updates. Has supply chain moved from a cost center to a competitive advantage in retail? According to Hans, yes. Retailers that invested in technology and flexible supply chain formats can keep products available when demand is highest. What matters more in retail logistics, speed or predictability? Hans argues predictability. Knowing when inventory will arrive lets retailers plan stock for stores and online, and lets them plan sourcing across multiple countries. Where does AI help in retail supply chains? Hans sees the most value in orchestrating workflows across the many separate systems used in logistics, and in analyzing which data sources are most reliable. He cautions that data quality determines whether AI can make decisions or only recommend them. What is Hans Elmegaard’s advice for retailers? Bring executives closer to supply chain operations, and align purchasing, shipping, sales and online teams on shared end-to-end objectives. About the guest Hans Elmegaard is co-founder and CEO of Moddule, a supply chain visibility platform. Born and raised in Denmark, he previously held roles at Agility (including time based in Hong Kong), DSV (commercial leadership for Asia-Pacific), Maersk/Damco (global head of the retail sector), Panalpina (supply chain solutions) and Scan Global Logistics (CEO of its Scandinavian fulfillment and distribution business). About the hosts Renee Hartmann is a retail strategist, author of Next Generation Retail and a Top 100 ReThink Retail expert. Chris Baker is her co-host on Commerce Beyond Borders.  www.renee-hartmann.com Related topics: retail supply chain, end-to-end supply chain visibility, supply chain as competitive advantage, AI in logistics, chief supply chain officer, global sourcing, ocean freight visibility, retail inventory planning

Most DTC brands pick their channel first and figure out the economics later. Jon Blair, Founder of Free to Grow CFO and founding team member of Guardian Bikes, says that's why so many struggle to scale. Drawing on work with hundreds of e-commerce brands, he joins Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker to break down the three "games" every DTC brand is playing (apparel, durable goods and consumables), why each needs a different playbook for CAC, channels and inventory, and how to tell a durable brand from a temporary arbitrage. Plus: why niche brands with loyal fans win, and how to measure growth across Shopify and Amazon. The easy days of e-commerce are over. Five years after the pandemic-era asset bubble, DTC brands can no longer ride cheap customer acquisition and institutional capital. They have to build real businesses. In this episode, Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker sit down with Jon Blair, Founder of Free to Grow CFO, to talk about what that actually takes. Jon was on the founding team of Guardian Bikes, now a multi-hundred million dollar DTC-only brand, before launching Free to Grow CFO five years ago. His firm has around 30 e-commerce CFOs and accountants and works with about 50 brands at any time, helping them scale from roughly $10 million to $50 million and beyond. Having seen hundreds of brands succeed and fail, Jon has developed a framework for why some scale profitably and others don't. At the heart of it is the idea that every brand is playing one of three "games": the apparel game, the durable goods (first-purchase dominant) game, and the high-LTV consumables game. Each has a different playbook for product expansion, CAC management and channel strategy. For durable goods brands, physical retail is where lifetime value finally shows up, because the retailer becomes the repeat buyer. For consumables, it's subscription and the LTV-to-CAC equation. For apparel, loyalty builds slowly over years, and excess inventory is the silent killer. Jon says 100% of the apparel brands his team audits have too much of it. The conversation also covers why Amazon-first brands often struggle to move into DTC, how marketplace expansion complicates attribution and strains the balance sheet, and why blended cohort models across Shopify, Amazon and TikTok are essential for consumables brands. Jon shares how one client grew from $800K to $5 million a month using this approach. Jon also introduces a key distinction: arbitrage versus durability. Some brands succeed by being early to a nascent product category or ad channel, like AppLovin, but those windows can close within 30 days. His advice: know which game you're playing, and if you're benefiting from an arbitrage, build durability proactively before it disappears. In this episode: Why e-commerce isn't harder, it's just back to business fundamentals How to define a DTC brand today: digitally native vs. brick-and-mortar native The three growth marketing games and their different playbooks The jump from Shopify to Amazon, retailer marketplaces and physical retail Why Amazon-first brands often should skip DTC entirely How successful brands set CAC ceilings and manage acquisition costs The inventory trap in apparel and why clearing it takes 12 to 24 months Spotting arbitrage, and why windows can slam shut in 30 days Why niche brands with raving fans, like a gothic apparel brand for customers in their 40s and 50s, often outperform mass-market plays How founder-led, mission-driven brands achieve exceptional three- and four-year retention What GEO and AI-driven product research mean for brands with long consideration cycles Building blended cohort models across Shopify, Amazon and TikTok Health and wellness consumables, clean beauty and the Grüns story Jon's core advice for founders: you don't choose your product's consumption pattern, so build your business around it About the guest: Jon Blair is the Founder of Free to Grow CFO, a fractional CFO firm specializing in scaling e-commerce brands. He was previously on the founding team of Guardian Bikes. Hosts: Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker, Rethink Retail Top Retail Experts and hosts of Commerce Beyond Borders.

Korea has just 51 million people and a GDP under 2 trillion dollars, yet it was the fifth-largest luxury market in the world in 2023 and continues to export culture, from beauty to fashion to retail experience, at a scale far beyond its size.   On this episode of Commerce Beyond Borders, Renee Hartmann and Chris Baker sit down with Dominika Kustosz-Lee, a Rethink Retail Top Expert for 2025 and 2026 with nearly two decades of experience across Korean e-commerce, luxury, and business development.   They dig into why Korean consumers move as one, how Olive Young became the infrastructure behind K-beauty's rise, why Seongsu is now known as Korea's pop-up capital, and what global brands consistently get wrong when they try to enter the market.

Roshni Nambiar, Senior Director of DTC Analytics & Strategy at Unilever Prestige Group, joins Renee Hartman and Chris Baker to unpack how AI, social commerce, and shifting discovery habits are reshaping the customer journey in beauty and CPG. Roshni brings a rare full-circle view of e-commerce, having built marketing technology at companies like Oracle, run analytics for automotive brands at an agency, and now leading DTC and Amazon analytics across eight luxury beauty brands. In this conversation, she breaks down why the path to purchase has become a "zigzag line" with no predictable pattern, how TikTok and Instagram are outpacing legacy retail channels in growth, and why content, not tactics, is becoming the new currency of discovery as AI search and generative engine optimization take hold. The conversation also digs into where agent-to-agent commerce is heading, what that means for brand loyalty and lifetime value, and why first-party data and a solid attribution model remain the anchor points brands need no matter how fast the landscape shifts. In this episode: Why the post-pandemic e-commerce boom slowed in early 2025 and what's driving the rebound How TikTok and Instagram evolved from content platforms into product discovery and social commerce engines The difference between impulse-driven buying in color cosmetics versus retention in skincare Why authentic content, not SEO tactics, is becoming the key to visibility in AI-driven search Where the line sits between useful AI-generated content and content that backfires with consumers How agent-to-agent commerce could change the role of brand websites and reshape customer loyalty Why CAC to LTV ratio remains a non-negotiable fundamental, even as checkout increasingly moves to AI bots How fragmented discovery and checkout across platforms is breaking traditional attribution models Why clean first-party data is now essential for segmentation, personalization, and predictive analytics About Roshni Nambiar Roshni Nambiar is Senior Director of DTC Analytics & Strategy at Unilever Prestige Group, where she leads customer analytics across .com and Amazon for a portfolio of eight luxury beauty brands. She previously led analytics for an automotive marketing agency and spent time at Oracle and various startups building marketing automation, CRM, and customer loyalty platforms.

Guest: Casey Lau, EVP at Web Summit and Co-founder of Startups HK Casey Lau has spent close to 30 years in Hong Kong building community at the intersection of startups, tech, and global innovation. As EVP at Web Summit — which runs flagship events in Lisbon, Vancouver, Rio de Janeiro, and Doha — he has a rare vantage point on tech ecosystems around the world. He is also co-founder of Startups HK, a pillar of the startup community in Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area. In this episode Casey joins Renee and Chris fresh from a month-long tech tour across five Chinese cities — Shenzhen, Chongqing, Hangzhou, Beijing, and Shanghai — his first time back on the mainland since before the pandemic. What we cover: Casey's global view from Web Summit — why the only race that really matters right now is US versus China, and why Europe is watching from the sidelines What shocked Casey most about returning to China in 2026 — from frictionless payments to the sheer pace of change on the ground Inside the Geely/Zeekr factory — a dark factory the size of a city block with 1,000 people doing last-mile work while robots assemble cars that were ordered online just days earlier China's generative video AI scene — why MiniMax, Seedance, Kling, and Alibaba's Happy Horse are the models people aren't talking about enough in the West Pop Mart Land in Beijing — why Casey thinks Labubu has barely scratched the surface globally, and what a full-scale Pop Mart theme park looks like in practice The F&B wave coming West — Heytea, Mixue, Luckin, and why Luckin buying Blue Bottle could spell real trouble for Starbucks Why China is forward-looking and the West is backward-looking — and what that means for the pace of innovation and adoption Chinamaxxing — why everyone at Web Summit Lisbon wanted to talk about China, and what the cultural shift toward Chinese brands, food, and culture means for global commerce The one through line across every category Casey visited: speed of iteration that no one else in the world can match

Host Renee Hartman interviews Mohaimina (Mina) Haque, CEO of Tony Roma’s, about the brand’s international franchise operations and adoption of AI and robotics.   Haque, a lawyer who led due diligence during the pandemic acquisition and later became CEO, discusses key differences in the restaurant industry including razor-thin margins and post-pandemic labor and supply cost pressures, leading Tony Roma’s to a localized, market-by-market approach for pricing, supply, and menus while keeping core items like ribs consistent. She describes what makes strong franchisees—capitalization, operational skill, and adaptability—and notes Tony Roma’s footprint of 42 units in 22 countries, with interest in expanding further, including Africa.   Haque details pilot robot runners in Carson, CA and Durham, NC, emphasizing efficiency plus human service, and outlines her AI philosophy: open-minded adoption as a productivity tool, strong critical thinking, and careful screening of outputs.   00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 00:41 From Lawyer to CEO 02:16 Restaurant Industry Reality Check 05:04 Localizing Pricing and Supply 07:36 Choosing Winning Franchisees 09:03 Global Footprint and Lessons 10:12 Core Menu and Brand Nostalgia 12:49 Robots in the Dining Room 16:15 Getting Franchisees to Try Tech 18:34 AI Philosophy and Rollout 21:20 AI Adoption and Quality Control 23:31 Where AI Helps Most Today 24:56 Whats Next for Tony Romas 26:50 Closing and Subscribe

Dr. Sumit Mitra is CEO of Tesco Business Solutions and Tesco India, overseeing a team that spans payroll and finance to AI, property, supply chain, and customer contact — serving 90 million shopping trips a week. In this episode he gives us an inside look at how Tesco is applying AI across the business, what's actually delivering results, and what India's retail revolution is signalling for the rest of the world. We cover: What Tesco Business Solutions actually does — and why the CEO calls it Tesco's key competitive differentiator How Tesco structures AI into three buckets and why prioritisation matters more than technology The 50K / 60-day rule: how they cut failing projects before ego gets in the way Real AI use cases delivering triple-digit million returns in cash flow and personalisation Why AI for operations means reimagining the whole process, not automating a step India's leap from kirana stores straight to quick commerce — and what's driving it Whoosh, Tesco's 30-minute delivery service, already a £400M business Omnisol: how Tesco is now taking its proprietary AI tools to market for other retailers Guest: Dr. Sumit Mitra, CEO, Tesco Business Solutions & Tesco India Hosts: Renee Hartmann & Chris Baker

Most companies are pretty good at writing strategies. Far fewer are good at executing them. That gap — and what to do about it — is exactly what Kevin Ertell has spent his career studying, and now he's written the book on it. Kevin brings a rare perspective to this conversation. He started as a clerk at Tower Records and worked his way up to Senior Vice President over 20 years. From there he held senior roles at Borders, Sur La Table, and Nike, where he led digital and retail operations globally. He has seen strategy succeed and fail at every level of an organisation. His new book, The Strategy Trap: Why Companies Fail at Execution and How to Get It Right, lays out a six-part framework he calls the Six Cs, built around two phases: setting the stage (co-creation, clarity, capacity) and showtime (communication, coordination, coaching). In this episode Kevin, Chris and Renee dig into why execution breaks down, what leaders consistently get wrong, and why the first step of execution is actually writing the strategy itself. They also get into the role of outside consultants, how OKRs done right can transform alignment, and why stack ranking priorities beats high-medium-low every time. Plus the NASA janitor story. You'll want to hear that one. Key takeaways: Strategy writing is the first step of execution, not a precursor to it Co-creation drives commitment — the IKEA effect is real Capacity has to be created before a strategy is launched, not found along the way Communication should be early, loud, and continuous The bigger the organisation, the more structured the approach needs to be — but smaller organisations need it too The Strategy Trap is available now on Amazon.

What does it take to turn around 12 supermarkets during a COVID lockdown? Or build a centralized logistics operation under economic sanctions? João Correia has spent 25 years solving retail operations challenges across four continents—from Ghanaian supermarkets to Iranian department stores to Paraguayan wholesale operations. In this episode, João shares hard-won lessons about what actually drives store performance: it's not the latest AI tool, it's disciplined execution of operational fundamentals. We discuss stock visibility challenges when supply chains stretch three months, why real-time store performance matters more than post-visit surveys, and how technology should remove friction—not create it. Key Topics: Why operational excellence is becoming a competitive advantage while competitors chase AI The critical difference between reported experience and real experience on the shop floor How to implement technology in resource-constrained environments (and what that teaches us about priorities) Store execution fundamentals that work across markets: expiry date management, standards compliance, workflow efficiency Change management lessons from converting stores, building logistics networks, and implementing new systems across different cultures The role of technology in empowering frontline teams vs. replacing them Guest Bio: João Correia is a retail operations veteran with nearly 30 years of experience across Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and South America. He's led turnarounds, store conversions, and logistics operations for retailers including SPAR, Primark, and Media Markt. His experience spans grocery retail, hypermarkets, supermarkets, convenience stores, and wholesale operations in markets including Portugal, Angola, Nigeria, Ghana, Iran, Malta, and Paraguay. Key Quotes: "AI and all the tech tools that are there come to improve the ecosystem in a way that they remove all the friction and give people the tools to provide a better service." "You might have the best product, you might have the best stores, you might have the best decor in the stores. Everything fails if the human factor doesn't deliver." "Retail is process. Retail is discipline. The truth happens on the floor—where real experience occurs." "Back to the basics will be a competitive advantage in the future, in my opinion."  

Why are both international luxury brands and established Chinese players losing market share to local upstarts? In this episode, we sit down with Xiaofeng Gu, founder of Jingzhi Chronicle, to explore the rise of China's challenger brands—and why this disruption is about innovation, not nationalism. From TCM-powered skincare to EVs with business-class lie-flat seats, these brands are leveraging China's manufacturing agility, deep consumer understanding, and mastery of decentralized media to outcompete legacy players. Xiaofeng shares insights on 8 brands redefining what "Made in China" means—and why this is a preview of what's coming globally. Key Topics Discussed: Why the "international brand halo effect" has disappeared in China Three key drivers of challenger brand success: product innovation, emotional connection, and communication mastery How post-COVID values shifted Chinese consumer priorities The role of globally-trained founders in building sophisticated local brands Why Chinese brands are winning on quality, not just price How TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) is being elevated into luxury beauty The future of Chinese brands on the global stage Featured Brands: HERBEAST - TCM-powered skincare with reishi mushroom innovation SONGMONT - Luxury accessories (one of only two stores Bernard Arnault visited in China) AVATR - Luxury EV collaboration between Huawei, Great Wall Motors & CATL TO SUMMER - Fragrance house putting Chinese ingredients on the global perfumery map LUCKIN COFFEE - Efficiency-driven coffee brand now expanding to the US DOCUMENTS - Fragrance and agarwood jewelry brand MAOGEPING - Color cosmetics combining professional artistry with accessible services YUSUMTONG - Innovative tea/lifestyle brand Guest: Xiaofeng Gu is the founder of Jingzhi Chronicle, a media platform covering China's emerging luxury, beauty, and lifestyle brands. With deep expertise in the Chinese consumer landscape, Xiaofeng brings unique insights into how local brands are disrupting both international and established Chinese players. Hosts: Renee Hartmann - Globally recognized retail strategist, Fractional CMO, and author of "Next Generation Retail" Chris Baker - Retail and commerce expert with extensive Asia-Pacific experience Key Quotes: "Being an international brand doesn't automatically give you trust anymore. That halo effect has more or less disappeared. You have to prove yourself." - Xiaofeng Gu "Innovative Chinese brands proved they're just as safe, just as effective—and they understand consumers better." - Xiaofeng Gu "Chinese consumers are very smart. They understand a lot of products from international brands are actually made in China. So they're asking: if Chinese brands and international brands use the same source and manufacturing capability, why are you asking for so much more?" - Xiaofeng Gu Resources Mentioned: Jingzhi Chronicles Bernard Arnault's recent China visit Takeaways: ✓ Chinese challenger brands are disrupting based on innovation and consumer understanding, not nationalism ✓ The "international = better" perception has evaporated among Chinese consumers ✓ Product innovation speed, emotional connection, and owning communication channels are key differentiators ✓ This isn't just a China story—it's a preview of global disruption to come ✓ International brands must prove value and can no longer rely on heritage alone