Transcript - Fanny Damiette
SEASON 3, EPISODE 7
Conversation with Fanny Damiette, CMO, The Webster
Fanny Damiette: Retail Revolution, a unique podcast that features in-depth conversations with guest experts in omnichannel retailing, with myriad perspectives: technology, consumer engagement, data analytics, merchandising, and more. You pay special attention to current sociopolitical issues and challenges and their implications on fashion retail as well as opportunities to innovate and rethink retail's future. Visit RetailRevolutionPodcast.com for more information, including full transcripts. And follow us on Instagram and LinkedIn @RetailRevolutionPodcast.
Retail Revolution is produced by Joshua Williams and hosted by Christopher Lacy, both are Assistant Professors in the Fashion Management graduate program at Parsons School of Design.
Christopher Lacy: Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of Retail Revolution podcast. I'm your host, Christopher Lacy. And today with me, I have a very, very special guest. She has spent 15 years building her international experience in branding, creative and marketing leadership. She has done consulting with startups and industry leading companies.
Currently, she is the CMO at The Webster, a US-based high luxury retail platform known for its unique identity and very strong brand assortment. There, she oversees all creative and digital marketing as well as brand strategy. I would like to welcome to the show, Fanny Damiette.
Fanny Damiette: Hi there. Hi. Thank you for having me.
Christopher Lacy: Thank you, Fanny, for coming on. Please tell me, I said your last name appropriately.
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely! That was amazing. Amazing pronunciation. Well done.
Christopher Lacy: Yay, there we go. So, Fanny, can you tell our listeners a bit about you?
Fanny Damiette: Yes. So, obviously with that last name and that accent, I am French, from France, from Paris, more precisely. I grew up there, but then got the travel bug. So, I lived in a lot of different countries, including all across Europe, China, Canada, and now here in the US; I'm in New York.
I worked for a long time, almost 10 years, as a consultant, having various interests in different industry, but mostly working with big banks and big real estate conglomerates, in Europe.
So, not like the most glamorous from the outside, but I guarantee you, it was very fun and very rewarding. And after that, I started thinking about what is the most challenging industry out there. And, I happened at the time to work with Galeries Lafayette, which is a French department store, huge one. And, they had so many interesting challenges that I thought that fashion would be a great industry to focus on. So, I got my MBA at the, kind of like the French equivalent of Parsons. It's called Institute Française de la Mode. It's a management and creative school that creates a lot of opportunities for students.
So, I got my MBA there and got a taste of NYC because my school had a partnership with Poly U in Hong Kong, but also FIT, here in New York. So, I got to come here, work with American students at FIT. It was really interesting. So, I really liked the New York vibe and the New York energy. And I decided at that point that I wanted, at some point, to land in here. And didn't know how; I didn't have a big network in fashion. So, that's also a thing that I want to put out there is that you can decide to work in fashion, even though you don't know anybody, because I did it.
And I come from, banking and consulting so, that's quite a gap. And I got my MBA and shortly afterwards, I was on the SSENSE website, browsing expensive products and I saw a job advertising for a director of brand strategy. So, it so happened that's exactly what I did before. I did brand strategy as a consultant. So, I applied and got the job, weirdly, and really established basically, SSENSE's brand identity and the whole content marketing, creative, operations over there. It was really, really exciting. It was such a rewarding environment.
It's like working in a tech company that sells the dopest fashion out there. So, it was just one of the best three years of my life, for sure. And after that, I moved to New York finally to work at Totokaelo and in Supply as the VP of brand and marketing strategy, and then moved on to The Webster where I am right now as the chief marketing officer.
So, it's been a very cool journey so far. I learn tons from each of my professional experiences. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to whatever happens in the future.
Christopher Lacy: You have such an exciting career trajectory. And hearing you talk about it; it makes me think of some of our previous guests. Not many have actually really started in the fashion industry or knowing that's what they wanted to do. And we've had quite a few come from the finance industry. And it's amazing to see the thought methodology for banking and finance, and then applying that in the fashion industry. And it makes me think for you, I mean, you're not new into it. Like now you're in it. You're into fashion retail. What are the most significant changes that you're starting to see in this industry? Especially someone who, didn't start in this industry.
Fanny Damiette: Yes. So, it's interesting. I would say because without patting myself on the back, I think because of my profile, I have a lot of perspective on fashion.
I'm not, yes, I'm in it, you know, now, for the past six years, but I actually have still kind of like a bit of a distance with it. And I look at it like sideways, not really like front and center. So, some of the, changes that I see right now, I feel like I see them because I'm a foreigner and I'm here in the U.S., So I have this kind of always looking at it with a cultural decoder. And I don't come from the industry, so I worked with banking. Obviously, we mentioned that. But also, I worked with food. I worked with industry like heavy industry companies. So, I have this kind of like broad scope. And what I see right now is that fashion is kind of leading the way, in terms of consumer changes. So, what we see right now in fashion will impact down the line, all the other industries. And it's always been that way if you look closely.
And as we know right now, everything is fashion, right? Like music is fashion. Food is fashion. Everything is fashion. So, fashion is broader than just clothing. It's amazing how, when you understand everything that's going on in fashion, you'll basically understand consumer behavior as a whole.
So, in terms of changes, I would say the first thing that really, really strikes me and kind of like accelerated with COVID; I see a rise in individuality, but not in a bad way. Individuality used to be loaded with so many bad, kind of like you're selfish, you’re only interested in your own topic, or in your own style, or whatever. And I see right now the individuality that's rising, it's more of self-expression. It's more self-creativity. It's basically using your body and your face and your hair and your clothing as a canvas to express who you are. And what it means for fashion, that trends are kind of dying a little bit.
Obviously, if you look globally, there are still trends, but they're not really fashion trends. They are more like society trends and health trends and other things, but they're not actual fashion trends. Fashion happens to be kind of like a precursor of what's coming up, but trends as we used to know them, are dying. What we see right now is more individual style, more self-expression, more personalization even. And we'll talk about that later, I guess, but this is one of the major changes I see. And I would say another change that comes from that, is also that retailers, especially in America, we have big retailers, large chains, right? Like, so we have department stores that are gigantic and, all of that was kind of like an era in the U.S retail sector. But right now, what we see is the rise of smaller brands, smaller boutiques. And why, why is that? It's because according to me, there is a shift between: we used to talk, one to many.
So, you used to have, let's say Macy's. And Macy's would just talk to their customer like there would be a mass of very homogeneous, kind of a group from Macy's to all the customers from Macy's. And that used to be kind of like the narrative and the relationship that was going on. But now what we see in retail and especially in luxury, is that that conversation becomes more of a one-to-one. Or, even like a many-to-one. So, what happens now is that the customer has more say in what we do, or what we say, or what we focus on. They basically ask for more. They ask for more engagement from our side, to know what is our mission? What are you sending for exactly? What do you care about? What are your values? So, there is a different relationship that's being established between people and brands; and obviously retail it's caught up in there as well.
Christopher Lacy: There's so much I want to unpack from what you've said there, because every single sentence was meaningful. We talk about individuality. And if we think about how subcultures came about and really took main stage in the fashion industry, it was based in individuality, right?
Fanny Damiette: Exactly.
Christopher Lacy: Yeah. It wasn't about anything mainstream. And a lot of times it was really just based on social economic concerns. Like this is all we could afford to wear and so that's why we're wearing it this way.
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely.
Christopher Lacy: It looked cool. Right. So, with individuality, when you layer on top of that authenticity, and then you go, we're in retail and fashion and to your point, fashion has influenced everything else. I mean, there's photographers for food now to make it look really cool and fashionable.
Fanny Damiette: Yeah, yeah exactly.
Christopher Lacy: And I think, you know, one of our students last year, his project was "Would I still be fashionable if I removed all the clothing from my closet?" And it's a really great question to ask yourself, is what is it that actually makes me fashionable? I think what you're bringing up here is, as a retailer, you have individuality, you have authenticity that needs to happen within that. And you're not talking to the group, you're talking to a person. How do you successfully do that now in retail? I mean, I feel like that's the question everyone talks about, they say personalization, but do you think it's really happening out there?
Fanny Damiette: That's such the million-dollar question, especially for The Webster and I'll get back to that in a sec, but it is the million-dollar question.
And to me, one of the guiding principles is integrity. And that means that, respecting the integrity of the customer, but also respecting our integrity, a retailer and as a brand. And what it means is that, it requires a high level of self-awareness. It requires to know exactly what we want to accomplish in this world. And in this lifetime, what is our mission as a retailer? Obviously, you know, bringing in revenue, but what's beyond that? What kind of like message are we trying to convey to society, to our customers, to, young people? And it's kind of like this bigger story around integrity. For me, it's, really important because authenticity is a word that unfortunately has been commoditized a lot, I feel. Because it has been thrown so much by my crowd, which is the marketing crowd, you know, here and there. And like everywhere, everybody was talking about authenticity, which if you look really doesn't mean anything, you know, because you can be authentic and lying.
You know, to me integrity is more important than authenticity. So yeah, to me, integrity is kind of like the nerve for all of that. And so how, how do you do that on the day-to-day? It's very complicated, and I don't think any of us is there yet. But one thing that is important when you look at personalization and trying to respect the integrity of your customer and to establish that relationship, is the leverage that you can get with data. And I know it's a dirty word right now, especially because of all the privacy concerns and everything that's happening. But, one thing really essential, I think to understand, is that nothing that is happening right now is new or should shock anyone. What people want is to be heard, to be understood and for brands or service providers, or to answer those needs and those expectations to solve those problems and those issues. To add value to their life in one way or another. When you keep that in mind, you can approach anything with that integrated mindset that I mentioned before, and you can establish a real authentic, here's that word, authentic relationship between brands and companies and customers, and even institutions. So, understanding your customer is key, and this is where I bring up data and technology, because once you decide that you want to understand your customer, a very easy way to do it is to obviously talk to them and whatnot. But when you scale really quickly and you have, your customer base is millions and millions, how do you do that? Well, you dive into data. And this is where data is very useful. If you see behaviors that are trending on your platform then, you know, "Oh, maybe I need to create this kind of product or this kind of services."
So, this would be a way, I would say data technology, definitely a help in huge understanding the customer to be able to establish that relationship and respect everybody's integrity. So, that would be one.
And the second thing, which is a little bit more, I would say intangible is also the point of view, right? To me, it's very important. As a retailer, and even more so in the luxury world, you have to be very, very clear on your point of view. Because one thing that's and, you know, any customer will not forgive you for is like if you waste their time, because time is the only scarcity, it's this the only thing you can't buy with money, the only thing you can't make up for. Time is the most valuable thing we have. And so, if you waste a customer's time, they will hate you forever. So, one thing you have to do, your duty as a company, and even more so as a retailer is to make it very clear what you stand for and what your point of view on fashion is. So, this is something that I love with SSENSE and Totokaelo before, and now The Webster, is that those companies those brands are very clear on their point of view. What it is that they are trying to convey what it is that they're trying to sell to you, what it is, the story they want to tell you. It's crystal clear and I can think of two luxury retailers that are more different than SSENSE and The Webster. And yet, to me, it's very clear that both add value to the world, to the customer's life, and even to the fashion industry, because both of them explore the very narrow, but the very deep vertical, that is their point of view. So, you know, someone who lands on the homepage of The Webster, or the homepage of SSENSE, immediately knows if they are attracted to it or not.
And I used to say to my team back at SSENSE, what we want to avoid basically is being meh, you know, being kind of like in the middle. You want to be loved or you want to be hated.
Christopher Lacy: I always say that.
I always say that.
Fanny Damiette: I know and it's true. It's true.
Christopher Lacy: There's nothing worse than being lukewarm.
Fanny Damiette: Exactly, I hate it. And I feel like The Webster also conveys that, it's like you land on it or you step into our Soho store or our Los Angeles store or Miami store. You immediately know if you hate it or you love it.
It's instant. And I think this is successful because that's how you respect the customer's integrity and yours and kind of like set the expectations, this is what you can expect from us. And what's great with that, to tie it back to your initial question. This is a very, very long answer, but to tie it back to your question basically, is that when the stage is very clear on what's we're here for, right? When you understand what I stand for, what my point of view is, what my curation is going to be about. I kind of did already have the work in terms of personalization because we already know we're speaking the same language we already know we're looking for the same thing. So, now all I need to is establish a rapport with you, establish a dialogue, and that can come through different channels. It can come obviously through a physical channel in the store with my stylist. It can come from online. It can come from the data. It can come from social media. It can come from a lot of places, but setting the stage is very, very important for personalization ultimately. So, personalization to me is not like drawing on a handbag. That's not personalization. Personalization is understanding who we are talking to and being aligned; what we care about, our values.
Christopher Lacy: The note that you make there of personalization is not about drawing on a handbag. And we've seen over and over again where it is this idea where it's about making product personalized.
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: Really, it's about how do you make the customer's journey personalized?
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: You made this statement just a moment ago and you brought up your stores, your brick and mortar locations, and there's always the talk about brick and mortar, drives me crazy because brick and mortar is something that is always necessary. It will always be there, but it will change. And I want to know for you, in the CMO role, you've got digital that you're thinking about, and you're also trying to drive traffic to the stores. How do you make this a comprehensive journey that feels personalized to the audience?
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely. It's the second holy grail questions that you asked me. A lot of ten million-dollar questions. Okay.
Christopher Lacy: I mean it you've got that mind on you.
Fanny Damiette: I mean, I love it. Don't get me wrong. I love a challenge. So, I think one of the interesting things also to understand, right from the get-go with this is like omni-channel has been, something that, it's funny because from a marketing perspective, it's kind of like a scam. Because what happens and I saw that a few years ago, starting when I was working with department stores, is that they think that omni-channel is basically enabling the customer to see their purchasing history, from, the store and online. Or, you know, to be able to offer a coupon that works both online and in the store. It's not omni-channel. What I just did describe is omni-channel but for the retailer is making the retailer's life easier, it's making the retailer's understanding of the customer easier. It's not making the customer's life easier at all.
Customers don't care about seeing their history, their purchase history online in the store. It doesn't really matter. So, this is very kind of like first degree omni-channel.
I would say for us, what's interesting and what we've kind of like established already, is that you can't expect the store experience and the online experience to be the same.
So, don't even try to do that. Instead, create a complimentary system. Compliment the physical experience with a digital experience and vice versa. There's a big group of customers that will never go on our website. And there's probably a big group of customers that will never go in our stores. And that's okay, because they don't expect the same level of engagement or attention from one channel to the other. They don't expect to see the same offering. They don't expect to see the same merchandising. They don't expect even content, to learn about the same things, et cetera. And when we talk about The Webster., It's even more interesting because we even do that on a store level. And if you're listeners, if some of them live in LA, I invite them to go to our store In LA and then, if they go on vacation, let's say in Miami, I invite them to go to our Miami store. And they'll see. Our Miami store, the one that we have in South Beach, is an Art Deco, beautiful building, several stories. It used to be a hotel; it's magnificent. But then, the one that we have in LA, it's built by Sir David Adjaye who is a British Guinea architect, it's all made in pink concrete. It has this brutalist vibe to it. It's, very striking. And its pink concrete. It's nothing is further from Art Deco than that, and so what's interesting is that even with our architecture and our physical stores, we try to create something that was always very unique and add something, add a layer to, or facet, if you prefer to The Webster brand. So, we're not trying to make something, like a nice straight line for everything, for us to, be easy to understand, we're trying to understand our customer's mind and what they want to see. They don't want to see the same thing. They don't want to see the same architecture. They don't want to see the same product when they are in our Soho store, or when they are in our Los Angeles store.
So, to me successfully understanding that, is basically already putting the right things in place to build an a real omni-channel relationship.
Christopher Lacy: I'm glad you said that because this is one of those things where the digital experience should always be consistent no matter what, right?
But there is that idea where the physical presence needs to speak to what's happening locally, and in that community and in that place. Because when we travel and hopefully, we'll all be able to travel extensively soon. The enjoyment of being in a new place is also seeing how a retail brand has taken their vision from that same place and made something work with it.
You know, while I love Apple, it's great. Like I know that I can go to any Apple store. Pretty much every Apple store will look the same. It'll be the same. But I think when it comes to like really fashion retail, the excitement is, if you go to Spain, it looks different than if you go to that same store in LA or in Miami. And that's exciting, right? And that in and of itself really is also a different level of personalization.
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely. And that's, the reason why people love to go to Japan or China, because those cultures are so different from the Western culture, that you understand how a brand can explore their identity in a very, very different way.
And especially with luxury brands it's amazing when you go to a Louis Vuitton flagship or Chanel flagship over there, it's very, very different. And that's so cool. That's exactly why we love going there. So, I don't understand why standardize at some point was the way to go, but I'm glad that we came back from that.
Christopher Lacy: Yes, yes. Standardization was a big thing quite some time, because it was like, let's, make it easy. Let's make it simple. Let's make it to where people know that it's us. But there is something to being able to do that and still holding onto the creativity of your identity.
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely. And I think also it ties back to kind of this, realization maybe that brands are multifaceted just like customers. And that you don't have to say the same thing over and over again, the same way. Right? So, you can use different things to communicate different facets of yourself. So yeah definitely.
Christopher Lacy: Exactly.
Now when we talk about, driving that business to stores and what a store should look like, the retail atmosphere, the other part I want to talk about is the business side of it, which is there's metrics for everything. Right? And to your earlier point, we look at a lot of data.
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: Bad word.
So, for you as a CMO what metrics are you looking at when you're thinking, okay, we need to start driving business to this store, or to this area. What are kind of the things that you go, this is the report I need to look at. This is what's important to me right now.
Fanny Damiette: Yes. So, I would say it's very different for me right now, because The Webster is very high luxury, right? So, we are probably looking at very, very different metrics than a mid-level luxury, or even like a more accessible retailer. And I would look at different metrics if I work at The Gap, then working at The Webster. And I would say for The Webster what's important to me and my team is to look at the qualitative aspects of things.
So, not necessarily, you know, did we, increase the number of hits on, Google search? Or did we get more traffic on the website or in the store? Those are cool. Don't get me wrong, love those. But, they're not necessary telling the story that I'm interested in. The main story I'm interested in is, am I turning this individual into a fan of The Webster is this person from now on completely, like enamored with my brand? Do they always want more from The Webster basically is what I want to find out? And for that I would look in a more qualitative way and less quantitative way.
For example, time spent on certain pages of my website, or how much time this person stayed in the store. That's something that I want to know because the longer they stay, the more in love with the brand they are obviously. So, to me that's a good one.
And another one that's a little bit more of a long time term metric is lifetime value, because it tells me yes, of course, like, you know, revenue, what I can expect and whatnot, but also it tells me like, is this person thinking of tThe Webster as a lifestyle destination? Meaning that they're going to buy, you know, their fragrance and then they're going to buy their kids new sweater, and then their husband's trousers and then a dress for herself? Or is my customer just a one-dimension customer? She comes because she knows I got the latest Chanel and then she buys her Chanel and she flees. So, I want to understand what role I'm playing in this customer's life and lifetime value can be a good one. Because again, I go back to the same thing, and I'm so sorry for repeating the same thing, but I'm all about that relationship. I want to establish that relationship with the customer. So, if I see that obviously the more interaction, she has with us, so frequency, and the more time she spends with us, I know that her lifetime value is going to increase, obviously. So, that's kind of like the key metric to me, but obviously to reach that metric of lifetime value, I need to look at her frequency. I need to look at her time spent and et cetera. So, yeah, it's a little bit of a long-winded answer, but that's kind of like what I look at.
Christopher Lacy: I think that's a perfect segue into this, which is because lifetime value is extremely important. And I remember looking at lifetime value a lot. But one of the things, when we talk about lifetime value, we talk about relationships; the relationship with the brand. Customers also have relationships with their associate population, or the store leaders.
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: Quite often, I think over the years, we've seen where corporate has this disconnect from their retail stores. And it creates a level of frustration between store line and what's happening in corporate.
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: And I want to ask for you, how often are you able to reach out to your store teams to really start getting a concept of how the customer is engaging? And is it important to you to do that? I'm asking that because also when we talk about diversity, we think of diversity just in terms of gender or race. But I think of it as an organization needs diverse voices.
Fanny Damiette: Yes.
Christopher Lacy: And I think that's really, what I want to get to with you is understanding how you make that happen.
Fanny Damiette: Yeah, that's a very good question. And my answer, you're not going to like, because specificity with The Webster is that it is born out of a physical store.
So, to this day we're still very much geared towards that. So, we look at our stores a lot. We follow our store's lead a lot. The store currently even dictates the buy in a certain way. So, we're very, very focused on brick and mortar, actually way more than any other luxury retailer out there, I would say.
Christopher Lacy: I love that answer!
Fanny Damiette: Yeah? Okay, good. Because I'm not bringing key solutions here because we actually already do it naturally. That's the thing, that's the secret. And, our founder Laure, Laure Hériard Dubreuil, for those who don't know her. She was the one who built this whole point of view and this whole curation. And when she thought about The Webster way back, she's saw a store in her head, and she saw a store with very specific features that she couldn't find anywhere else. So, and when I say features, for example, she thought, when I look at my closet, I don't think about, Oh, I want to wear Dior today. It's not the way a customer thinks. Like the way she thinks as a person who wants to get dressed in the morning is like, do I want to wear black or red, today? And she was like, why are the stores not organized that way? I don't understand it. So, it was organized by brand. Nobody cares about the brand because obviously you're a luxury store, you have a killer selection. Obviously, we don't need to know, like before we see the product. So, she thought about this visual merchandising that would be based on color and on mood and on styles rather than on brands. And even something quite essential like that was not done before her.
So, that's just to tell you how we think about everything through that physical retail lens. Because that's the way she thinks. And that's the way she trained everybody in this company. And that's still to this day, even when we conceive marketing communication like newsletters or Instagram, we always think in the way of the customer. She doesn't want to buy, like, it's not like you wake up in the morning and you say, I want to buy Dior. You wake up in the morning and you want to full outfit and you want to feel inspired. You want to tell yourself a little story. You want to show something about yourself. So, do you feel like a glamazon vibe today? Or do you feel more romantic? Or do you feel more formal and corporate? What kind of story do you want to tell today? And this is how are we going to help you tell that story? So, everything from the most basic newsletter to our physical stores is geared toward telling that story, sending a little dream almost to our customer. Every time they want to hit their closet, they want to have fun. It shouldn't be a chore; it should be fun.
Christopher Lacy: It should be fun. And that's the thing that I always think sometimes we lose sight of in the retail industry, is most of us who work in retail, we love the business aspect of it but there is a joy to our day that's a bit different than what I think most people experience on a day. And we know this because when you say you're working in the fashion industry, like people's eyes light up and they're like, Oh my gosh. And you're like, I didn't go to a runway show so relax. Like that's not--I got yelled at by somebody! But you know, I mean, there's something romantic that people think about it. And so there still should be that fun to it.
And there are many people who do want to step into this field, right. Or step into this field of retail marketing. And for you, what would you give someone advice, what do they need to do to really learn and understand retail marketing as it is now? And I, this, especially because we're dealing with economic upheaval; we have a lot of unrest that's happening on many fronts, a lot's going on. The topic is always client acquisition, while also trying to retain clients during economic challenges. If you were coming into this industry right now, as a marketer, what would you do? What would you tell somebody else to do?
Fanny Damiette: Yes, that's such a good question. I think one of the key things to understand is that, as I said before, fashion is everywhere, but also branding is everywhere and that's my background. I come from branding. And I realized that everything is brand. Every kind of like signal that you send is a brand signal. And, it can be something as, simple, as the shipping box in which, you know, you receive your goods, the hang tag or, so I'm talking about packaging for some reason, but it could be, you know, everything, even the caption on your Instagram.
So, the first thing to understand is that everything is branding, and the customer doesn't see just the store, doesn't see just the Instagram post. They see everything. They see all of it at the same level. So, consistency is key and understanding that is, definitely a huge, it's already kind of being steps ahead.
The second thing I would say for a new marketer in this realm would be to understand how to listen. And that's valid for listening to customer, as well as listening to the team that you work with, being the retail team, the warehouse team, all the teams that you work with. Because marketing is not, done with the Proctor and Gamble, early way of marketing. It's not about pushing a product down somebody's throat and then hoping that at some point it gets so tired of you that they just buy it. It's not. We live in a world of abundance where there's a lot of products and brands out there. So, the service that marketing is right now is helping people make a choice and make the right choice. we went from, from, trying to jam everything into, into one neat package for people to, you know, so it's, it's kind of like, this is the detergent you need, to being like, this is what my detergent, what kind of benefits it will add to your life. My detergent is, I don't know why it talk about detergent, but my detergent is good to the environment and is good to your skin. And it also takes care of your washing machine. So, you should probably buy this one if you care about those three things. But if you don't like, please do not buy my detergent. And it's kind of like the story right now. You can't force yourself into somebody's life. And I think that that's, I mean, you know, normally-
Christopher Lacy: That says a lot for a lot of things, even outside of fashion. So, I'm just going to-
Fanny Damiette: Exactly yeah. When I was saying that I realized what I was saying I was like, yeah, normally you can't, but apparently there are ways! So, when you're well-meaning you can't do that.
So, what you need to do is like, how can I help my customer. And how can I help the people who don't know I exist and who don't know I can actually make their life easier, funnier, whatever it is that you provide? And I would say listening is going to be key in that. Listening to, putting your ear on the ground and kind of like understanding the weak signal that maybe later will become strong signal, kind of trying to anticipate what your customers and what your team need in the immediate future, but also in the long-term. So, I would say listening is a very undervalued skill.
And I want to say something quite funny. When I was, especially when I was a consultant, but even still to this day, one thing I do is I read a lot of self-help books because I found that when you know a lot about human psychology, it's actually amazing what kind of insight it brings to you as a marketer. So, for example, let's say you read something around depression; it's a fun topic. You read something about depression, and you know, how people get out of depression, blah, blah, blah, all of that stuff. And what's interesting is that okay, you understand the triggers, you understand fear, you understand anxiety. How is that playing in your context as a retailer? Why do people buy $6,000 handbags? It's not because they need to carry their stuff around. Certainly not. You know? So, what motivates that? Are they looking for status? Are they looking for validation? Are they looking just to congratulate themselves on something that they accomplished? Is it a purchase out of ego? Or out of generosity? All that stuff. If you understand the key motivation of human beings and of your customers, it also helps a lot, because then you can, I don't want to say manipulate because that's a dirty word, but you can play with those. You can relieve certain pain points. You can bring joy when it looks like there is no joy at all, which is exactly what we're trying to do at The Webster. I would say listening, highly undervalued skill. And to me, number one skill for sure. So, I talked to a lot, but yeah, those would be my advice.
Christopher Lacy: No, no. It's perfect.
And, I like you, read lot of self-help, but it was because I was developing trainings and I wanted to understand how to empower our employee population to connect with people better, but also deal with the stresses that they were dealing with as associates every day and it made me, I hope it made me, a better leader, and someone who could do my work better by doing that. So, it's great that you mentioned that.
I am a huge fan of The Webster, and I have to ask you, if you can tell me, what are the plans for The Webster for holiday this year?
Fanny Damiette: Yeah. Ooh, getting this scoop here! Okay, we have some things planned. The first thing I would say is that obviously we're going to do a holiday campaign and, so the way I usually approach holiday campaign is, we see a lot of gift guides out there from especially department stores because their task is a little bit more complicated because they have so much inventory, and there's so much at stake, right for them. Not to say, there's no stakes for us, obviously there are, but we are on a much smaller scale. And also, our point of view is so narrow and precise that we know exactly what kind of stories we want to tell. So, you know, when you're a big department store or a big retailer out there, you try to make your gifting messaging around I have something for everyone. You know, that's kind of like the message that you want to share. The Webster, obviously we're not doing that because I want to be highly curated. And, what we're trying to do right now is to create a story that will not bore our customer, but also will not bore us. Because you have to, you have to sustain that messaging for, whatever eight to 10 weeks. And it has to be entertaining for everybody, including the team that has to produce that content. So, the way we do it is that we create an overarching story. So, that's kind of like the big story. And I can't tell you what it is, no. And then each week is a different chapter. So, it will start on November 2nd. So, stay tuned, subscribe to the newsletter and you'll see it. But basically, we're going to start with that and it's going to be visually very inspiring and so, so exciting. I have to bite my, my, tongue just not to tell you because...
Christopher Lacy: OK.
Which, now you know what I'm probably going to do. I'm going to be like, Laurent, can you please let Fanny tell me.
Fanny Damiette: Actually, he probably would say, yeah, of course. So, I'm the one who’s blocking here.
Christopher Lacy: Okay, so for
Fanny Damiette: everyone listening, I might get a private scoop.
Christopher Lacy: So, uh-
Fanny Damiette: I'll tell you afterwards.
Christopher Lacy: Awesome.
Fanny Damiette: The second thing, hold on, that's not all.
Christopher Lacy: That's not it? Ok.
Fanny Damiette: No, no, because you know, The Websters like very closely tied to Art Basel, because we come from, we come from Miami and Art Basel, for us, is always a big moment in the year.
And this year obviously is a little bit different. And we chose to do our own little Art Basel, but online. So, again here I can't dish too much on the details, but it will be amazing, and it will be visually very rewarding. So, stay tuned for that.
And then the third thing also is that we're launching a new category very, very soon. So, yes, that's also something that is going to be super exciting. So, there's a lot for us happening right now.
Christopher Lacy: I am so excited to see what happens. I'm looking forward to November 2nd. I want to thank you so much for joining us today, but before we go, how can our listeners hear more about what you're doing and hear about The Webster?
Fanny Damiette: Absolutely. So, they can obviously find The Webster at thewebster.us, which is our website. They can also find us on Instagram, which is @thewebster for our main accounts. And then we have a men's account that's called @thewebsterman. And, Laure, our founder, also has an Instagram account that's @LHD because those are her initials. So, that would be all three Instagram accounts. And then if you want to find out about Fanny Damiette, who is me, I can be found on LinkedIn, and my name is so distinctive that there's only one of me.
Christopher Lacy: You are very distinctive.
Fanny Damiette: Thank you. I try to.
Christopher Lacy: Fanny, I have enjoyed our conversation today. I want to thank you so much for joining us today.
Fanny Damiette: It was fun, and it was intellectually stimulating. Thank you.
Christopher Lacy: Agreed and thank you. Well, you take care. Have a great day.
Fanny Damiette: Thank you. You too.
Joshua Williams: Thank you for listening to this episode of Retail Revolution, a very special thank you to everyone who has helped make this podcast possible. If you'd like to support the work we're doing, please visit our show page at retailrevolutionpodcast.com and click on the donate link. Our theme music was composed by Spencer Powell, UL and stay tuned for our next episode.
