Hello Omni Talk Fans! Anne and I leave for NRF tomorrow, and we have our biggest banger slate of interviews yet set to come your way live on Sunday and Monday.

Courtesy of SES-imagotag, we will be livestreaming from their booth and interviewing the likes of:

• John Furner, President & CEO Walmart U.S.
• Matthew Shay, President & CEO NRF
• Seemantini Godbole, EVP & Chief Digital & Information Officer Lowe’s Companies
• Wesley Rhodes, VP Technology Transformation and R&D Kroger
• Tim Simmons, SVP & Chief Product Officer Sam’s Club
• Kristi Argyilan, SVP Retail Media Albertsons Companies
• And much, much more!

Stick close and be sure to follow our Omni Talk Retail page on LinkedIn all week long as Anne and I attempt to make this our best NRF yet!

In today’s Fast Five Podcast, Anne and I:

- Argued over whether Instagram removing its shop tab was a good idea

- Praised Amazon for taking Buy With Prime to all retailers

- Found much to like in the rebirth of Babies R Us and also had some fun predicting what could come next and with whom

- Took notice of Nestlé building its first smart DTC warehouse with Alibaba

- And closed with a look at the operational pros and cons of Arizona’s new “sip and stroll” law that lets mall shoppers shop with beer or wine in hand

There’s all that, plus Colin Farrell’s filmography, Cheetos pretzels, and the Kohler smart toilet feature Anne would prefer over all others.

Listen to This Week’s Fast Five Podcast

Be careful out there,

-- Chris, Anne, and the entire Omni Talk team

P.S. We ended 2022 on a high and have continued the momentum into 2023.

On Wednesday we had over 800 people register to hear Talkdesk’s Antonio Gonzalez’s thoughts on how customer service will evolve in 2023.

You can listen to the podcast recording of our conversation with Antonio by clicking here or on the image below.