What happens when three home brands share one roof? On Episode 3 of Making Space Real Time, Chris Niesen is joined again by Omni Talk’s Chris Walton to talk through three retail stories they saw for themselves on the store floor.
🏠 The Container Store x Bed Bath & Beyond x Kirkland’s
The first co-branded “everything home” stores promise room-based solutions and a big jump in sales per square foot, from $220 to $500. But four months after a “June conversion,” the store we visited still had hundreds of boxes of freight on the sales floor, an Elfa closet space with almost nothing merchandised in it, and very little sign of Kirkland’s. Is there real potential here, or is it a square peg in a round hole? One Chris says no. The other gives it a puncher’s chance.
🏀 Dick’s House of Sport: A Lab That Works Comps are up 4.9%, there are 41 House of Sport stores open, and the plan is 75 to 100 by 2028.
We talk about why House of Sport keeps winning: discipline, a clear point of view, and a floor that changes with the seasons, like how it scaled back swimwear in Minnesota in October without dropping it. While the rest of retail shrank its stores, Dick’s went bigger. Could toys, beauty or electronics do the same?
☕ Back to Starbucks: Inside the Remodels
The 250 closures got the headlines, but we looked at the roughly 1,500 stores getting the “Back to Starbucks” remodel: cognac leather chairs, terracotta walls, linen dividers and the new digital order board. We spent an hour sitting in a remodeled store. Is comfier seating enough when so much of the volume now comes through the app? We also cover Starbucks China now requiring a purchase to sit down.
🛒 The Checkout
A better Old Navy checkout queue, a shout-out to Walgreens pharmacy, the new Adidas concept store at Mall of America with its Anthony Edwards shop, and Halloween plans that didn’t go as expected.
Making Space Real Time is presented by the Association of Retail and Consumer Professionals in partnership with the Omni Talk Podcast Network.
🙏 Thanks to our sponsor, Outform, an award-winning global innovation agency transforming customer experiences through technology and creativity: https://www.linkedin.com/company/outform
🎙️ Produced by Jake Niemi
Follow the hosts:
Chris Niesen: LinkedIn | Retail in Real Time on Substack
Chris Walton / Omni Talk: https://www.youtube.com/omnitalkretail, or search “Omni Talk Retail” wherever you get your podcasts
If you enjoyed this episode, a like, a subscribe or a review really helps. Interested in sponsoring the show? Reach out to Chris Niesen directly on LinkedIn.