In episode 519 of Total Retail Talks, Editor-in-Chief Joe Keenan interviews Jillian Cueff, chief merchandising officer at Claire's, a global specialty retailer known for tween and teen fashion accessories, costume jewelry, and iconic ear-piercing services. Listen in as Cueff shares how she's implemented her own vision for the brand's merchandising organization (1:25) and how Claire's…

Chinese fast-fashion giant Shein has agreed to pay $100 million to settle an investigation by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission over delivery delays and other customer complaints, a source with direct knowledge told Reuters late last week. The settlement, equivalent to 44 percent of Shein’s second-quarter profit, ​is ⁠the latest to hit the online fast-fashion…

Everyone's doing creator partnerships, but almost nobody is measuring whether those partnerships are building brand equity. Two-thirds of marketers are already working with creators. Whether it’s a top-of-funnel play to build cultural relevance and feed the content engine, or a genuine move to convert new audiences into customers, creators are a mainstay in the marketer…

The forecast you build in January doesn't always hold up by the time the season ends. It's based on last year's numbers, and buying behavior and economic conditions can shift before your inventory even arrives. Then comes the moment every apparel executive dreads: the season closes with 20 percent of inventory unsold, and you're forced…

Retail enterprises across the globe are investing heavily in artificial intelligence to improve inventory management and solve operational challenges. The investments that prove most successful are using real-time data about the items they make, move and sell to automate and optimize manual tasks. The early results speak for themselves: Inditex leveraged item-level data combined with…