Our purpose became a lot, much, much clearer.
And if there was a distinction between the US show and our
show, it wasn't the US show as a domestic American show, where as
we as internationals go along as passengers, where we really have
a a role to play in bringing the community together.
Hello and welcome to a you know, Reef.
I always say there's special episodes of the retail podcast.
I feel like I have so many children and I love them all.
But truly this is a special episode or a unique episode
because we get to look behind the scenes.
And I think that's really important when we're talking
about conferences, when we're attending the conferences.
What more would you want to know as a attendee then to have a
sneak peek behind the scenes? And we're really privileged to
be joined by Reef Quail, managing director of Retail's
Big show Asia Pacific. As an attendee last year.
And I think I've I said this to you face to face, the energy,
the passion, the the execution that you bought to the event
being that it was the first event in in the region was
phenomenal. And I think if if you don't
mind, why don't we start there 2024, how was that for you when
you when you sort of now almost on the cusp of the show 2025 but
how, how was 2024 for you? From now looking back is just a
real sense of gratitude. You know, a lot of big
organisations put a lot of faith in us to do, you know, it was a
big undertaking and, and I feel that we repaid them in spite.
So we had last year we were aiming for 5000 registrations,
we had 8600 and we turned off conference tickets 8 days before
because we were worried that we couldn't actually deliver a
space for the people who were buying tickets.
So we didn't sell any conference tickets for the last 8 days.
And, and then we had, you know, Expo, we had one full of Expo
and, and that was incredibly, it was full and excitement and
energetic. We had 52 countries attend in
the first year. And I was like, I was just like,
it was mind blowing for me because when I was like running
an event in our, in Australia, I, I, I knew everybody in the
market. So if I, if it was, we were a
bit soft on sponsorship. We're a bit, we were worried
about retailers coming. I could always just pick up the
phone. We ran a, a comprehensive
regional programme and I, we didn't know everybody.
Yeah, so, so it really proves the power of a brand and an
effective programme that delivers an outcome.
Felt like we just created a movement.
People came towards us and they just want to.
And this year they're already talking to us and they're
telling us what they're doing and how they're coming and and,
and we, and we've made mistakes along the way, but we we, we
knew where they were and we can approve them.
So I think for me, you know, it's, as I said before, it's one
of gratitude. You know, it's been an amazing
experience and I've just met some awesome, awesome people
through the prices. So you've spent a year going
round to your Advisory Board, you you've sort of got, well
you've definitely the agenda has already been published.
So what has driven the agenda for this year?
We we really coming through the first year's show and then also
engaging advisor, but also the wider market.
We really, it really became clear that the, our purpose
became a lot, much, much clearer.
And, and if there was a distinction between the US show
and our show, it wasn't the US show was a domestic American
show where as we as internationals go along as
passengers, yeah, where we really have a a role to play in
bringing the community together. And so in terms of the way we
engage our Advisory Board, it's much more about diversity on
stage. We've got much this year much
more diverse than we were last year.
So we were diverse last year, but our stages are much more
diverse. So we'll have 11 keynotes, 11
leaders from 11 different markets in the region, from
India to Japan to Australia to the US to Singapore to Malaysia.
So we've got lots of to the Philippines leaders from all
around the region. And then we'll have 18 breakouts
which are really the how to sessions, a bit more functional
sessions and they're more led by I suppose heads of HR or heads
of marketing or heads of e-commerce or heads of
transformation that will talk to some of the big, big hairy
topics in the region. What we've tried to do there
though is actually match up. So, so rather than doing 4 on a
panel or just two on a panel with a moderator and having an
Australia and a Thailand or in New Zealand and in Japan, so
having really contrasting markets.
So they might be talking about, for example, we've got a great
session on ESG and sustainability and we've got DFI
in Southeast Asia and we've got Kohl's in Australia.
Got you. And so the way that global
legislations manifest in their markets and in their
organisations, while it's similar, is very different.
And so it allows to see retailers to see, to take things
away and, and see stuff that are that that's unique to their
market or unique to another market which they can lift and
transfer. And then there's other stuff
like for example, we talk about the delivery revolution, which
is, you know, which is unique to this region, such as quick
commerce in India. Yeah, which is, you know, you
know, when the iPhone recently launched, I think it was 18
months ago, you know, you, you know, if you're in Hyderabad,
Chennai, Mumbai, Delhi, you ordered a phone and arrived on
your desk 8 minutes later. And, and, and no one in the
world has done quick commerce like India has.
And now we're seeing how businesses from grocery to
costume jewellery are re engineering their business
around delivery as a service convenience by you know, so this
is totally unique to our region. And so that's been really neat.
And I think the other thing too, which is probably the most
challenging for our region and another reason for us to be is
in the content, we're seeing a real desire to cross borders as
a retailer, to expand geographically, but through
culture, language, currency, legislative context, that's
really hard. And so if you're Japanese and
you want to go to Malaysia, you've got to find a Malaysian
partner. If you're Australian and you
want to go to Vietnam, you can't do it on your own.
You've got to find someone in Vietnam who is going to be
aligned, spiritually aligned enough with you that you can go,
that you can form a collaboration with to allow you
to, to take that leap. So that's we're doing some
really nice interesting work in terms of opening up markets, in
terms of different range of speakers, having some country
spotlights on places like the Philippines, on Indonesia and on
Thailand. So people can really start
understanding are these markets I want to enter?
Yeah. And then I've noticed that in
terms of the hall space, you've expanded.
So last year we had a red carpet club, which was our sort of the
leadership club, and that didn't work because in America all the
CEOs are domestic and they all know each other.
In Asia Pacific, all the CEOs don't know each other.
So we needed to have some facilitated networking.
So we took that out and moved it up to Level 3 and we're having a
whole programme of facilitated networking among CEOs and the
CEO. And that's going to be the
largest gathering of retailer CEOs in the region.
So if you, if you want to get to, if you want to build your
business case to come as a retailer can be your boss that
who's the CEO to come to the CEO club because that ticket's free.
But we want, we'd love to have as much gathering as many of
those as possible. The other thing we've done on
the floor was we've moved some of the elements which didn't
work as well as she liked the some of the arranged meetings.
We've taken those out. So there's actually more
exhibitors. And.
Yeah, the more exhibitors and we've also got last year we only
had two exhibited big ID stages, those green stages at the back
of the hall. Yeah, they will have three this
year and they only said 80 last year.
This year they'll we'll be able to fit in 130 into those
sessions because they were oversubscribed.
And you've kept your innovation area, I see as well.
Yeah, Yeah. So the innovative showcase has
now become a global programme. So this is really, this is
really neat. So in New York, in Singapore and
in Paris, NRF Europe, in Paris in September, the VCs, this is a
programme independently curated the VCs pitch the leading, the
latest, greatest retail tech. And they, and they, so they
picked the tech we have about 120 plus people pitch for about
30 spots. And then, and then we have a,
the, the gathering of the, the best bleeding edge retail tech
from anywhere in the world. So from a, from people coming to
NRFA pack, they, they're going to see in one place 30
exhibitors that are the latest and greatest as deemed by our,
our curation team. So that's pretty cool.
So you, you won't see that anywhere else.
And they, they had that in New York and we had that in Paris as
well. So it's a, it's a global
programme now. And and then I've noticed you've
kept your special tours, the special programmes in terms of
retail store tours and then the Expo tours, right?
Yeah. So the Expo tours, we've got
three different types and really they're centred around
operational excellence, marketing and and some of the
and send some of the cool technology in, such as AI and
and other mercy tech. And they're really designed for
retailers to sort of look at those heartland big bucket
topics back up this front office and bleeding edge technology
with the view to solving problems in their business.
So you know that that means that as a retailer, I can go, OK, the
tool will allow me to go, well, I need to I need to understand
AI fully. So therefore I can take an
application back on a use case back to my business that will
begin us on the journey. Or it might be the fact that I
have an operational problem in my business around inventory and
I need to find a set of suppliers that can help me with
that or a set of partners who have the answer to the questions
I need to answer. So that's the tour from the Expo
point of view. In terms of the retail tours for
Singapore itself, Singapore's really fortunate that you know,
it's the hub for Southeast Asia. So a lot of the the some of the
best practise retail, whether that be the Adidas's and Nikes
or the Porsches are running amazing retail experiences.
So there's and, and people like fair prices at a domestic level
are also doing some pretty incredible stuff.
And so you'll be able to go and look at this three different
tour types that will allow you to look at some of the best in
retail in, in the Singapore marketplace, some quite
traditional, some looking at different formats, some looking
at, you know, different installations.
And then obviously the use of technology and grocery a whole
lot. So you'd be able to have a, and,
and obviously, if you're in Asia, grocery is important
because food is very important in Asia.
So, so understanding how that all fits together is quite cool
too. So those two are, are are were
much, much more improved because we took a lot more out of 2024
learnt so much. Also a bit a bit of it was a bit
supply and demand. We understand understood what
the what our retailers were looking for.
But more importantly got much deeper into the the headspace of
the of the region. And really people like
enterprise Singapore, Singapore tourism border to have as well
as our our big Singapore advisors have provided and
Singapore Retail Association I've given us a lot bigger
better steer into tapping into what's best in the market.
So Reef, you probably like all of us have been glued to, to the
screens over the last couple of weeks, tariffs and the impact
that it's having on the global economy.
I'm just curious when, when you have such a global show in such
a hot region of the world, how does that bleed into your
conference or like do you have, are there talks in it?
Are there, can you, yeah, expand that for us?
Great question for us and I think for me really in a day,
the big thing out of this whole, you know, created uncertainty is
that there's one thing for certain is we've is our purpose
and our purpose is to create intra AIPAC collaboration.
And so within our region, everyone's pretty open to each
other. This is we're not talking about
facilitating trade between Asia Pacific companies in the US,
we're talking about facilitating trade within Asia Pacific
region. And so you know, and retail
thrives through open conversations, collaborations,
connecting with like minds. So it's, I think, you know, it's
given even an even stronger purpose for us to exist because
as companies think about diversifying their supply
chains, you know, we've got countries like China, of course,
but we've got countries like Philippines, Vietnam, who are
creating a lot of materials for all sorts of different
companies. Then you've got these, we've got
some super big markets such as Indonesia, India, China.
So how do you play in those markets as a retailer and then
how do these markets alike, how do these markets come and expand
out? You know, we're talking as I
said before and talked to touch on the CEO club to have a whole
bunch of CEOs in the region who can talk to each other and find
opportunity to be to work together in a place where they
quite often didn't know each other.
I think the context just gives us more reason to be Yeah, I
think. And that's, that's pretty cool,
you know, because that's what I want to do anyway.
That's what I we, my, what gets me out of bed in the morning
every day to see that stuff. And so now there's even more of
a reason to, to do that and to be that platform that allows
those connections and collaborations to occur.
So for me, that's, that's really neat.
So I'm, I'm, I'm actually, you know, we all went and held our
breath, but really it's even better, you know, it's, it's a,
it's a business doesn't want to stop.
They just need to, they just need to look at other ways of
doing it and the whole region's ready to do business.
One of the things that I love is I'm going to take part in the
show and we had a pre call with the Family Mart.
He's #2. OK, we had a, we had a
conversation with the number two person at Family Mart and I've
got to be on. I mean, the easiest way for
people who don't know Family Mart is to think of 711 and
that's who you've got. But what what I came away with
and I came away with this feeling from Shanghai last year
when I was in Shanghai. We are so fixated on technology
over here that we forget that once technology is solved, what
happens next? And here you have an executive
ex CEO of Uniqlo who is bringing all of this creative juice and
elements to an industry, the convenience industry, because
technology, if you like, is, is sold right?
They, they, they don't need to optimise anything anymore.
Yes, you can optimise things a little bit more, but it's
absolutely all about the experience.
How do you stand out? How are you unique?
How do you bring your future customers in?
And I just sat there. This was a pre talk, right?
We were just sat there going, OK, let's just have a quick chat
before like 30 minutes just glued to my to my little screen
to what he has to say. And I just found what a
wonderful example of a Japanese powerhouse because within Japan,
they're they're, they're huge and sorry.
And within the region, they've got stores in other parts of the
region. But when you mention
convenience, most people probably roll their eyes and go
convenience, right? But you know, you ain't seen
nothing yet as as, as they say when, when the transformation
that that one convenience powerhouse is going on.
And I think that's such a reflection of the maturity of
the industry within your region and how you know how globally
mature they are and then on the other side how they still are
are transforming and maturing within certain markets.
And I think it came. Sorry.
Go on. Well.
I I finished that call and went out because obviously family
might have launched convenience wear.
So I've got two. I've bought 2 pairs of, I bought
some socks, I've got 2 pairs, I've got to give some to Raffi.
My programme manager, but but a
ducky son was quite keen to bring us if they've got a whole
range of convenience where it was really neat actually.
So no, they weren't at all. It was awesome.
Yeah. You know, they're quite, they're
quite. I feel like a bit, I feel a bit
Gen Z ish in my so so white, so half calf in the colours of
white socks within the colours of family Martin Apple, sort of
a green and an Aqua, little rings around them.
I look pretty retro. I want to be super respectful to
your time obviously in Singapore in terms of the the final
thoughts, what do we have in store in terms of size and scale
or at the Expo this year at the conference?
This year, so the, in terms of the Expo and conference,
obviously we have more exhibitors this year it'll be
bigger and we will, I suppose it's, I mean events are people
based. So it's about the people who
attend. I think, you know, in terms of
where we are today, we are a long way ahead of where we were
in 2024. So I, I, I hope to see somewhere
between 9 and 10,000 through the site, which you know, means
we'll have 13 or 14,000 registrations with just under 50
days to go. That looks incredibly likely
now, which is just mind blowing. So it's going to be pretty busy.
We should have a lot of fun. And then I think through the
conference, I think we'll probably get to probably another
half, 50% more than we were last year in terms of people.
So it's going to be pretty full. So I think from my mind, it's
going to be, you know, we, we had a great first show, this
show, this year's show is going to be really busy.
And I think there's going to be more diversity in terms of the
group. We'll have more language.
We'll have obviously on site, we'll have particularly Chinese
and Japanese and we'll have there'll be more people to meet
and just so many more people to meet.
So I think that from a, from an, if you're coming for the first
time, just just expect it's, it's if you come, for example,
if you come from my market in Australia, it's like nothing
you've ever seen it's and that's why I find myself quite
fortunate of being part of it. Because it's just.
Big. It's yeah, And there's so many
different people you can meet and collaborate with that.
Yeah. I mean, I've got, I've got for
for me, it's incredible. And actually we have to talk
about this off off when we finish recording.
I've got my clients from China. Like last year we spoke about
it, but this year there's three or four of them making the
effort to fly out from China. Obviously they're a European
company with offices there, but it's on their radar, which I
thought was, was, was phenomenal that they're, you know, they're
getting 4 execs to fly over because it's, as you said, the
region now is really coming together.
But there has been that sort of gap for where do they come
together at which is that space that you're filling?
And that, and I think that's come from, you know, the, the,
that still desire people hung back a little bit in the first
year, But I also think that the desire is there.
There's been, I said before and a few people have actually said
thank you because they were, they've been waiting for this
sort of event for a while, for such a long time.
That's just, you know, I, I love what I do, but you know, when
people have you've done one event and everyone's saying
thank you, It's like that's, that's really neat.
But and I, but I, it doesn't say before it will, it will be, it
will be bigger in terms of people and numbers, a lot
bigger. I.
Think it's busy last? Yeah, it was busy last year, so
and we've resisted the urge to have two floors of Expo we could
off. Yeah, but we, we'll, we'll do.
We'll do one and do and we'll just grow in an orderly manner
this year. I think really it's about the
experience and doubling down on, you know, making it a really
fantastic experience for people who come to Singapore and make
the trip. And, and, and that's where our
emphasis will be. And, and then then as we, we can
take, continue to grow in, in a way that, you know, as aligned
to the values of the show. And I think that over time, this
show can be one of the biggest in the world because we're you
think we're only in U2, we could have 10,000 people through the
site, you know, you know, that's just in the second year.
Yeah. So, which is just so neat.
So. I have no doubt, I, I have no
doubt of watching this show. I'm, I'm, you know, for the
moment, I and I, and I've told, I've shared the story many
times. I saw Reef, I saw the, I can't
remember the Minister of Culture who every person was at NRF 3-4
years ago talking about this regional event that we're going
to do. And it just made so much sense
in the sense that there are so many retailers that I've spoken
to in the UK, in Europe and in, in region that look for that.
Where do we come together? Right?
Yes, you can go to an in country event, but there are very few.
So it's, it's a, a real joy to watch this to go from strength
to strength to strength. And thank you as, as, as it is,
it's only, you know, I, I think with the right energy that you
can pull this off. So I'm, I'm, I'm super excited.
Thank you, man. And to just to, to finish that
thought. It's just we're creating a
movement, you know, we're, that's what we're trying to do.
And at this point in time for us, as we grow, it's about
bringing people towards the show who are, who are passionate, who
are invested and, and that's what we're looking for.
And it's and there's just been so many of them that we're just,
we're just trying to keep hold them all together and, and, and
because once we get them together, we just got to get out
of the way and let them do their thing and meet each other and
enjoy the moment, right? Because I think you know that
that that is what will make us successful.
It'll be the people that continue to come year and year
that just make this such a fantastic show.
Yeah, that's wonderful, Reef. I look forward to seeing you in
what? That's 40, about 47 days I
reckon. 47 days and counting. I'm not counting at all.
All right, Alex, thank you very much.
Appreciate the opportunity. Take care.