EP 226: Beyond the Saks-Neiman Merger: The True Cost of Market Consolidation

Special Guests: 

Mickey Alam Khan, CEO of Luxury Roundtable

Pam Danziger, TRR contributor and founder Unity Marketing

The shift in luxury retail's competitive landscape through the Saks-Neiman Marcus merger could have a domino effect on the operational synergies of both companies, unlocking fundamental questions about the sustainability of the luxury department store model. At stake is the state of personalized luxury retail when longstanding customer relationships and local market expertise are at odds with the impersonal efficiencies of large-scale consolidated operations. As the evolving dynamics of signature, singular brand stores and large multi-brand retailers unfold, it is evident that luxury brand houses are increasingly gaining control their own destiny through direct-to-consumer channels. Join Shelley, Mickey Alam Khan, CEO of Luxury Roundtable, and Pam Danziger, TRR contributor and founder Unity Marketing, as they dive into Richard Baker's acquisition track record and question whether Saks Global can gain strides against global luxury brands which have become its largest competitors. Or is the Saks model the demise of luxury department store retail? 

For more strategic insights and compelling content, visit TheRobinReport.com, where you can read, watch, and listen to content from Robin Lewis and other retail industry experts, and be sure to follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Transcript

Transcript by Descript:

Now that you've got one owner, but one brand is considered a little, uh, you know, more exclusive than the other,  what happens to those relationships and are they willing to Uh, you know, turn some Neiman Marcus stores into sex stores. Are they willing to turn some sex locations into Neiman Marcus locations, right?

So that's the question there.  Retail Unwrapped is a weekly podcast hosted by Shelley Cohan from The Robin Report. Each episode dives into the latest trends and developments in the retail industry. Join them as they discuss interesting topics and interview industry leaders, keeping you in the loop with everything retail. 

Hi everybody. Thanks for joining Retail Unwrapped. I'm Shelly Cohan and I'm very excited today. I have some luxury guests with me and it's always fun to have luxury in the room. Um, we are joined by Mickey Alam Khan. You are really a pioneering figure in the luxury and marketing media. You are now CEO of the Luxury Roundtable and founder of American Marketer.

And you just, you have spent like two years, two decades rather, shaping how we understand luxury, retail, and digital markets. Probably more than two decades to be honest. Um, we also have one of our esteemed writers and a great colleague of mine, Pam Danziger. She is a market researcher. And who is awesomely internationally known for her expertise on the world's most influential customers, the American affluent, including the Henry's.

So Henry's, if you don't know, I'm sure all of you already know this, but it's an acronym for high earners, not rich yet, mass affluent. So needless to say, two experts on luxury. And today we're going to talk about the Sachs Neiman's merger.  But before we jump in here, Mickey, I would love for you first to kind of tell us about the Luxury Roundtable, what it is and why you founded it, if you don't mind.

And then we'll jump into the nitty gritty of our podcast.  Great. Thank you so much, Shelley. Really appreciate the opportunity. Thank you to the Robin Report as well for the opportunity to have Pam and I. And I have to say that Pam is one of the reasons why, uh, you know, I pretty much, uh, have credibility in the luxury space.

When I launched Luxury Daily many years ago, Pam was one of my Very fast columnist, my very first commentator, a very fast speaker. And so she predates me in the luxury marketing space. So I have to give Pam a lot of credit. And every time Pam came out with a new book, we basically couldn't wait to read it, couldn't wait to dissect, run op eds and stuff like that.

So. My background, as you pointed out, is in marketing media. Uh, I was the editor of Mobile Marketer, Mobile Commerce Daily, Luxury Daily. I founded these three publications. I sold them. Um, and prior to that, I was the editor in chief of eMarketer, which, as you know, is a fairly big market research firm. And then before that, DM News, which was America's largest trade paper covering direct marketing.

And then I worked for advertising age for five and a half years. So, like Pam, Um, the entire undercurrent in my career is marketing. That's what it is. And from there, we cover retail, we cover luxury  and all the other sectors. I currently run Luxury Roundtable. I founded that, uh, in 2023. Uh, I saw a need for a network based on experiential events, uh, and training.

And so we do five events a year, and I also do special masterclasses and Uh, next month I'm announcing the launch of our luxury class, uh, and that's focused on the interior design, the real estate, and Pam and I'll be talking about that later. But I basically go into these companies and I train them for four to five hours.

I've been doing that for the last two years now, but I'm just formalizing that. And then what I also do is I put them in touch with experts. So, I'm basically the person who goes in, tells them what's going on there, and then when I say, all right, what are your specific needs within each area, and then I say, I have  a partner who is the right fit for you.

So basically, I'm also a lead gen for a lot of people. So that's the focus right now for Luxury Roundtable. That's great. And I think I'm going to turn this into the Pam Show, because I'm going to echo your sentiments about Pam, because Pam is the reason I really became the writer that I am. So, um, she's one of the first people that reached out to me for quotes and stuff as a retail expert.

And, uh, she's been great. And she's the reason I'm at Forbes. com. So again, Pam, your, um, reach is very great and wide. Oh, thank you. very much. I'm, I'm blushing if you can't see.  So, uh, you know, it's interesting. So the Saks Neiman merger in terms of like a merger, I don't know, it's no big deal, right? Just the merger itself.

I think what's a bigger, the big deal is the domino effect, like the outcome of what's going to happen. I agree, Pam, it's going to be a tremendous deal. So it's not so much that, you know, Sachs is acquiring, uh, Neiman's, it's more about what the heck is going to happen in luxury markets. So I'm going to turn it over to you guys, whoever wants to start first. 

I'd lead with Pam. Pam, why don't you go ahead? Uh, you know, multi, you know, we've got these two competing, you know, channels of distribution for luxury. We've got the, the boutiques, the luxury owned brand boutiques, which have, um, you know, they've really exploded. And I, I don't have the data in front of me, but I can certainly get it.

How much. These, uh, the major luxury brands have opened new boutiques across the world, um, dedicated to their own solo brand with the idea that, one, it's more profitable for the companies, which it is, and two, they can better Represent their brand than multi brand retailers. Um, and so the multi brand luxury retail sector has really been on the slide, although it represents currently about 10 to 15 percent of the total luxury market.

So it's not out, you know, it's not It's not been totally displaced, and it has a definite role. But I think companies like Neiman Marcus and Sachs and Nordstrom, at least in the U. S., are really trying to find a foothold, a unique point of differentiation,  where they can shine, um, against these brands that, you know, may have a store or a boutique right up the street or right, right in the same mall.

So it's, it's really, uh, It's really a, a sector right now and the distribution channel that, you know, has maybe an identity crisis.  Great. And I think, uh, I, I  tend to agree with what Pam said. In fact, the article she wrote on this merger is worth reading for Forbes readers. You know, Shelley, you published that article.

Now, the thing is, you always ask yourself when two corporations of that size merge, why are they doing it? And sometimes 2 plus 2 is not necessarily 4.  So, you have to look at the larger sector, and Pam has alluded to this. Think about what's going on with the department store over the last few decades.

Their biggest competition are their vendors. I mean, if you look at all the luxury department stores, I mean, Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Cartier, all of these guys. are opening monobrand stores  yards away from where they are. So, what makes a luxury department store different and unique today? In the old days, people would go there and they had white assortment, relaxed return policies, uh, personalized shopping experiences, and just the thrill and entertainment of walking through all these various exhibits of different designers. 

Today, you can get that, or more or less, you can get most of that by walking into a Louis Vuitton store or a Chanel store, and they replicate a lot of those experiences. They want to own the direct relationship with their customers. Another ding against these department stores is discounting, and Pam has always talked about this in the years past, is the, you know, come holiday season, these guys go overboard, and that damages the brand.

So when I looked at the Saks Uh, play for Neiman Marcus. Neiman Marcus was already over leveraged and, you know.  When the previous companies bought them, they, you know, they always, they're stripped, you know, bought with a lot of debt, and then what is the company left with? And so I think this play is a real estate play.

And again,  that article alluded to that. This is completely Richard Baker, the Uh, the chairman of, uh, Sachs, the, the, I mean, HBC, the Hudson's Bay company, the parent company, is a real estate guy. And to me, they're looking at all these locations where Neiman Marcus is and saying, Oh, right, how do we basically, uh, monetize or leverage that?

Now, we'll, in the minds of affluent consumers, Neiman Marcus is a notch above Sachs.  Hold on, Mickey. Hold on. Hold that thought for one second. Before you jump into consumers, I want to go back to something you said about Richard Baker and real estate, if you don't mind. So, um, you have Richard Baker, who's not a retailer.

And you have Mark Metric, who's Not a merchant, both running now one of the biggest global luxury brands. So, uh, you know, tell me a little bit about that. I do want to get to the consumer, but it's interesting that you see this as a real estate play. And so therefore, you know, who's, who's really running the company. 

Yes. But I would also look to someone like Bernard Arnault. The chairman, CEO of LVMH, uh, his family background was, uh, what was it, Pam? Lumber or, uh, hardware. And I guess sort of building. Yeah, industrial product. He was in the construction business. That's one reason why he gets along with Trump, I think, because they were both builders.

Exactly.  But he's a luxury guy. I mean, he was born,  you know, into.  No, uh, Bernard Arnault bought Dior. Spare and company for 1.  The company was bankrupt. So he took on all the liabilities and then he bought it and he started with Christian Dior and then he went on and almost did a hostile takeover LVMH, the original Louis Vuitton, Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy.

But coming back to these two guys, look,  at the end of the day retail is about location. It starts with location, number one. It has always been real estate no matter what people say then follows assortment personalized shopping experiences And you know, uh competitive pricing, but it's always been where do you attract the maximum number of footfall?

And is that a place where? You feel, uh, you know, enticed enough to come back for repeat visits. So look, there's also the larger concern of the model of department stores. That is itself in danger. There's no guarantee that the Sachs Niemann  merger will solve the Problem underlying the department store model, which is people are shopping directly with the monobrand stores.

Um, the assortment, uh, the younger generations, how are they shopping? We've got to look to Gen Z, the younger millennials, where are they going right now? Everyone talks about e commerce like Pam. Uh, I still believe in the store experience. And I think you're going to have a cap with e commerce. Right now it's about 20, 25, 30 percent depending on, you know, whose numbers you believe.

Uh, but the fact is that I don't think e commerce will ever cross 50 percent because the discovery will be online and mobile, but they want to touch field experience and all that. But coming back to the real estate play, we don't know how many of these stores will close. We don't know how many of their leases are up, you see, and also when you have Neiman Marcus locations, what changes will Sachs bring to the Neiman customer?

And I know we'll talk about later, but the fact is, it doesn't matter if he's the chairman of the combined company, he's a real estate guy because retail is real estate. He's hired merchants. Interesting who he has made as the new president of Bergdorf, Tracy Margolis, and Tracy is a merchant. Right. Right.

So he's given Bergdorf to Tracy and then basically Saxxy's got Mark. Now Mark obviously again is not strictly speaking a merchant, but Mark has basically Uh, kept Sachs stable. He didn't do anything, he didn't destroy any value, more or less. And to me that's, uh, you know, uh, A minus grade. So, uh, do no damage, the first rule of retail.

Anyways, uh, Pam, your thoughts?  You know, I think it's like, you know, I, I don't know Richard Baker myself, but I mean, I've certainly read, um, a number of articles by Warren and by Robin on the Robin Report, sort of critical of him. And if past, you know, if past experiences is a predictor of the future, I mean, Baker has, you know, failed when, with the guilt group, Fortunoff.

Home outfitters acquisition and most notably Lord and Taylor. I mean, he drove those in the ground. And so, you know, one wonders what's going to happen. I, you know, the one that I am most concerned about is Neiman Marcus because it has Such a strong, powerful reputation, such a deep connection to the customers.

And interestingly enough, you know, when, when Joffrey VanRamdonk was, Joffroy VanRamdonk, was appointed as, as the CEO of, of Neiman's, you know, I was a little skeptical because I think he came out of, um, McKinsey or something. He came from a, a, uh, a, uh, consulting background. Um, and, and I guess he also had worked with LVMH.

I thought he did an exceptionally good job. I mean, they had lots and lots of problems, but I thought he did an exceptionally good job from the employee standpoint and from the customer standpoint over the course of, you know, running that big operation with so many financial troubles. And he's of course gone.

He's, he's been bumped out. So I, that's the thing that I, I think Neiman Marcus is the most vulnerable and at risk of the two brands right now. Um, and which, you know, is, I think is very problematic. Bergdorf is part of Neiman, so Pam. But yeah, to your point, I think Bergdorf's gonna do fine.  Interesting. So Pam, when you look at the consumer, I know you're an expert in consumer shopping behaviors and you look at this dual, uh, retail stores, real estate play.

So in malls, or  do you think today's consumer pr prior to the merger, are they shopping both? Niemann's and Saks. Are they getting different things from each one?  Um, you know, I think it's really got to do more with location where they're close to. I mean,  and they,  you know, and I hate to kind of bounce off, you know, this idea, but You know, they are loyal to their local store and and that I think is that connection and if I think about back in the day when federated bought up all those department stores and and then rebranded them all under under Macy's.

I thought that was a terrible, terrible mistake. It was a mistake. It was a choice made from the point of view of managing the operations. That was like a great way to manage their operations. But from a consumer point of view, it It severed all those ties with it did with their customers. Um, I don't think that sacks is going to rebrand Neiman Marcus sacks.

But, um, I think that  Neiman Marcus is very vulnerable, uh, you know, because of the employee. I mean, they are, you know, they're second class citizens now. You know, the employees and the and, you know, retail, as far as I'm concerned, is first and foremost, a people business before it's a product business. And so the and in luxury, it's even more important to have the right people in place.

And I think that those. Connections at the Neiman Marcus sales representatives, which Jeff Roy would, would talk about how, you know, he had had sales reps who'd make, you know, millions of dollars a year, you know, would bring in a millions of dollars a year of revenue from high paying customers. And I think, well, I think those connections are going to be severed and there's going to be a lot of people, you know, Abandoning ship.

A lot of important, critically important sales, um, representatives abandoning. Yeah. So it's, it's so interesting. Mickey sees retail as a real estate business and you see real estate, Pam, as a people business. I want to see, I want to add on to something that Pam said, because she mentioned, um,  Uh, did you mention Macy's, Pam?

You mentioned Federated, right? So, interesting. Uh, many years ago when, uh, Macy's, Federated decided to buy Marshall Fields. And they decided to rebrand all the Marshall Fields into Macy's. So I was,  I was at a reception and, uh, Terry, Terry Lundgren, who was the CEO of Federated at that point. I questioned him in front of a whole bunch of phoning.

There were reporters, analysts and all that. And he got red in the face. I said, look. I said, I understand you're rebranding every one of these stores because that's what you did, right? They bought Burdens, there's that,  and all of them were bunched up into two primary brands, Bloomingdale's and Macy's. So I said, can you spare the Marshall Fields in Chicago?

I said, that's iconic. So he got red in the face and he tells me, look McEve, If the people of Chicago were so concerned about that store, why didn't they shop there?  He says, we've got to standardize all our merchandising. All the materials are marketing. We can't make an exception to one store. I said, but that's an iconic store.

You could have, I mean, I didn't want to publicly question further than that, but my thinking was department stores got to where they were because they were icons. I mean, when you look at Woolworth in New York, look at the Woolworth Tower. I wish people would go and take a look at the ground floor and the second floor and the third floor.

You'll understand. What they were, they were basically palaces of retail  and they were experiences. Today you walk into a Sachs or you work and you walk into a Neiman Marcus, right? Beautiful stuff. There's no one to sell you the stuff. I mean, there are no, you're wandering the hallways looking for a sales associate.

Macy's is a dump. I'm sorry to say that. I mean, the clothes are all over the place. Then you look at Bloomingdale's. That is another lost wonder there. Right. And sex again, depending on which sex you're going to, not all of them are matching sex Fifth Avenue. So to Pam's point,  if you want to build your relationship, you've got to have local ties.

I'll give you an example of Madison Avenue.  Last week we hosted our conference here in New York, uh, the Luxury Outlook Summit and we had the president of the Madison Avenue Business District, Business Improvement District speak. And he told us, he said, look,  almost all our customers come from the neighborhood  and They're all mono brandand boutiques there. 

And that is what I feel a lot of these department stores have lost sight of that fact. They talk about metrics, they talk about ai, they talk about, um, the Black book, you know, but are you saying, all right, I ask you Sex fifth Avenue in New York. Tell me how many 1, 0, 0, 2, 1 zip code customers do you have?

How many? 1 0 0. Two eight customers do you have? One? Zero. Zero. Six five customers.  Because guess what? Those are the richest customers in New York City. That's just one example If we go to the stores in philadelphia, we go to stores in boston  Have they cultivated that local relationship to pam's point because that's the only way these stores will stay in business In five years time you're you already got Nordstrom going private, the Saxonemon merger going on, then you got Macy's Bloomingdale's, you're going to see something on that very soon there, and then they tried that Bloomy's small store format, I don't know how that's going, we had a speaker there a few months ago.

And who else do you have left in a decade's time, you'll have only three players left.  And, you know, to  back to the Macy's thing, um, Wannamakers was another in Philadelphia where I, you know, I'm outside of Philadelphia. Wannamakers was an iconic store with this great, you know, huge organ that, um, you know, people would just come from everywhere just to see and hear the organ play at noon.

Well, that was rebranded to a Macy's Macy's is now closing that iconic store and to connect now to Neiman Marcus, Neiman Marcus was, you know, was founded in Dallas and have this incredible foundation and relationship with the, with the Dallas community. Um, that's going to evaporate. I mean, it. It's bound to because, because of this, this merger. 

So, uh, all very interesting. I do think that, uh, it's, it's, yeah, I mean, Dallas is Neiman Marcus, so it'll be interesting whether they are going to keep the separate offices, separate nameplates, all that. Any feel for the nameplate, either one of you? Do you think they're going to really kind of brand them separately? 

I will think that they're going to be kept separately branded, but I think that the culture and the way it's going to be merged, you know, going to the future, is that what made Neiman Marcus distinctive from Sachs is going to, is going to evaporate, it's going to all merge together and that, that, and Sachs is going to impose the corporate culture of Sachs  And maybe HBC, you know, Hudson Bay Company, it might,  it might start to infiltrate into Neiman Marcus, and I just think Neiman Marcus, I think Neiman Marcus is going to end up in a worse place after this, you know, Neiman Marcus was coming back, and I think it's going to end up in a much worse place than it was, and I think that the customers are going to,  you know, it's almost like, and again, these are really high spending customers.

They, they are,  they might start shopping at the individual boutiques, or go to Nordstrom. I mean, Nordstrom has much of the same merchandise, and I don't, you know, I don't know what the percentage is, but, you know, Nordstrom at least, now Nordstrom is going to be under, Uh, under family control. Um, through this, this, this new, the new movement they're making, which I think is an extremely good,  you know, good part.

I mean, if you think about Neiman Marcus, they say that Mr. Stanley, Stanley Marcus would meet customers every morning at the door of the Dallas store, you know, take their coats and, you know, escort them into the store. store. That's a personal touch that I think, um, is missing and needs to come back. And I think Nordstrom's may very well usher it back in.

And that is going to be a very good move for the, the luxury multi brand sector. That's great. And, and Nikki, where do you see Nordstrom's, you know, in this? Do you, do you see them as the luxury brands like Neiman Sachs?  So Nordstrom is a step below them in terms of, you know, like Neiman is. I mean, not from the, uh, business fundamentals, I mean, they've been broke.

So, strictly speaking, there shouldn't be a Neiman Marcus existing, I mean, maybe a decade ago. But,  uh, Nordstrom, if, if they go in house, then they don't have the pressure of quarterly earnings.  Right. So then they can basically invest and they can make decisions without fear or favor. That's very important and I feel that a family that's willing to take a bet on their future They're there for the long term now with Neiman and Sachs if you compare them  my question to HPC and to Sachs global is how are you going to differentiate the two luxury department stores? 

What is  the Neiman Marcus customer going to get that the Sachs customer won't get and vice versa?  Right. So now that you've got one owner, but one brand is considered a little, uh, you know, more exclusive than the other.  What happens to those relationships? And are they willing to, uh, you know, turn some Neiman Marcus stores into Saks stores?

Are they willing to turn some Saks locations into Neiman Marcus locations, right? So that's the question there. I foresee, when I read the merger announcement, you have to see what in, read between the lines, squeezing. Uh, you know, when you bring two corporations together, the back office is the first one to go, right?

They're going to get rid of, you know, the accountants and all the duplicate functions that are there.  But as I said, what makes Neiman distinct from Sachs? Nordstrom, when you go to Nordstrom, they always talk about customer service. Nordstrom's whole mantra has been customer service. You go to their flagship store in Seattle.

And you can see that. I mean, they're very concerned, caring. I remember once I was in Chicago and I forgot to pack socks.  So I, uh, popped into the Nordstrom store there. Super friendly. I just went and bought a pair of socks. They treated me the same respect. They would treat someone who went and bought, you know, an expensive dress. 

So that culture inside can be maintained if you have one brand, but when you have two brands and one parent, you're not like an LVMH where, you know, Bernard Arnault and his lieutenants are past masters at segmentation. They are. Are Americans and Canadians that adept at segmentation? LVMH has 76 brands in their portfolio. 

They pretty much all sell handbags  and they pretty much all sell sneakers. And yet, people want to buy a Miss Dior versus a Louis Vuitton canvas versus you name  the other brands in the portfolio, right? So  and, and,  and Bernard Arnault has put many of his children, which I don't know, he has lots of them.

They are in charge of those brands. So there's that family connection,  you know, which again, I think is so critical.  So two things before we leave. I can't believe we're running out of time already, but two quick things I want you guys to kind of give me a view on. One is what's going to happen to the assortments. 

Um, in the brands. And two, what about the vendor relations? Like, what's happening? What do you think the vendors are thinking in terms of this merger?  Well, I, I will, I will guess that the assortments,  they probably had a tremendous amount of overlap before anyway. And they will, Continue to have overlap. I think sacks has has private label if I'm not mistaken.

Some yes label they do. So there may be a move toward more private label, um,  which may be good or not. I'm not sure. And, you know, I haven't got a, a feel on the, on the vendor relations. How, how do you see it, Micky?  So, uh, the two questions are, one is, uh, the, um, vendor relations. And the first one was, uh, basically the assortment.

So interesting.  Um, I, I visit these stores. I do a secret shopper sometimes. And I've noticed a younger profile in Saks stores now,  younger customers. So they've changed the decor. They've changed the assortment. They work with their, uh, vendor partners. And if you see Louis Vuitton store within stores in Saks, they've got a very vibrant assortment.

And, you know, so I fear, I feel that they're basically targeting a younger customer. Set in Sachs. I haven't been to a Neiman Marcus store recently But if you go to Bergdorf, it's always been more established and older wealthier Demographic there. So I I suspect that they're looking long term and they want to lower the average age of the shopper in Okay, I see that at the same time.

It's a balancing act because you don't want to alienate the boomers  And the audience before the boomers, because they supported Neiman Marcus quite heavily and Neiman Marcus also the, the The store associates, uh, they have very long standing relationships with the people in their markets. That is one thing that Neiman's has always prided itself with.

Their black book is stellar. So they're going to do their level best to make sure to retain those top store associates. So that's one thing I can guarantee you that. The second thing, having talked to a lot of SAX, uh, staff, they're betting heavily on marketing. And data mining and using AI, uh, they're very big into identifying, uh, all these pockets of growth.

And basically, how do you extract more value from the existing customer?  Now, in terms of vendor relationships, now that's a big F because look,  if they think that they can squeeze more  or squeeze most, uh, collections or get better deals from these big guys, what's happening is.  Department stores were known for introducing new and fresh blood  into their stores.

I mean, Michael Kors got a break because he got into, uh, Bergdorf's and Ira Neimark. Gave him and Calvin Klein and all the, actually Dawn gave, uh, Michael, uh, I forget Dawn's last name. She used to run, um, uh, Bergdorf and she gave him the break and then Ira Niemark gave Calvin Klein his break there. And that's how these brands were introduced.

Now you name one brand in the last five years that grew to phenomenal size through an introduction through Sachs and Niemann. Think about it.  I don't know if I can think of one. I'm telling you, so that's the existential problem. What, what is the raison d'etre for these stores, for these luxury department stores?

So that's for the up and comers. Established brands are saying our networks are as good as yours. All right. Uh, we are located in pretty much every market you're located in and we own the customer relationship. We control the pricing. We control the loyalty marketing efforts, right? So that's another challenge they're going to face there.

So the only way they can differentiate themselves from their own vendors. Is basically asking their vendors to make products just for them. That's a little distinct Well given this market and given the stress that the luxury industry is under  that is up Uh, you know, I I don't know if that strategy will work So  their relationship with vendors will only grow tougher in the years to come I can tell you that and lvmh Is in such a position now where?

They can basically take a department store and have everything, all LVMH products under one roof. They already do that, right? They're buying all the real estate. You see what's happening in Louis Vuitton, their corner 57th and 5th. They're going to build a new tower there. And they own a Samaritan, the Samaritan in Paris.

You go into that store and see the beautiful merchandising. Most of the products there are LVMH products. So  I come back to the question is,  is the experience different?  Is the product different? Is the pricing different? Is the location different? What is the reason why sex And name and exist in this market today and to serve which customer. 

Well, thank you, Mickey. Thank you, Pam. Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. Now, SACS has had a record of not paying their bills before this merger happened. There was a lot of money that had to, you know, be put together to change hands. One wonders if SACS can, you know, SACS Global can keep up those payments. And that will really You know, drive vendors from there, from the doors.

Yeah, a lot of the vendors weren't happy. Yeah. Um, so anyway, thank you, Mickey and Pam. It's been great conversation. Thanks for all your input. I want to thank our listeners. Uh, thank you so much for supporting Retail Unwrapped. If you have any suggestions or any feedback, please go to therobinreport. com and hit the contact us button.

And thanks so much.  Thank you for listening to Retail Unwrapped. We'll be back in one week with another podcast. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or any podcast service. If you have questions, ideas for a podcast, or anything else, please contact us via therobinreport. com.