This is the first of a two part NRF wrap-up of #NRF2022. In this episode I shared some thoughts around the show. Part 2 I'll discuss some of the technology trends I saw in the Innovation Zone
These are the 3 write-ups I references.
Jerry Sheldon VP of Technology at IHL Services https://lnkd.in/gdgjSKvj Phil Thorne MD, North AmericaMD, North America Quorso https://lnkd.in/gJE9yFsD Jim Roddy RSPA - Retail Solutions Providers Association https://lnkd.in/ga_veEzd Greg Buzek https://lnkd.in/gcT53q-B
Podcast Hosts
Jeff Roster
Twitter https://twitter.com/JeffPR
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-roster-bb51b8/
Website https://thisweekininnovation.com
Brian Sathianathan
Twitter https://twitter.com/BrianVision
Website https://www.iterate.ai
Podcast Website
https://www.podbean.com/pu/pbblog-f8asf-af2782
https://thisweekininnovation.com
Apple
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-week-in-innovation/id1562068014
Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/show/2QDqTUnt6jebdRHbRzSTJN
LaunchPadOne
https://www.launchpaddm.com/pd/This-Week-in-Innovation?showAllEpisodes=true
Listen Notes
#StartupsOfNRF, #innovation, #innovation, #Startup, #Startups,#Retailers, #retail, #thisweekininnovation, #DigitalTransformation, #retailtechnology, #retailtech, #futureofretail , #retailtrends, #emergingtechnologies, #podcast, #retailpodcast, #socialcommerce, #mobile, #VentureCapital, #VC, #Founders, #Entrepreneurs, #Gartner, #5ForcesOfInnovation, #ArtificialIntelligence , #AI, #cloud, #conversationalai, #InternetOfThings, #IoT, #Blockchain, #LowCode, #Data, #computervision, #virtualreality, #augmentedreality, #Robots, #metaverse, #Cryptocurrency, #vr, #3d, #ar, #xr, #NFTs,#drones, #dronetechnology, #dronedelivery, #lastmiledelivery, #lastmilelogistics, #lastmile,#deeplearning, #naturallanguageprocessing, #sentimentanalysis, #machinelearning, #personalization, #datamining, #pos, #loyalty, #livestreaming,
Well hello everybody and welcome to this week in innovation today I am back from sunny new york city in the nrf's big show and boy do I have thoughts
The title of this is a little provocative I survived edref 2022 in new york city the reason I'm doing that title is just some of the silliness some of the energy around the show
And I just thought I'd have a little fun with it obviously I went and a lot of people didn't go and so anybody that is in retail knows by now at least an awful lot of big tech and some small tech and medium sized tech pulled out of the show
A lot of retailers didn't make it big debate on the number of people there my guess is probably around 10,000 the show typically has about 30 to 35,000
That seems to be about the same pattern as what we saw in ces about 15% to 20% of pre covid numbers and it is what it is it definitely took away a lot of the energy from the show
Instead of me kind of going on I really saw three write ups that I thought were really perfect and I'm going to read some excerpts from each one of those
The first one is from jerry shelton vp of technology and just so everyone knows jerry and I are personal friends I worked at ihl for a couple of years before retiring from the active analyst
And I'll just read a couple of excerpts of his write up I thought it was just spot on I'll have links to all these blurbs in either the show notes or you can just ping me and I'm happy to pass them on
They're also on my linkedin post so jerry starts off normally on monday morning at 09:30 a.m. you have to fight your way through the crowd as booth meetings typically spill into the aisles for most of monday
This year was thin enough that you could play multiple games of flag football and would probably have room to set up the stands without creating too much of a disturbance
In my opinion 100% correct exactly what we saw a little later on jerry says hey the next thing I suspected was that the innovation zone would crush it
And for everyone what the innovation zone is is really where the startups and some innovative vendors they sort of had a whole separate little couple of three rows
It's where I spend all my time very cool space so anyway as jerry was saying the next thing I suspected was that the innovation zone would crush it
And that was exactly what I observed I popped in the area at least three times and every time it was bristling with attendees plenty of lively conversations and really engaging vendors sharing stories of technology on the zero to four year horizon of becoming mainstream
I saw really enlightening concepts and found it to be a worthwhile time investment and as somebody that's obviously driving a podcast titled this week in innovation
I love it when mainline analysts are falling in love with the startup community in retail he goes on to say the one thing I anticipate happening that I thoroughly missed was the international attendance and for the record
We all were speculating would there even be any international attendees given the covid situation so going back to jerry's piece my guess before the show was that the international audience which had been growing robustly precovid would be nonexistent
This wasn't the case at all from both observation and from multiple vendor attendees from both europe latin were in abundance I had two separate vendors that told me while the circulated statistics suggested international registrants at less than 5% of the total
They are around 30% of their booth visits later on in totality I'm glad I went while it was certainly unique and surreal in a sense it was also a further step in trying to regain that which was lost and be resilient because that is what we do as part of the human race
Adapt and persevere and that's jerry's piece and it's beautifully written well worth the full read another observation comes from phil thorne he's managing director of north america for course ito and just a couple of three points he makes
I edited out an awful lot but his three points were people who come were shocked at how much they missed from not attending live events for two years couldn't agree with that more
There was a fair bit of anger for those who pulled out the showroom floor has nothing like the vibe and excitement of previous years and number three
For the first time the lower levels were where the energy is and for people that don't know the layout of a big show the or main the jabbits focus where you walk in off the street
That's where all big tech is the lower floor is where the smb vendors are really the small vendors and the startup room so typically that was an area as a working and analysis I would never go to because all my clients are up on the front floor
And now in this new gig that I'm doing covering the innovation world and startups that's my new patch and so couldn't agree with what phil said more and then jim roddy
Who represents the retail solutions providers association and I'll edit his piece quite a bit because he's a writer and had a lot of content well worth the read
Please don't call this the worst nrf ever as I expect some will instead use these three different adjectives number one the weirdest nrf ever 100 plus empty spaces and several ghost booth exhibit spaces set up but unstaffed due to the pandemic made this by far the weirdest event I've ever attended
One attendee described the main show floor as relaxing others called it surreal and eerie I agree it was the weirdest trade show I'd ever seen the second observation
The friendliest interrupt ever at most shows you might get five or ten minutes with an exhibitor before they're interrupted by a scheduled meeting or prospect inquiry
But with the lack of traffic exhibitors were welcoming to anyone that showed interest in their products and services let me show you our products yes
I'm happy to also share our go to market plans while you're here tell me about your family additionally I noticed a band of brothers mentality developing among attendees
Appreciative of everyone else overcoming so many obstacles and taking the risk to participate in the event nothing builds camaraderie like mutual commitment and an effort despite fierce headwinds
And then third and here's the punch the most important to nrf ever we have to figure out asap how to conduct business safely because koba doesn't look like it's disappearing anytime soon
Nrf 2022 afforded a few thousand attendees the opportunity to meet and collaborate safely and they did from what I saw 98% to 99% of attendees respected the mask mandate
Well I didn't so I'm one of the 1% but that's okay respected the mass mandate and each other south their organizations move the needle this week in new york city and helped our industry begin to get back on track
I could not agree with that more that is a beautiful statement and one I'm proud to be part of it was interesting I sent out a tweet on tuesday let me just actually read the tweet and then we'll talk just a little bit about it
So it came under me and I just simply said took the test this morning the test being the quick covid test that nrf issued to everybody or at least made available for everyone to take for free
Took the test this morning been in new york city since friday had a group dinner on friday and a big reception on saturday went to nrf 2022 on sunday and monday
Spent both days in the innovation lab and startup zone there was a well attended reception to startup zone was in bars sunday and monday night am I glad it came
Yeah exclamation point pretty simple tweak didn't call anybody out didn't challenge anybody just literally a statement of fact that I thought was going to be a pretty simple thing
Well as of a few minutes ago I had 6522 views on that one tweet and let's just say a few of them were really interesting and by the way this was on linkedin
This was on twitter twitter I wouldn't mind you could send me death threats on twitter it is what it is no big deal this is on linkedin and a couple of the more aggressive comments came from people that I was on not a first name
But whatever they were in my inner circle on my first whatever you call it direct connection so at some point both these people asked to connect to me because I didn't recognize the names and we're extremely aggressive in their observation of me attending an event very nasty
Not threatening but implying that those of us that went to a conference might in fact be responsible for tens of thousands of people dying which obviously in my mind is utter idiocy and it just sort of brought up the point that
Boy we are in almost everything we do we're a divided nation politically for sure and now in simple that two years ago where no one would think twice about and I don't know where we go from here
I'm certainly going to be going to conferences if I pass my pcr test on friday I'll be going to manifest which is a new which is a new logistics conference
I'm not reckless but I'm certainly not going to not go out and live again my personal observations over the last five days is number one as the theme came out with my three friends
I could not be prouder of the startup community in the innovation zone several startups missed the show because they were traveling internationally and some would fail the pcr test
Very problematic all the time all the effort to prepare to go to a show and literally the last minute you fail a test and you scratch these startups aren't sending teams of ten and 15 or 20
Usually they are one or two people so that becomes extremely problematic but the overwhelming majority of the startups did make the trip and looked like they had a fantastic time
And I surely enjoyed spending my nrf down in the innovation lab number two I'm not going to say anything either pro or con about the vendors or retailers that chose to pull out of the show
They did what they needed to do so be it but number three that being said I really would like to have the same respect for the decision I made as I said in my tweet
I was glad I went to nrf and I do it again so let's maybe put away you're going to kill grandma thing that was really kind of 2020 I think we've pretty much moved beyond that
In my case I'm the oldest of my family group both my parents and my in law parents are past and so if I'm going to kill anybody it's going to be me and I'm going to make that decision
And by the way I'm certainly not going to kill myself as I said I'll test again friday which I'm pretty sure will come back negative and off we go
So just some thoughts about what happened in the last week I'll probably get together a pod to really go over the actual technologies the stuff I normally do
But I just felt it was really important to get some thoughts around how this show sort of worked itself out and my observation after spending some time in there because it is clearly a hot button issue
Thanks everyone if you have any questions just reach out to me it's a subject I'm extremely passionate about and let's maybe figure out how we can get this country moving again