HeyJaredThe Voice of Retail
The Voice of Retail is a weekly podcast hosted by retail pioneer, advisor and keynote speaker Michael LeBlanc and is produced in conjunction with Retail Council of Canada.
- Indexed episodes, last 90 days
- 7
- Latest publication
- Sep 18, 2026
- Audience
- Checking…
- Earliest in this view
- Jul 10, 2026
Latest episodes
The Countdown to Black Friday: Getting Agent-Ready for Holiday with Caila Schwartz, Head of Agentic Commerce & Shopper Insights, Salesforce (opens the original)
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Holiday 2026 is coming, and your next customer might be an AI bot. Today on The Voice of Retail, Caila Schwartz, Head of Agentic Commerce and Shopper Insights at Salesforce, is back with brand-new State of Commerce data. AI-powered discovery is up 200%. Canadian retailers are leading on agentic AI, but they're three times more likely to be stuck in pilot mode. Caila shares the three moves to make before Black Friday, why your product descriptions still need a human touch, why Reddit reviews now
Ann Tracy, Chief Sustainability Officer, Colgate-Palmolive: Why Retailers Hold the Key to Sustainable Growth (opens the original)
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Ann Tracy, Chief Sustainability Officer at Colgate-Palmolive, joins Michael LeBlanc on The Voice of Retail ahead of the Retail Council of Canada Retail Sustainability Conference. An engineer with 35 years at the company, Ann unpacks the 2030 strategy, the shift from advocacy to value creation, the intention-action gap between what shoppers say and buy, and why retailers are essential partners. She takes the stage in Toronto October 28 with RCC President and CEO Kim Furlong. Presented by Konek, C
Uncommon Leadership: Author, former Walmart Executive Keith Wyche on Restoring Trust in Leadership (opens the original)
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Fortune 500 board director, keynote speaker, and author Keith Wyche joins Michael LeBlanc to unpack his new book, Uncommon Leadership. From the back room at Sears to running Walmart stores with 30,000 associates, Keith traces how business leadership drifted from service to self-interest, shares his trust formula of character times competency times consistency, revisits former Walmart CEO Doug McMillon's omnichannel turnaround, and explains what kind of culture boards and retail leaders should be
Inside A Merchandising Revolution with Liza Amlani, Chief Merchant & Principal at Retail Strategy Group (Encore) (opens the original)
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In this Encore episode of The Voice of Retail, presented by Konek, Michael welcomes back Liza Amlani, Chief Merchant and Principal of Retail Strategy Group, to explore the ideas behind her new book on process innovation in fashion retail 'The Material Life: Process Innovation for Retailers and Brands ". Liza explains why materials—not designs—should drive product creation, how silos inside retail organisations erode margin and speed, and where AI, sourcing transparency, and new legislation inter
The Strategy Trap: Why Companies Fail At Execution and How To Get It Right with Retail Veteran Kevin Ertell (Encore) (opens the original)
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Kevin Ertell, founder of Mistere Advisory, veteran retail operator joins The Voice of Retail in this Encore episode to discuss his new book, The Strategy Trap: Why Companies Fail at Execution and How to Get It Right. Kevin explains why execution—not ideas—is where most strategies break down, and shares practical insights from his career at Tower Records, Nike, and beyond, including his “Six Cs of Execution” framework for building alignment, focus, and momentum. Presented by Konek.
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