“I take immense pride in the evolution we’ve undergone in recent years,” Magid said. “We’ve enhanced our assortments, fortified our point of view and curation, and elevated both our digital and physical experience. Shoes have been pivotal to our growth, embodying our distinctive market positioning from accessible to aspirational. Continuously expanding our brand offerings remains a priority, and we remain dedicated to infusing excitement into our customer experience through immersive pop-ups and activations. The journey has been remarkable.”

Magid began her retail career in the Lord & Taylor executive training program. She joined Saks Fifth Avenue in 2003 as buyer of evening collections and progressed in successive merchandising roles, becoming senior vice president and general merchandise manager of women’s ready-to-wear, outerwear, dresses, private label and kids.

In that role, Magid led the team through an integration following the acquisition by HBC. She also introduced the first concession model in contemporary sportswear and refocused the business on core and emerging brands. In 2015, she became chief merchant for Intermix but left a year later to start DVMagid Consulting, where she gained valuable experience working with both international and domestic brands.

In January 2019, Magid joined Bloomingdale’s as the general merchandise manager of ready-to-wear, Bloomingdales.com and concessions. In 2021, she added responsibility for outlets and center core. And in 2023 was promoted to chief merchant.

“Working and leading at Bloomingdale’s is a uniquely rewarding experience,” Magid said. “There is a rich 150-year history and authentic energy that really defines not only the shopping experience for customers but also our internal workplace. I take immense pride in being a part of this team, guiding Bloomingdale’s into its next chapter and nurturing this distinctive environment. As a female leader, mentoring young talent is not just a responsibility, but a privilege. Guiding the next generation has been one of the most fulfilling roles I’ve had the honor of embracing.”

A version of this article appeared in the June 3 print issue of FN, as part of the “Women Who Rock” special section. On June 5, FN and Two Ten Footwear Foundation honored these women at a live event in New York City.

“As a leader, my greatest pride comes from witnessing the growth and success of my team. It’s incredibly rewarding to collaborate with such a talented group of individuals who lift each other up and collectively strive for excellence. Their achievements are a testament to the strength and unity of our team at Macy’s,” said Walsh. “At Macy’s, our challenge lies in revitalizing our brand to become an even stronger and more vibrant presence for our current customers, as well as for our new customers we are looking to welcome to our stores. Our mission is to captivate them with trend-right products that not only look great but also make them feel amazing.   

“In the realm of women’s shoes, we’re at the helm of driving trends and ensuring a diverse and fresh assortment from beloved brands” Walsh added. “We’re introducing our customers to exciting new brands and elevating our offerings within Macy’s private brands, like On 34th. Our goal is to curate a unique selection that reduces redundancy and enhances the shopping experience for our customers.”

A version of this article appeared in the June 3 print issue of FN, as part of the “Women Who Rock” special section. On June 5, FN and Two Ten Footwear Foundation honored these women at a live event in New York City.

Last November, Rodbell surprised the industry by returning to HBC, as president and chief executive officer of the Hudson’s Bay division in Canada. She was working as a consultant, as founder of LHR Advisors, and before that she served as Steve Madden’s group president of retail, accessories, licensing and direct-to-consumer for four years.

Prior to joining Madden, she ran the former Lord & Taylor as president when it was owned by HBC. She simultaneously served as president of Hudson’s Bay, and before that as executive vice president and chief merchant of both retail businesses.

Rodbell is among the only four women to have led Lord & Taylor since it was founded in 1826 as the nation’s first department store. The others were Dorothy Shaver, from 1945 to 1959; Jane Elfers, 2000 to 2008, and Vanessa LeFebvre, who succeeded Rodbell.

Rodbell built a successful career at Lord & Taylor where she worked for 32 years, starting as a dress buyer. Rodbell presided over L&T during downtrends, management integrations and streamlinings, but she grew L&T’s e-commerce business, including putting a Lord & Taylor store on Walmart.com and implementing some omnichannel services like buy online, pick up in-store, staging events tied to social media and targeting millennials to offset L&T’s reputation as being “grandma’s” store.

“I’ve been fortunate to experience some big wins in my career. However, I am immensely passionate about helping women realize their potential, and I am proud of that,” Rodbell said. “Extraordinary success comes when women support women.” 

Regarding her current assignment, Rodbell said, “Hudson’s Bay has incredible brand awareness and affinity in Canada. We believe people should surround themselves with things they love, and our mission is to help customers enrich every moment of their life and style.”

A version of this article appeared in the June 3 print issue of FN, as part of the “Women Who Rock” special section. On June 5, FN and Two Ten Footwear Foundation honored these women at a live event in New York City.

When talking strategy, “digital-first” or the metaverse aren’t part of von Maur’s conversation. It’s more about “blocking and tackling,” bricks-and-mortar and service. And he seems dubious about retailers that come up with slick corporate mantras to impress investors, or identify as tech companies to seem cutting edge.

“Shouldn’t it just be you want to provide a great product, at a great price with great service? That’s our strategy. Call it whatever you want,” von Maur said. “We are just customer-first. We have always prided ourselves on doing what we need to do to get the customer the information they need and what they want. We have always been omnichannel.”

Von Maur does have a growing digital business. It currently represents a low, double-digit percent of the company’s approximate $1 billion annual volume, whereas in 2019, it was 8% of the total. “It’s our No. 1 store now,” von Maur said. “Digital has grown on its own. It’s a good augmentation to our brick-and-mortar and an important part of our business.”

He believes the customer’s shopping behavior will dictate just how much e-commerce should represent of the company’s total sales in the future.

But the physical store, “that’s our bread and butter. True retail brick-and-mortar is here to stay,” von Maur said.

During a wide-ranging interview from his headquarters office in Davenport, Iowa, a city on the Mississippi River with a population of 101,000, von Maur made the case for operating a privately owned versus a publicly owned company. He also discussed the secret sauce behind his company’s longevity, his expectations for continuing to grow his business and his philosophy on shopping.

“People want to get out and shop, get real service, touch and feel the product, try it on, not just sit at home and click on a device,” von Maur said. “People want to see other people and have a real experience. When I talk to the young executive trainees, they will tell me they prefer to go out and shop. I think it’s the older demographic that likes the convenience of shopping online.”

After 150 years in business, Von Maur sees much room for growth and continues to launch stores in cities and suburbs around the country where it hasn’t had a presence before. Von Maur’s 37 department stores, currently situated in 15 states, sell men’s, women’s and children’s apparel, footwear and accessories; beauty; soft home; home decor; gifts, and some food. The company also operates 70 Dry Goods specialty stores selling contemporary women’s fashion, accessories, shoes and gifts.

“Geographically, we would eventually like to be coast-to-coast, but it’s so hard to predict the future,” said von Maur. “We open one to two Von Maur department stores a year, so I don’t know how long it’s going to take” to reach that national goal.

“We’ve been very patient. But if we end up buying another chain to grow faster than our typical rate, it’s possible. I don’t know who that would be. We are very happy with the course we are on, though we would like more opportunity. We are actually surprised that there hasn’t been more options out there, with Sears going under and other stores retrenching and having difficulties. Sears has been very strategic with how they sell their real estate. We thought there would really be so many it would be hard to choose from, but the availability hasn’t been there. They’re asking for a lot of money, holding out.

“We have a lot of places where we could open a department store.”

These days, it’s rare when a department store opens, yet Von Maur has been opportunistically seizing vacated store real estate. In fall 2024, Von Maur will open a 118,000-square-foot store at South Hills Village in Pittsburgh, its first location in Pennsylvania, on the site of a former Sears.

Last month Von Maur opened a 90,000-square-foot department store at West Towne Mall in Madison, Wis., on the site of a former Boston Store. “It was wall-to-wall people from the minute we opened the door,” said von Maur.

Last spring, the retailer opened a two-level, 140,000-square-foot department store in Rochester Hills in north Detroit, moving into a former Carson Pirie Scott store.

A 140,000-square-foot store in the Jordan Creek Town Center in west Des Moines, Iowa, was set to open Nov. 5, in a former Younkers, replacing the Von Maur in the Valley West mall.

“We were ready for a new store there,” said von Maur. “The old one was getting a little tired. The Jordan Creek store will have a more updated look. The children’s department, instead of being covered in primary colors — that kids’ look — it’s more modern and sleek. We have added a food section, and we’re going to a smaller footprint so it will be easier to shop. Valley West was 180,000 square feet. For me, it was too big. To get from one end of the men’s department to the other, it took a lot. It was harder to get service.

“I think our new store is going to be more shopper friendly, with better sight lines and more symmetrical than the old store. It’s in a great mall,” which is anchored by Scheels, Dillard’s, P.F Chang’s, Barnes & Noble and Apple. “It’s very well leased.” There is also a Dry Goods store in the mall. “It’s got better parking and better stores around it. Des Moines has been one of our best markets since we opened there in the 1970s. We want to put our best foot forward in Des Moines.”

Jordan Creek will be the scene of Von Maur’s biggest 150th birthday celebration, with giveaways, gifts with purchases, a charity donation and what von Maur described as a massive free gum ball machine that, depending on the color of the gum ball dispensed, a customer could get a $15 gift card or a $500 gift card, or just a piece of chewing gum. Other stores are also celebrating the milestone.

Von Maur expanded into Michigan in 2003 and New York state nine years ago. The retailer’s most western location is in Oklahoma City, where in 2014 it opened in the Quail Springs Mall, also on the site of a former Sears.

In the near term, Von Maur could push further west, and Denver is being considered, though for now at least, the Midwest and Southeast are the primary regions for expansion.

Von Maur selects markets with minimum populations of 400,000 to 500,000 and locations that are readily accessible off a major artery to draw customers from a wide radius.

“You want to be in a quality shopping environment. Are there good stores that would surround us? We don’t want to be next to a lot of budget stores,” said von Maur. “Are there nice restaurants? We don’t have restaurants, so that’s an important component. Are there movie theaters and other forms of entertainment? Is there good visibility [from inside and outside the mall]? Good parking is important too.

“We look for communities that have been overlooked,” von Maur added. “Madison was really underserved for the size of the market and the type of customer that is there. They didn’t have a lot of options. But we are not afraid of competition. Atlanta is a very competitive market.”

Von Maur entered the Atlanta market in 2011 by opening a department store in the North Point Mall in Alpharetta, Ga., and subsequently opened units in Atlanta’s Perimeter Mall and the Mall of Georgia. Von Maur’s business in Atlanta has been “solid, but not going as well as we hoped, though this year it has been very good,” the CEO said. “We’ve grown quite a bit on a comp basis. It has not been as good as we hoped but we are making inroads. We are making money, not a lot. We are not losing money. It’s a highly retailed market, with a lot of malls.”

Coming off the pandemic, Von Maur opened just one Dry Goods store this year, but next year, 15 to 20 are seen opening. There are 70 Dry Goods stores.

“We have big plans for Dry Goods,” said von Maur. “It’s doing really well, so we want to be aggressive. It’s a great concept and we have an exciting mix. We have great merchandise. We are seeing some pullback from that younger demographic, but it’s still doing extremely well. It’s very, very profitable.”

The 12-year-old Dry Goods has been rolling out 4,000-square-foot specialty stores focused on junior and contemporary women’s apparel, accessories, shoes and gifts with an interior design that has a SoHo feel, like an old vintage store. The Dry Goods units each generate around $1.5 million to $2 million in sales, while some do as much as $3 million.

For the Von Maur business overall, “I always say we are all fighting for the same dollar. Dillard’s, Target and Scheels are out there, and there is all that stuff on the internet pulling dollars away,” said von Maur. Nordstrom and Macy’s would be direct competitors as well but there’s also JCPenney, Kohl’s, Walmart, Gap and others. “The competition is anybody selling apparel and accessories.”

On the other hand, “Practically all the family department stores that used to be in America no longer exist,” von Maur observed. “There were hundreds and hundreds of them.”

Citing several reasons for their disappearance, von Maur explained, “You might have had family dynamics. The families grow and some members want to get out, some want to continue. Or they didn’t adapt. They ran the same thing, without changing.

“We are pretty much one of the last ones that’s still family-owned. We are a traditional, family-owned, good-old department store. It’s 100% still owned by the family.”

So how has Von Maur endured for 150 years?

“My dad and uncle reinvented the store,” said von Maur. “They focused on service and selection, rather than price. They realized they didn’t want to be one of those stores that had a blowout sale every weekend. So they decided to go a different avenue, focus on quality experience and quality merchandise and not playing games with the customer with coupons.

“We are extremely profitable and we do it without charging interest on our credit card,” the CEO added. “Most retailers make their money on the interest they charge. We don’t do that. We do it by running a clean business.” It’s an interest-free charge card with no late fees and no annual dues. The card has been around since 1988.

“Remember the days where there was Federated and May? You walked in their stores and they all seemed the same. The same merchandising, the same layout, the same boring decor. Make it a great experience.

“You walk into our store and you are going to feel special, and we make sure you get what you need and that you leave happy. It’s hassle free. We have exciting merchandise,” said von Maur. “We make it relaxing, no loud music, hardly any vendor signage. We’re not screaming 40% off. You’re walking into a nice relaxing residential environment. Our aisles are not merchandised. You don’t run into a rack or a dump table. You don’t get people bumping into you. People come to our store to relax and enjoy themselves, rather than just to get in and get out. There is a piano in every store with live music. We employ a lot of piano players.

“When you walk into a Von Maur you know you are in a Von Maur. It’s special and unique.”

Other factors have sustained the business.

Von Maur has managed to escape decades of department store attrition by avoiding the traps many retailers fell into, like over-expansion, over-promoting to push volume, or taking on too much debt. Von Maur has outlasted large retail nameplates that were either gobbled up by other retailers or went out of business on their own, like Marshall Field’s, Hess’s, Carson Pirie Scott, Parisian, Younkers, Bamberger’s and Abraham & Straus, among others.

The company has kept a clear course and identity, banking heavily on national brands without the kind of heavy private-label buildups seen at other department stores and mass chains. Some key brands at Von Maur are Vineyard Vines, Tory Burch, Kendra Scott, Free People, Eileen Fisher and Tommy Bahama. Key brands at Dry Goods include Blowfish Malibu, Lola Grace, Eunina, Originality and Thread & Supply.

“The fact that we are family owned allows us to make smart decisions,” von Maur maintained. “We don’t have to worry about propping up the stock price by growing too quickly, or getting the topline up. It hurts the earnings. We think in terms of five, 10, 20 years. We had seven presidents in our company’s history. My great-grandfather; my great uncle; my grandfather; my uncle; Jack Arth, the only non-family to be president; my brother Richard; and me.” A dozen family members are owners. His uncle, Charles von Maur, serves as chairman.

Asked how the business is performing currently, von Maur replied: “We have seen a pullback in the younger, junior demographic at Von Maur and Dry Goods.” He also said the children’s business recently turned flat. “The rest of the business has been very solid,” he said, citing women’s sportswear, men’s clothing, shoes and handbags.

“We, like everyone else, are trying to be optimistic for the holiday season but there are a lot of headwinds,” von Maur said, referring to inflation, declining consumer confidence, and recession fears.

“I was talking to a handbag vendor on Saturday and he said he is going to increase his prices again. I said, ‘Give me a percent,’ and he said, ‘It’s a lot.’ And I said, ‘Would it be like 5%.’ And he said, “More like 30% on the stuff being manufactured right now.

“It’s like price increase after price increase. We are going to see fewer units go out the door, but at higher price points. The volume may stay the same, but we are not going to be moving as many units,” for the most part.

Von Maur does see a “silver lining” in a recession. “You don’t need to staff your stores as much as in good times. We used to have 5,500 employees but since the pandemic we are probably down to 4,000. We have had a hard time hiring people.”

Generally, though, “Our selling payroll [as a percent of SG&A] would be dramatically higher than our competition,” von Maur said. “We are just going to always have more full-timers and more people in our store, to the point where it drives my CFO crazy. Before the pandemic, it was double as a percent of selling. We pay our people more. We like full-timers and we have lots of them.”

Discussing the future and further expansion, von Maur said, “I am very optimistic based on the number of stores we have been opening. We are willing to make that investment. Retailing is changing so fast, with the internet, these pop ups, so many little apparel websites out there that people use, and you have influencers that have a huge impact on your business — YouTube influencers, Instagram influencers.

“Navigating all these new things that are popping up, retailing is not like it used to be. But we are doing better with vendors than we ever have. Sometimes they limit distribution and let us sell their products in seven stores or whatever, instead of all of our stores. That gets frustrating, but it’s getting better over time. It helps that a lot of the competition has been struggling.

“When we opened in Madison, we had so many customers come into the store saying they had no place to buy shoes. Okay, they’ve got Macy’s, but it’s in a mall that’s hard to get to. Here is a community with 600,000 people that doesn’t have a place to buy a decent pair of shoes. The lack of competition is encouraging because we are not dealing with a lot of promotional department stores like we used to.”

Von Maur acknowledged that when the company expanded into Georgia, Pennsylvania and New York, “there’s been a learning curve for sure,” meaning many shoppers in markets new for Von Maur are getting to know the store for the first time.

“Because we don’t do a lot of advertising, word of mouth, as well as the internet, billboards and staging a big grand opening, all help. It does take a while to develop some customer loyalty in new markets. We do get our name out there, and we let our reputation spread by giving that legendary customer service. But sometimes it’s astounding how many people, after five or six years of being in a market, just discover our store.”

Asked how he feels about being in business for 150 years, von Maur said, “This is a great source of pride for the company, the family and the community. The fact that we are based in Davenport, Iowa, is pretty unique.”

1872: J.H.C. Petersen & Sons Co. is founded on West Second Street in Davenport, Iowa.

1887: Charles Jacob “C.J.” von Maur, R.H. Harned and E.C. Pursel establish the Boston Store on the corner of Second Brady Streets in Davenport.

1889: Pursel dies and Boston Store becomes Harned & Von Maur.

1916: Harned and von Maur purchase J.H.C. Petersen & Sons and continue to operate the stores separately.

1928: Harned, Von Maur and J.H.C. Petersen & Sons merge and becomes Petersen Harned Von Maur, which customers dub “Petersen’s.”

1929: Petersen’s purchases the Fisk and Loosley department store in Moline, Ill., and closes it three years later.

1961: Petersen’s returns to Moline through the purchase of a furniture store in the Orchard Center Shopping Plaza; the store closes in 1982.

1968: Petersen’s purchases the Van Allen department store in Clinton, Iowa.

1970: Petersen’s purchases the M.L. Parker department store at Second and Brady Streets in Davenport; the store closes in 1971.

1972: Petersen’s celebrates a century in business and opens its first mall store in Duck Creek Plaza in Bettendorf, Iowa; the store closes in 1999.

1974: Petersen’s opens in Moline, Ill.

1975: Petersen’s expands to West Des Moines.

1979: Petersen’s opens in Muscatine, Iowa; the store closes in 1994.

1980: Petersen’s opens in Cedar Rapids, Iowa; the store closes in 2007.

1981: Petersen’s opens three stores in Iowa.

1986: Petersen’s downtown Davenport store closes.

1987: Petersen’s opens in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

1989: Petersen’s buys two stores in Illinois, in Decatur’s Hickory Point Mall and in the College Hills Mall in Normal. Jack Arth becomes the first person outside the von Maur family to be named president.

1989: The company shortens its name from Petersen Harned Von Maur to Von Maur.

1990: Company headquarters relocates from the former Petersen’s downtown Davenport store to the north side of Davenport on Interstate 80.

1994: Von Maur enters the Chicago market with a flagship in Yorktown Center in Lombard, Ill.

1995-2005: The Von Maur expansion continues into Omaha and Lincoln, Neb.; Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, Ind.; Eden Prairie, Minn.; St. Charles and Glenview, Ill.; Wichita, Kan.; Ann Arbor and Livonia, Mich.; Louisville, Ky.; and Columbus, Ohio.

2007: Von Maur launches online shopping.

2008-2010: Von Maur department stores open in Dayton, Ohio; Overland Park, Kan.; and Lake St. Louis, Mo.

2010: Von Maur’s first Dry Goods store opens in Aurora, Ill.; an e-commerce fulfillment center opens near company headquarters.

2011-2012: Von Maur enters the Atlanta market, opening first in Alpharetta, Ga., and in Dunwoody, Ga.

2013: Von Maur enters the Northeast, opening a store just outside Rochester, N.Y. That same week, a store opens in the suburbs of Birmingham, Ala. The Iowa City store relocates to Coralville.

2014: Von Maur’s first store in the Southwest opens in Oklahoma City.

2016: Von Maur opens its third Atlanta store, in the Mall of Georgia, one the nation’s largest malls.

2017: Von Maur enters the Milwaukee market with a unit in Brookfield, Wis.

2022: Von Maur opens in Detroit; Madison, Wis.; and Des Moines, Iowa.

In the past few years, the retailer has trimmed its brand portfolio from 40 down to 12. “They really needed to have a soul and attract certain customers. Some were just transactional labels. We asked our customers which ones do you have a relationship with, and those we grew. We picked fewer but we made them more meaningful,” Brown said. “We built up the design and fit part of our organization. That’s where we spend most of our focus.”

NPG, which covers apparel and accessories for men, women and kids and home goods, calls its private brand portfolio “Nordstrom Made.” NPG has a team of about 350 people in merchandising, design, development and sourcing, and works with manufacturers in 25 countries. “I like to say we do everything from candy to cashmere,” said Brown.

“Our young adult business has been a big focus for us, in just getting that back on track and catering to the right group,” said Brown, who began her career with Nordstrom as a salesperson in Glendale, Calif., in 1990 and steadily rose up the management ranks. “For the younger millennial, we launched Open Edit in the spring. I’ve actually never seen a brand take off like this before. Now it’s how to scale and grow that.”

NPG’s deep dive into the data, and having conversations with customers to understand all the things they do, “really helped us to get it right, right out of the gate. I think that’s the page I’ll use to launch new brands,” the executive said.

Nordstrom has been evolving its Halogen brand, targeting millennials with “day-to-night essentials” with greater comfort and versatility in light of changing lifestyles and work situations. More trend-driven pieces have been added in recent months. “It’s always been our customers’ go-to brand,”
she said.

The Nordstrom label — Nordstrom Made’s largest brand seen in home, kids’, layette, men’s and accessories — is poised for further growth. “When we get it all the way expanded out, it will be in every category. We are expanding into women’s right now,” Brown said. The label, she added, reflects those pieces in the closet that never have to change: the perfect cashmere sweater, that black cardigan. Other top Nordstrom-owned brands include Zella activewear, which was introduced in 2007 before the athleticwear boom. It’s offered in women’s, men’s and kids’. There’s also BP for young adults, and Treasure & Bond, which donates 2.5% of net sales to charity. “Probably a year and half ago, we said every single brand we have is going to have extended sizes. That was a bold move,” said Brown. “We hired people to help us understand fit for different types of body shapes.”

One of the biggest ideas that came up, Brown said, was wanting to see different people wearing Nordstrom brands, in other words, a more inclusive approach. BP + Wildfang (introduced last spring) was born out of that. It’s an unusual pairing, where Wildfang, a fashion label that challenges stereotypes and gender norms, teamed with Nordstrom Made’s BP brand on a gender-fluid collection including overalls, button-ups, blazers, statement T-shirts and accessories in a body-diverse size range up to 4X.

Henna and Hijabs x Nordstrom, geared for the modern Muslim woman, is another recent launch reaching different audiences. This month, the retailer will debut Nordstrom x Christina Martinez to celebrate Latinx Heritage Month and reach a largely underserved customer. Martinez is a Mexican American artist known for beautiful art prints, which Nordstrom has adapted for apparel and home products. “We are looking for more collaborations and influencers to help us with our impact and inclusivity story,” said Brown.

Nordstrom intends to grow its reliance on private brands, though Brown declined to specify any figures on the business or what percent of the company’s total volume could be presented by private brands. “With our customers changing values, they’re really clear about what they care about. We can make brands and products to cater to all of their needs. And of course, it’s wildly more profitable, and the return rate is much lower than our non-Nordstrom Made brands.”

Still, there is risk in the long lead times required to design and develop private brands, but Brown said, “We have more flexibility than we’ve ever had. While working on Open Edit during COVID-19, our sourcing and development team was working on closer-to-home production systems in our country, Mexico and Guatemala. I see a path forward to increase our closer-to-home production,” Brown said.

Brown cited other Nordstrom Made goals for 2025, among them that 50% of Nordstrom Made products come from sustainably sourced raw materials and ensuring that 15% of the assortment qualifies for Nordstrom’s “sustainable style” program, which makes it easy to shop consciously manufactured products. The company is also shooting for 90% of its products to be factory traceable by 2025 and is on track to achieve that goal ahead of schedule.

“The company has managed itself very conservatively, fiscally,” Bramman said. “In the last 120 years, it’s been through wars, depression, economic recession, a pandemic. So we take pride in making sure we can weather the storm out there. As a CFO, I really appreciate working for a company with that mindset.”

Being the CFO of a large public company — tracking the cash flow, dealing with Wall Street, guiding investments and financing, and advocating for corrective actions when necessary — is no easy role. “If you asked me a year ago what was most challenging, it was dealing with the pandemic when the stores were closed and we were trying to keep people employed and maintain cash liquidity,” Bramman said. “Right now, our cash flow and our balance sheet are in great shape.”

Nordstrom ended the second quarter with $1.3 billion in available liquidity, including $487 million in cash, and in July retired $500 million in notes due in October using cash on hand, reducing annualized interest by $20 million. Long-term debt is about $2.85 billion.

The retailer has forecast annual revenue to reach $17 billion in three to five years, compared with $15.13 billion in 2019, and $10.38 billion in 2020 when the pandemic hit. “There is still a lot of uncertainty and volatility, and the global supply chain environment is a great example of that. In an environment of volatility, it’s about making sure you’ve got scenarios you can adapt and that you can be agile — and that is exactly what I am focused on in this role. But it’s also ensuring that we live by the values of the company as well, and deliver a great customer experience.”

That’s where Nordstrom’s “Closer to You” three-year agenda comes in. Unveiled last February, it calls for broadening the digital assortment from 300,000 items to potentially 1.5 million in three to five years; injecting lower-price offerings into the Nordstrom Rack off-price matrix, and extending the reach and effectiveness of its three-year-old market strategy, which entails leveraging the physical assets of Nordstrom’s department stores, Rack locations and Nordstrom Local service hubs, to increase services, conveniences, merchandise choices and speed deliveries. “We are making progress” on the agenda, Bramman said. “There are definitely areas we are particularly happy with and other areas where we have more work to do.”

Nordstrom has begun building up its dot-com assortment to support the increasingly “digital first” orientation of the business. In 2020, digital sales accounted for about 50% of the company’s total revenues. “This year, it’s running a little under that given the recovery of our store business,” Bramman said. “We are still seeing good growth on the digital side, so we do anticipate that the majority of business will be digital in the next couple of years.”

With the goal of having 1.5 million SKUs in the dot-com assortment, she said, “We’re actually ahead of where we thought we would be at this point in time. Anniversary Sale was a great proof point for us. We really opened up on the offering from vendors.” More were added and many were drop shipping.

Asked what being digital-first implies for the future of brick-and-mortar stores, Bramman said, “It doesn’t mean we don’t value physical assets. They are incredibly important in serving our customers. They want to engage with us in multiple ways. We have 100 department stores today, primarily in A and A-plus malls, with some in downtown urban centers like Michigan Avenue [in Chicago] and Manhattan. We have really good locations.  We continue to spend money refreshing them. As you know, we opened a huge store in New York, which was not a cheap prospect.”

She pointed out that stores have become more than places to shop. Store inventories are used to fulfill dot-com orders. Stores serve as centers for services such as BOPIS and returns, and elevating the services at stores leads to “more meaningful customer experiences,” Bramman said. 

The exec characterized Nordstrom Local as another “engagement point” with customers and a convenient service alternative to going to a Nordstrom or Rack store that could be farther away. There are currently seven Nordstrom Local units: five in Los Angeles and two in Manhattan. Another opportunity centers on “getting more data-driven” and using predictive models to allocate the right inventory at the appropriate levels, market by market, to better meet customer demand and provide speedier deliveries, be it a next-day or two-day delivery. “That is really the piece of the strategy to unlock,” observed Bramman. At Rack’s 250 stores, about 70 have shifted to lower-priced merchandise to capture a customer shopping at TJX, Ross and Burlington. Prices at Rack are generally two to three times higher than the prices in other major off-price chains. “We’re getting more into that $10 to $15 price point for some Racks. We won’t do all 250 Rack stores” that way, Bramman explained.

Other Racks will continue with their high penetration of branded products. They share a lot of the same brands with Nordstrom’s full-line stores, but are sharply discounted. A third group of Racks will be “hybrids,” Bramman said, meaning they will have a mix of lower-priced goods and the branded goods.

Nordstrom raised its guidance for 2021 revenue growth of 35%, versus 25% previously forecast, and EBIT margin at 3% to 3.5% of sales, versus around 3% previously forecast. Net sales in the 2021 second quarter increased 101% to $3.57 billion, from $1.79 billion in the same period in fiscal 2020, and decreased 6% from the same period in fiscal 2019. “The consumer is spending. They’re coming back, even in markets with higher COVID-19 cases. People are socializing and want to refresh their wardrobes,” Bramman said.

“Anniversary is an event of scarcity. That creates excitement,” said Jamie Nordstrom, president of stores.

Nordstrom’s last Anniversary Sale ran from July 12 to Aug. 8, and each year after the event concludes, the retailer begins prepping for the next one. It’s about a year in the planning, and no small feat to pull off. It’s staged across the entire Nordstrom 100-unit department store fleet, and on Nordstrom.com.

The Anniversary Sale gives Nordstrom’s most loyal, highest-spending customers a first crack at shopping designer discounts on new fall styles, at 25% to 40% off. Other loyal but less-spending cardholders get access soon after, and eventually all shoppers get access to the event.

For Anniversary Sale, designers and brands — some of which typically have a large selection on the Nordstrom floor — might have three items, creating a sense of urgency and exclusivity. Nordstrom locations designate areas for Anniversary Sale merchandise and it’s always signed well. The very next day after the event, the remaining Anniversary merchandise reverts to full price.

The Anniversary Sale is Nordstrom’s biggest volume event, or sometimes its second biggest depending on the outcome of the holiday sale. The two events are usually close in volume, but always different in character, with Anniversary being more of a loyalty event and unique in the retail industry.

During the 2021 Anniversary event, sales increased 1% compared with 2019. “A compelling merchandise assortment, combined with new and differentiated services and experiences, contributed to strengthening customer engagement and improving financial results during our Anniversary Sale,” said Pete Nordstrom, president and chief brand officer of Nordstrom Inc. One hundred brands were added to the Anniversary assortment.

“In the past, it was primarily a fall and back-to-school load-up, with a lot of coats and sweaters,” said Jamie. “People don’t need that anymore. Over the last 10 years or so, you are able to buy in real time what you want and need. It’s more evolved to wear-now, with a broader aperture of merchandising.”

The executives said traffic and sales trends during the sale were strong across both digital and stores as customers responded positively to the expanded selection, better in-stock rates on top-selling items and enhanced capabilities, including convenient pickup options at Nordstrom and Nordstrom Rack stores.

This year, the timing of the event shifted. It straddled both the second and third quarters of 2021, resulting in a negative impact of about 200 basis points on the company’s total net sales in the second quarter compared with fiscal 2019. Adjusting for this timing shift, sales trends improved by about 900 basis points relative to the first quarter.

The Nordstrom Anniversary Sale has become an industry phenomenon, not only because of its popularity and revenue potential, but because of its unique format that hasn’t yet been copied by competitors. Retailing in July is typically in the doldrums and most department stores have racks of clearance and no new merchandise

But the sale is not a promotion or clearance. New fall merchandise is stocked just for this event, with buyers getting orders from vendors when department stores typically don’t get them, and Nordstrom achieving a surge in volume in an otherwise soft sales period.

The Anniversary Sale dates back to the early 1960s with Nordstrom’s acquisition of Best Apparel, which had been running an “anniversary” sale since the mid-1940s. Nordstrom has adapted the formula over the years, such as extending the length of the sale and providing early access for cardholders.

“Most of our focus is how to make the Anniversary Sale even more fun, how to create more engagement,” said Jamie. “Our customers love it because it’s fun. We’ve got to make sure we don’t lose sight of that aspect. You’ve got to get there first to get the best selection. It’s like concert tickets — you’ve got to get them before they’re sold out.”

“There was a period of time for a lot of retailers like us when we were managing the dot-com and store businesses separately, with different teams and organizations. Across the company, in technology, accounting, finance, the supply chain, HR, we needed to transform our thinking,” he said. “The real win would come from having an integrated approach both online and in stores — for the merchandise, the messaging and all service touch points for our customers, be it buy online, pick up in-store, styling, alterations or returns.”

Not many retail executives have as much experience across selling channels as Jamie Nordstrom, the cousin of brothers Erik and Pete Nordstrom, respectively Nordstrom Inc.’s CEO and president/chief brand officer.

Jamie began his career in 1986, in the stockroom of Nordstrom’s Bellevue, Wash., store. He then worked in sales in shoes through high school and college, held positions in merchandise management, store management and buying, and from 2005 to 2014 was president of Nordstrom.com when the online revenue grew from $250 million to over $1.6 billion. Dot-com continues to grow, accounting for $5.7 billion, or 55%, of Nordstrom’s $10.33 billion in total sales last year, when the business was severely impacted by the pandemic, and about $5 billion, or 33%, of Nordstrom’s total sales of $15.13 billion in 2019.

Jamie was the vision behind the 2011 Nordstrom acquisition of the HauteLook flash sale website, and in 2014 he led the launch of Nordstromrack.com. As president of the Nordstrom department stores, he has been involved in several openings, notably the first international store in Calgary, Canada, and the Manhattan flagship, as well as closing 16 department stores in a downsizing completed last year.

Given all that, it’s not surprising what he seems most proud of — initiatives to create more seamless customer experiences, elevated services and greater conveniences.

He explained that by integrating the store and online merchandising teams for a companywide “single view” of inventory, the salespeople and customers get access to nearly all Nordstrom merchandise “anywhere and anytime.”

“It’s about getting our teams really focused on Nordstrom customers as opposed to the store customer or the internet customer,” said Jamie. “It’s one customer. Nobody exclusively shops in stores or online. More than 50% of customers who shop in-store will have started their shopping journey online with us, and similarly a significant number of customers who buy from us online started their journey by seeing a product in-store.”

Nordstrom Inc.’s three-year “Closer to You” agenda — unveiled last February to media and the investor community — calls for dramatically widening dot-com offerings from 300,000 SKUs to 1.5 million, growing the Rack off-price business by layering in products with lower prices, and advancing the three-year-old market strategy linking and leveraging store, distribution and digital assets, to provide greater services and conveniences at the local level with the intent of triggering deeper engagement by shoppers.

“Buy online, pick up in-store is one of the fastest-growing parts of the company’s business,” said Jamie. “Having a big selection of merchandise ready for next-day pickup at local stores, using all the inventory available in that market, be it from local stores or from online, requires a lot of people to make that work.”

Thanks to the market strategy, in each of Nordstrom’s top 20 markets, four times more inventory is available for next-day pickup of a Nordstrom.com order at the most convenient, Nordstrom, Nordstrom Rack or Nordstrom Local store.

“We have nearly 350 physical locations to supplement our digital capabilities,” said Jamie. “In the Los Angeles market alone, we have 16 stores with inventory available for next-day pickup at the store.”

Asked how far the market strategy has progressed, he answered, “I still think we are in the first or second inning on how to deliver on customers’ increasingly high expectations. It’s a never-ending cycle of listening to what the customer is asking for and getting the team to deliver on that demand. “Good service is not the absence of bad service,” Jamie continued. “Good service is often invisible. You don’t notice it. When we execute well the customer says, ‘That is just great.’’’

He draws an analogy of being in a top restaurant. “You get your water, and then your water is full again, as opposed to somebody coming up and saying, ‘Would you want more water?’ We want to be in the place where your glass is always full.”

Food and beverage is something Nordstrom executives know a lot about. “It has been part of our offer for 40 years,” Jamie said. “It’s in every Nordstrom department store, and over the last 10 years, more bars have been brought in. Cocktail lounges have been a real win. Food and beverage is one of the most pure forms of service. We are really proud of our restaurants.”

In a broad sense, service is also about exposing customers to products other than those they may have come to the store or the website for, and helping them locate items they may have trouble finding. In the last 18 months or so, Nordstrom, as Jamie said, has been “unleashing the sales team through new tools and social media to engage with customers to create excitement about new styles and find something cool they didn’t know they had to have. We are constantly looking at leveraging our sales team, our supply chain and our vendors to give customers more choices.”

In Q1, there was progress in expanding personalization by providing tools to more salespeople and stylists to offer customers highly relevant recommendations, both in-store and digitally, and to chat with them.

More than 50% of Nordstrom’s salespeople are now utilizing these remote styling tools, a 10-point increase compared to the quarter before. Nordstrom’s tools provide associates with stored information to keep track of what customers are asking for and buying. They also have “style boards” so associates can arrange outfits that can be viewed digitally on a cell phone.

Over the past year, Nordstrom has also been livestreaming. “We are in the very early stages of what that can mean for our business. Our best salespeople and influencers are doing livestreaming,” said Jamie. “We’ll put our sales [team] against anyone else’s.

“For as long as I have been around, there’s been this focus on having good people and the right amount of them,” Jamie added, when asked what he believes makes his family’s company unique.

Asked whether Nordstrom spends more than its competitors on manning its stores, Jamie said, “I don’t know what others spend, but to get the right quality talent, you’ve got to make sure you have effective compensation. We’ve had primarily a commissions-based organization for a long time. The value of that is our people think of it as their own business, that it’s their name on the door.”

With the nation’s labor shortage, “It’s a challenge out there, and it’s no different for us. But we’ve got a pretty good story to tell as an employer.”

Now, as CEO, he’s guiding the family-run company through a most critical, pivotal phase filled with opportunities centered on Nordstrom’s new “Closer to You” long-term growth agenda, unveiled last February to the investor community, as well as external hurdles, ranging from supply chain bottlenecks, labor shortages and increasing wage and delivery costs to uncertainties surrounding the pandemic, compounding challenges in planning the business.

“These are very unpredictable, volatile times. Today is a lot different than a year ago,” Erik said in a wide-ranging, candid interview. “We have a lot of challenges these days. I don’t think anyone is short on those. With the pace of change, the mix of business and the mix of product, obviously the pandemic is still causing a lot of uncertainty. Supply chain has been a big challenge for everyone, both externally slowing down and just [creating] difficulty managing the flow of product. We are not a price-promotional retailer. Our customer looks to us for newness. That steady flow of product is really our lifeblood and it continues to be challenging to manage to a steady flow.”

Asked if managing certain categories is more difficult than others, Erik replied: “It’s not that predictable. It changes. If it were that predictable, we could get in front of it.”

On Aug. 24, Nordstrom Inc. reported second-quarter results that were mixed. There was improvement on the top and bottom lines from the year-ago quarter, though the sales revenue fell below the 2019 level. Consequently, Nordstrom shares took a big hit on the stock market as investors were disappointed that the retailer couldn’t keep up with competitors such as Macy’s and Kohl’s, where second-quarter 2021 top-line figures surpassed second-quarter 2019 results.

Still, Nordstrom cited “some real rebounding in stores, in dressier categories,” and that’s cause for optimism. Nordstrom Inc. did report sales momentum from the first quarter to the second quarter, and healthy profits in the second quarter, motivating the company to raise its outlook for the year. “Business continues to improve,” said Erik. “Particularly for us in stores, recovery has happened faster and more impactful than we had planned.

“On the category side, we’ve seen a dramatic shift, to some real important categories for us, the dressier categories. There is still the overall trend of casualization, but customers are buying for occasion, to get back to work, to get out in the world again. We always had a good reputation [catering to] high-stake occasions.”

The company’s “Closer to You” agenda calls for “widening the aperture,” meaning a massive expansion of the digital assortment from 300,000 items to potentially 1.5 million within three to five years; injecting lower-price offerings into the Nordstrom Rack off-price matrix to gain share from less-expensive off-pricers such as T.J. Maxx, Ross Stores and Burlington Stores, and finessing the three-year-old market strategy, which revolves around linking Nordstrom full-line department stores, Rack off-price stores, Nordstrom Local locations and a variety of services, in different ways to deepen customer engagements, such as through BOPIS, ship from stores and faster deliveries.

Nordstrom’s market strategy is fundamental to sustaining the company’s large and loyal customer base, service reputation and recapturing what it had for so many years — an edge on the competition.

“The market strategy has a lot of traction. It’s been very successful. It’s now rolled out in our top 20 markets,” Erik said. “In a nutshell, it’s about leveraging those physical assets available in the market where the customer lives, and the outcome is bringing much more selection at much faster delivery to the customer — at their doorstep, at the store, at curbside, within the same day or next day. Our capabilities are being enhanced to serve customers much more on their terms.”

Asked how he knows the market strategy is working, the red-haired, soft-spoken CEO answered, “We look at market share, No. 1. Then we have performance metrics like how many customers are engaged with the different services. We look at trips a lot, including digital trips.

“In the last year, we were able to turn on Rack stores, as part of our market strategy, so Nordstrom.com orders can be picked up at any Rack location, returns can be made as well. About 30% of our store pickups occur at Rack stores, which is terrific.”

When the retailer first unveiled its Nordstrom Local service format in September 2017 in Los Angeles, there was some sense that for consumers, a learning curve was necessary to understand its functions and purpose. Nordstrom Locals are situated where customers live and work, so trips to actual Nordstrom stores farther away, for order pickups and returns, can be avoided. Nordstrom Locals also offer alterations and styling assistance, but do not sell merchandise.

“I think the concept is pretty understandable for customers,” Erik said. “Customers take to them pretty quickly. It’s not like we have much marketing around them. The idea of having a neighborhood location, where someone can do an order pickup or return, instead of jumping in their car and going to a mall, people pick up on it quickly.”

Currently, there are a total of seven Nordstrom Local locations in Los Angeles and New York City. Asked if it was important to have Nordstrom Locals in other major markets, to further the Closer to You agenda, Nordstrom replied that enabling Rack “gave us a lot more coverage, more quickly. … We still think there is a place for Locals. They’ve been very successful. We do plan on adding more. There is still opportunity to add some more in the L.A. and New York markets,” which are Nordstrom’s two highest-volume locales. “But that faster ramp was by lighting up our Rack stores.”

Another possibility is for bringing Nordstrom Local to Seattle, the company’s third-largest volume market and where Nordstrom is based.

To dramatically ramp up the digital offering, to that 1.5 million item goal, “We think it’s going to take a different model with different products, different brands,” said Erik. “The traditional wholesale retail model won’t get us there. Drop ship has been the example we’ve had in the past. It’s a way of bringing more product choice and [complete] brand expression. We need to add flexibility.

“A real good example is our Asos partnership. We are really excited about that and what we can do together with the Topshop brand,” which is part of the Asos portfolio. “Topshop has been a big, big brand for us for a number of years. But also there are other brands” at Asos.

In July, Nordstrom revealed that it had acquired a minority interest in the Topshop, Topman, Miss Selfridge and HIIT brands owned by Asos, the London-based fashion website. It’s an unusual type of partnership, considering Nordstrom has not been in the business of investing in market brands that it sells at its stores and online. The deal is designed to help grow and ensure the future of the four British brands, in particular the trendy and affordable Topshop women’s and Topman men’s labels.

The transaction also reflects Nordstrom’s efforts to bolster its appeal to younger shoppers. For decades, the retailer’s image was rooted in catering to more traditional and mature audiences, though in the past decade Nordstrom has made several initiatives to achieve a greater balance in the business, including staging pop-ups and collaborations with emerging and advanced designers, notably the Dover Street Market Incubator Brands, as well as establishing a wholesale relationship with Madewell. An early initiative came in 2012 when the Seattle-based retailer became the exclusive distributor of Topshop and Topman in the U.S.

“We have a lot of respect for Asos and their capabilities,” Nordstrom said. “That partnership can allow us to bring more exciting choice to customers, but will take some different business models. We entered a joint venture with them. We made an equity investment in a holding company that owns the Topshop brands. It’s a clear signal of not only our openness, but we think it’s a requirement moving forward. We have different ways of bringing customers the brands they want and the selection they want.”

Erik said the company’s e-commerce operation is “moving to more of a hybrid commerce model,” though it wouldn’t be accurate to consider it a marketplace model, at least at this point in time. “For us to have the capability of accessing the amount of product we think we need and that our customers want, it’s going to involve product we own directly and product we don’t own as well.

“We still have quite a ways to go around maximizing our inventory selection for customers,” added Erik. “There are two specific examples,” he said, citing “forward deployment of inventory” first. “That’s having inventory in stores in the markets, as opposed to a centralized warehouse — more than what store sales require. You need to have really good store fulfillment capabilities to do that. It allows faster delivery.

“The flip side of that is inventory holdback. We still have some supply chain facilities to build out in our network,” to have inventory in a market within a day of delivery to stores.

It’s generally believed that retailers make more money by selling an item in a store rather than online where there are rising fulfillment and delivery costs. But at Nordstrom, “It’s parity, profit-wise. We’ve been there for a few years now,” said Erik. He explained that Nordstrom started investing in e-commerce operations years before most other retailers. Nordstrom.com launched in 1998.

He also said that sellers online don’t get commission, whereas store sales associates do, and that Nordstrom fulfills many of its online orders from stores, which makes deliveries faster and less expensive.

“A Nordstrom.com sale and a Nordstrom store sale are pretty darn even,” Erik said. “We absolutely do not care whether we make a store sale or a digital sale. A big part of our strategy is valuing engagement — not the sale in that visit. If we do a great job making a return in a store faster, or making an order pickup faster, customers don’t necessarily buy on that trip, but they come back and become a customer in that store, even if they never visited that store before. … I really feel strongly that serving that customer takes a singular focus and if you throw in criteria that’s not the customer’s criteria and say what channel do we want them to shop in, that just makes us less effective. And I think it becomes transparent to the customer.

“When I grew up selling shoes, I was taught with a customer return, get them in the chair and make sure they leave with something else. That’s changed. If it’s most important to the customer to get in and out to make a return — great. Let’s make it fast. Look at things like curbside services. If you do it well, customers want it and they do come back. Seeing the big picture there, it’s much more about customer lifetime value than one specific interaction.

“I’ve been working here at Nordstrom for 45 years now. There is a natural tendency to think of the good ole days. I’ve always had a great appreciation for what came before, and mainly it’s the culture and our values — things that are woven throughout our company. I really think they are more alive today than ever before. Our people are better than they were when I was selling shoes. The company has been able to keep its core values and apply them in a modern way for changing times.”

Erik first joined Nordstrom Inc. when he was 12, stocking shoes. “I didn’t get to start selling shoes until I was 15. I had to work into that.”

It could be assumed that it was a forgone conclusion that Erik and his two brothers, Pete and the late Blake Nordstrom, would automatically be part of the family organization at very young ages and quickly ascend the ranks. “That’s not true at all,” Erik said. “But with our dad, [Bruce Nordstrom, chairman emeritus], the work ethic was really important. You turn 12, you get a job. He didn’t care where it was. I didn’t have a lot of job opportunity at 12, so working the stockroom seemed pretty good. It wasn’t like any of us graduated college and got into the corner office.”

After stocking and selling shoes, Erik became an assistant department manager, and later a department manager. He became the sole CEO in March 2020 after serving as co-CEO with his brother Pete following their brother’s death. Pete then shifted to president and chief brand officer. Their cousin Jamie serves as president of the
Nordstrom full-line stores, and Blake’s daughter Alex (Erik’s niece) is an assistant buyer.

“For me, Pete and Jamie, we liked it and just kind of hung with it,” Erik said. “Although I didn’t love it at age 12, that’s part of it,” meaning taking the good and the bad that comes with any job.

“What I really liked all along was working in stores — the team aspect, especially selling shoes. There’s some bonding in the stockroom that could go on there. It was very evident to me early on that people with different backgrounds and talents can come together and be better than any of us individually. You get the crew together every morning and talk about how we are going to take care of customers today and the curtain goes up and you’ve got to perform.

“We have been very explicit and absolutely believe that you can’t create a place where you treat customers well if you don’t first treat each other well. We have to be a great place to work.”

But retail is not for everyone, especially when it comes to dealing with the public. “We have our share of turnover. Where we are a little different is that we get people who like it and stay with us for a long time. A number of people on our executive leadership team have been with us for over 30 years. That’s pretty humbling,” he said.

There are also salespeople who have been with Nordstrom for decades.

“There is a woman who sells shoes in the store I am in right now [the downtown Seattle flagship] who sold shoes for me when I was a department manager — 35 years ago,” he said. “Sometimes you hear about people today who don’t have a work ethic or don’t care. I don’t see that at all. We have new people who blow me away, especially this last year when things have been so challenging. People care about doing a good job. They care about the company. They care about the customers and the people they work with. … It’s always very encouraging to see the caliber of the people we have. We are fortunate.”

Asked what makes Nordstrom distinctive in a country that’s still overstored, Erik replied, “First and foremost, it’s the focus on the customer. Everyone says that, but our aim is simply to make customers feel good. We think about that through the lens of getting closer to our customers, physically in ways of having the product closer to the customer, and in delivering one-on-one service, which has always been important to us,” he said.

Today, that means delivering what the consumer wants, and empowering them and bringing them a bigger selection. “We are a house of brands. We are not a price-promotional retailer. I think customers have confidence in coming to us for something new. Many don’t come to us with a shopping list knowing exactly what they want. They are seeking something new, the breadth of our merchandise.”

Having two strong brands — Nordstrom and Nordstrom Rack— enables the retailer to bring brand stories to life in a dynamic way. He cited the rise of On, a fast-growing running footwear player.

“Our active shoe business is really good. One of our very top vendors now is On, a fairly new brand. It’s not only become a big resource for us. We are one of [its top] retail partners. Here is a new [name] that has real innovation. Our team has done a good job of telling that story.”

Some vendors and industry analysts have the perception that Nordstrom is investing in Rack, digital and technology at the expense of its full-line stores.

“I am a little surprised to see that. That is just not the case. Look at the investment in our Nordstrom stores, both in our remodels, in things like our pop-in shops, but you also have to look at our New York flagship store. It’s the biggest investment we have ever made. Having such a flagship reflects our belief in physical retail. We really feel great about the store. It’s a modern, world-class store.”

The New York store opened in October 2019 and cost well over the initial $500 million budgeted.

“I still believe as much progress as we made digitally, telling a brand story, with the brand partners we have and also with our own brand, is more effective in a physical store than online,” Erik said. “So we continue to invest in the capabilities of our physical stores and in linking them with our digital capabilities.”