The Future of Retail: Innovators within Swedish Retail in Panel Discussion

Together with Konrad Olsson, editor in chief for lifestyle and tech magazine Scandinavian Mind, xNomad organized a launch event for their rebranding. Four innovative Swedish brands, Nudient, Styles, Skinome and Weard Underwear, were invited to participate in a panel discussion at the Next Gen Retail Hub.

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During the discussion, the panel dissected the current trends within the Swedish retail market and how AI, omni channel strategy and influencer marketing may affect the landscape of retailing. 

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Lydia Engholm, CEO of Skinome, talks about how the company challenges the current customs within beauty through conducting a fully digital business model and a creative approach to product development.  The Skinome business model offers personalized skin care that is produced in small batches, without conventional preservatives, perfumes, or other additives. ”We have adapted our entire business model to enable a gentle and local production chain, founded in our belief in high-quality ingredients and sustainable skin care", Engholm says about the brand. 

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Weard Underwear’s Creative Director, Joakim Falk, also advocates a gentle production. Weard Underwear intends to innovate the underwear industry through their choice of bamboo viscose as material, as well as an environmentally friendly manufacturing process. In their production chain, environmentally friendly chemicals are used in a closed system that counteracts emissions, where almost all solvents and water are recycled.

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Styles is an AI-based fashion app that has come to receive extensive attention from both media and the public. Since the launch, the team and Verona Farrell, Community Manager at Styles, have attracted over 50,000 users. Styles is an invite-only app where users receive fashion inspiration and may, through an AI-based algorithm, generate personalized shopping suggestions. Influencer marketing is one of the pillars for Styles’ success. The team has chosen to actively recruit influencers for the internal team because "content creators with their own entourage have a completely different understanding of content creation and what engages, which has been valuable for how we designed the app and built interest", says Farrell.

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On the same note, Andreas Hallin, Global Brand Director at Nudient, touches upon the opportunities within influencer marketing. Nudient is the mobile phone case company that has quickly made a name for itself within the industry - with ‘community’ as the leading word. As the mobile phone case market is highly competitive, Nudient’s strategy has been to “instead of paying key profiles and offering discount codes - create a community of brand ambassadors who use the product in their everyday lives”, Hallin explains. As a result, Nudient has been able to create indirect marketing synergies by being visible on the ambassadors’ channels without having to pay for sponsored content, creating demand in a less traditional way. 

The panel discussion concluded with an open conversation about the future trajectory for the retail industry. Omnichannel strategy and pop-up activations were highlighted as a cost-efficient, scalable and accessible way for e-retailers or start-ups to establish and test their business model in a physical setting.  

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Here you can find the entire panel discussion.