Lessons from Mejuri & The RealReal: What Most DTC Brands Get Wrong About Retail

Liam:

Courtney, incredibly excited for today’s episode. You’re someone that so many people look up to in the world of retail, ecommerce, and brands in general. You’ve worked with some pretty incredible brands throughout your career. Maybe you just give an intro on you.

Courtney:

It’s been a wildly fun, amazing career. I’ve been in retail for over 20 years, primarily focused on scaling physical spaces. Most recently I was at Mejuri for the last two and a half years, building out their full retail model from concession, franchise, and physical retail spaces. Before that I was at The RealReal, Gap Inc., and Bath and Body Works. My specialty is really understanding the brand, learning what they want with physical retail, and then figuring out how to grow it and make it scale.

Liam:

And you started right at the bottom — doing sales yourself in store. What has that journey been like?

Courtney:

I honestly thought this was not going to be my career. I thought I was going to be a social worker. I’ve always had a knack for wanting to help people and connect with people. But once I realized I love fashion, I love people, and I grew up competitive, I was like, oh, I love this drive for results too. I started out as a cashier in an outlet store and just started growing my career. I took a lot of feedback, moved quite a bit, learned from some amazing leaders, and I really started to think about — I don’t want to be traditional retail, I want to be on the forefront of change. My agility and ability to ask what’s happening and where do we go next, while still building the base business, has kind of been my specialty.

Liam:

Can you think back to a moment that triggered the shift from the store floor to thinking about the scale of the business?

Courtney:

I do remember it specifically. It was when I had my first corporate role — I got recruited out of a store to run total field communications for all of Gap Brand. In my mind as a field person, I always thought, why don’t they do this, I could do it better. And then I really got into the business and realized this is a lot more complicated than I thought. I had to learn what the field felt in terms of execution and what the enterprise priorities were, all funneling into the communication going out to stores. I had to learn how to negotiate, how to prioritize, how to think about how much communication went out. That really opened up my full, broad perspective on business. And from there it just didn’t stop.

Liam:

You’ve led teams and the growth of billion-dollar businesses. What do people misunderstand about physical retail? Because there’s this sense that ecommerce is the only way, but when you speak to really large businesses, a lot of their growth is still coming from physical retail.

Courtney:

Stores are a sweet spot. But you can’t muscle a store to success. There’s so much enterprise work that goes into it — from the assortment to the profiles hired to the operations to the payroll allocated. Upstream has to work before the store works. I often say when a fleet of stores isn’t working, it’s not the fleet that’s the problem — you need to solve it at the enterprise level. But then on the flip side, when you run stores you have to look for variability from store to store to find where you can maximize more, because some stores run better than others. It’s our job to figure out how to get consistency across all the variables.

Liam:

What’s the biggest mistake a brand makes when trialing physical retail?

Courtney:

A lot of it comes down to assortment, real estate positioning, inventory allocation, and not spending enough time thinking about what you want the physical retail experience to feel like. I’m sure you’ve gone into stores where every associate immediately says “hi, what are you looking for?” and you just want to leave. You just walked into their brand and there’s no real connection. You have to spend time on the service model — who’s the profile of your employee, define it well, hire to it, train to it, schedule to it. When all those things come together, the stores really hum.

Liam:

Is a lot of this created at the boardroom level — just opening 100 stores and expecting them to perform overnight?

Courtney:

You basically have to step back. That’s kind of where my new advisory work is going — helping brands not make these costly mistakes. You can open a bunch of stores, but if you don’t have the right assortment, you have very expensive real estate with the wrong products and confused customers. I always position the end to end — here’s the real estate and what it means, here’s how the experience will look, how does the brand team, the marketing team, the merchandising team feel? Are we all aligned? Because you’re going to spend payroll either way. You might as well put the effort in upfront. A lot of companies going in for the first time just don’t know that, which is why getting the right advisors around the table with institutional knowledge is so important.

Liam:

Unlike ecommerce where you can trial so quickly, physical retail has rental agreements for years, build costs — it’s so much more committed.

Courtney:

Exactly. Imagine your homepage — if you don’t like it, you switch it. Well, you can’t switch the windows of a hundred stores overnight. You have to really think about what you want these messages to do and make strong strategic decisions upfront.

Liam:

Have you felt like the advice for physical retail has been very lacking in the market?

Courtney:

I think because there’s so much data, people get inundated. There’s an art and science to physical retail. You can measure everything in digital marketing, but you can’t measure every customer journey in a retail store — at least not today. Somebody walks in, you don’t convert, you miss the opportunity to capture their information entirely.

Liam:

What’s the equivalent lever in physical retail to what data and digital tools are in ecommerce?

Courtney:

It’s the people, the product, and the product availability — really those three things. Store design matters too, how you navigate the space. But the people bring the brand to life. The sweet spot that’s different from digital is that connection point.

Liam:

You talk a lot about people making the difference. What traits do you look for?

Courtney:

This sounds obvious, but you have to hire people who like people. You go into so many stores and the staff don’t want to be there — you can feel the vibe. You’ve got to hire people who really love people, treat them really well, excite them about the job, make sure the work environment is great, train them with the right tools, and continue to incentivize them the right way. And don’t roll down pressure to the store when something isn’t working — hold people accountable, but don’t make them feel the weight of the entire organization. It really comes down to the profile, the training, and the structure you architect within the store. When that ecosystem works well, that’s how momentum is made.

Liam:

How do you think about incentives? A brand we work with called Fate to Label in Australia — she’s a female founder, drove a lot of attention from TikTok, just opened a bunch of stores across the country, and she doesn’t give her retail staff sales targets. She doesn’t want them to put pressure on the customer. She’s investing in the long-term of that customer relationship. What are your thoughts on that?

Courtney:

It’s a constant debate — do you incent the individual, make it a team goal, or even make it a customer acquisition goal with no revenue goal? There are so many different approaches. What you just described is a great example of a founder having a clear vision on what she wants the stores to perform. And financially you also have to be okay with whether the EBITDA works. If it’s working, that’s amazing. It’s very individualized, and it probably changes over time too.

Liam:

What was the transition like going to Mejuri — a very digitally native brand with physical locations?

Courtney:

The last five years had all been digitally native going to brick and mortar, and then Gap Inc and Bath and Body Works were stores first. What it taught me as a leader was to really be the student as well as the teacher. There were things I just didn’t know. I definitely have a toolkit, but it wasn’t going to translate directly into these businesses. It was about being curious, being humble, while also being the steward of what I know to be true about retail. Sitting with the cross-functional partners, it was — we’ve got to solve this together. Strategic planning, commercial planning, longer-term decision making in stores — that’s a change for a digitally native company. Where in a stores-first business, all of that is already on autopilot.

Liam:

How did you bridge the gap between the digital team obsessed with online sales and the physical retail team obsessed with in-store purchases?

Courtney:

One of the biggest things about stores is the halo impact they have into digital. That’s how you start to measure the total impact on the ecosystem. Once everyone starts to see it’s all rising together, we all are winning. That metric is so critical because it allows for a more holistic view of the business. The store P&L and the digital P&L still both have to perform, but if the total is rising, then we’re doing all right — and then we learn from there.

Liam:

A big push recently has been brands moving back into physical retail. They’ve had huge ecommerce growth since COVID and now they’re going from zero to 10 stores almost immediately. What is that process like?

Courtney:

The executive team has to work together. It’s really the brass tacks of — what do we want the assortment to be, do we have it, what do we want to test? What I love about digitally native brands is the agility to test, learn, and apply quickly. In legacy brands that can be the opposite where everything just takes so long. Both have their ways of working that are good, but in the scale and test-and-learn environment, moving quickly is where DTC excels. It just has to be smart, because you need to make sure the right infrastructure is also built around it to continue the success.

Liam:

How did you bring that same speed mindset to physical retail?

Courtney:

You have to build a culture of it. It starts with the whole organization working that way and then figuring out what that means specifically in retail. For us it was being upfront in the hiring process — saying we are scaling, learning, and changing. That is exactly what I talk about with companies: be upfront about where you are and what it’s going to feel like, otherwise there’s a misconception when people come on board. When you’re transparent and clear, and when things aren’t working you own it — it actually galvanizes more momentum. People are in it with you to help you build.

Liam:

How do you measure performance across a fleet of stores with so many varying costs, different locations, different teams?

Courtney:

It depends on what you’re measuring and the time horizon — weekly, monthly, quarterly. There are metrics for stores, metrics for multi-store leaders, and metrics at the enterprise financial level. Each has a subset they need to be responsible for. At the financial level it’s probably revenue at the top line and EBITDA at the bottom. What happens in the middle is where the flexibility is. When I ran fleets, a New York store might produce strong brand credibility but lower EBITDA, while a store in the middle of the country is much more profitable. You step back and look at your portfolio — what do we want this to do for us? We can handle lower EBITDA in New York because of the brand importance, but we offset it with more profitable stores around the country.

Liam:

How would you describe the most loyal shoppers for a brand? What keeps them coming back?

Courtney:

It’s the ecosystem of a brand — not just the store. Meet them where the customer is at. Know who your customer is first, where they are, and then let them experience your brand journey wherever they’re at in their lives. Whether it’s an app, a website, a store, or TikTok — what means the most to your customer and their demographics, and are you servicing them there?

Liam:

What actually moves the needle in loyalty though? What drives that repeat purchase behavior?

Courtney:

I think trust. Which is really hard to measure — it just happens or it doesn’t. You can have the best in-store experience, the best digital experience, but if the return process is poor, you’ve lost it. For me personally, I love shopping The RealReal. Items sent quickly, condition is right, price makes sense, I can rely on it, and I can resell the product if the season changes. I’ve been doing it for years and it just feels natural — like doom scrolling the brand on the couch.

Liam:

Generally 30% to 40% of a brand’s annual revenue online is generated through retention marketing — email, SMS, bringing the shopper back. Are there creative ways you’ve implemented anything like that for in-store?

Courtney:

There’s a lot of cool stuff you can do — eventing, like inviting moms groups in, Galentine’s Day events, speaker events with cool influencers coming in to talk. Sometimes it was as simple as having a client list and saying, “We’ve got new product, come shop with us early.” That keeps the repeat loyalty going and the connection to the brand. And then services really matter today. Levi’s is a great example — they have an embroidery station in store. You walk in and you’re like, wow, I can customize a pair of jeans to be me. That gives you a completely different lens on the product. You could buy jeans anywhere, but the store offers something unique. Stores that offer something unique connect differently with the customer.

Liam:

Where do you think AI is going, specifically in your world of physical retail?

Courtney:

It’s indexing in marketing in a lot of different ways right now — bots for customer service digitally. But I think there’s a really interesting in-between space on how it starts to help employees perform better and have better knowledge of the customer. Online it’s so easy to give a targeted ad, a certain product, or reach someone at a certain time. But an associate in store — every customer who walks in is basically a cold call. So how does AI help with suggestive selling, profile matching, more inquisitive conversations, and even coaching and training? There’s so much opportunity to take AI and translate it into supporting and accelerating the physical space. Flagship AI is a really good example of that.

Liam:

What are they doing? What does the tool do?

Courtney:

You can basically oversee the store and see what execution looks like — inventory levels, what’s selling, what’s not selling. You can heat map your store to see where you should place product and what’s contributing to revenue. It’s bringing a digital experience into the store. And then coaching from the multi-store leader that would have taken hours to pull that information is now all at their fingertips during a store visit — here’s how we coach to this.

Liam:

Do you think AI will change training for staff on the floor?

Courtney:

I think it has to be individualized to performance. Right now training is homogenized — you roll out a training and everyone does the same thing. But not everyone is at the same level at every touchpoint. It’d be really cool to tailor it based on individual performance, accelerating growth with individualized training.

Liam:

How do you decide, as a leader of a billion-dollar business, what tools to use when there’s so much noise — LinkedIn, inbound emails, everyone pitching something new?

Courtney:

You have to step back and ask — what are our goals, what do we want to accomplish? Define your enterprise goals and then determine what tools will support them. Also, what can be built in-house? There are some really great things that can happen internally that don’t always need to be off the shelf. But the thing that’s underestimated is the change management — where is the enterprise at in order for the change to actually happen? As important as it is to pick the tool, it’s equally important to figure out the implementation, the change management, and bringing everybody along into how that’s going to shape the culture of the organization.

Liam:

How do you build a team that’s obsessed with experimentation? U.S. brands especially seem obsessed with growing and winning — so willing to try new technology. Other places want a million case studies first.

Courtney:

You also have to give them the bandwidth, because sometimes traditional operations get in the way of experimentation. You have to look at where we’re broken, solve that quickly, and then figure out how to get ahead. If you can’t get ahead, there’s usually a systemic problem — whether it’s mindset, operations, or internal processes. But we’re at a place now where change is constant, so the environment internally kind of has to reflect that. You build that culture and people start to self-select — some will love it, and some will say this pace is not for me.

Liam:

What’s the biggest mistake of your career?

Courtney:

Probably every time I went against my gut and hired somebody I knew I shouldn’t have. I keep counting on my hand how many times I’ve done that. Every single time — business pressure, backfill the role, there’s a huge need. I got desperate and I rushed it and tried to make it work. It wasn’t the person’s fault, it was my fault for not assessing it right. So now I just know — slow down on the hire.

Liam:

What are the traits of an incredible person to lead bricks and mortar strategy for a brand?

Courtney:

It’s a dynamic role — you’re going from the boardroom all the way to the part-time associate, and that’s your voice of influence across everything. At the executive level it’s clear — working together, aligning priorities, building strategy, being accountable, delivering what you say, and surfacing problems in a solution-oriented way. But when you lead a dynamic fleet of people, you’ve got to make sure your voice and your messaging gets through repeatedly on many different channels — written communication, video, calls, store visits. You have to reward, recognize, and hold teams accountable while giving the vision so everyone feels galvanized. Because you’re galvanizing a team of people to do something every day that isn’t always easy. Working with customers is not always easy. But when people feel good and feel like it matters, it’s impactful. And you have to have really great store managers because those are the culture makers of the organization.

Liam:

Would you bring those people together regularly?

Courtney:

Regularly, every month. Sometimes every week depending on the business — just so everyone can be together, problem solving, sharing what’s working. Those organic solutions and the camaraderie of coming together just creates the momentum to push past challenges.

Liam:

To end on a positive note — looking forward, what do you think is the number one thing a brand needs to get right as they expand their physical retail presence over the next 12 to 24 months?

Courtney:

I still believe it’s people. In a physical retail space, no matter what AI or technology you implement, you’ve got to invest in the people in the store. Because if they’re invested in and they feel good, that’s how they impact the customer. They are the face of the brand. They are the marketing vehicle for the brand. They’re the most critical thing in a physical retail space.

Liam:

As we said at the start — it’s so easy to chase the bright shiny things. But it really does come back down to the people.

Courtney:

It does. When you walk in and someone has a genuine smile, they’re knowledgeable, they remember you — that builds the trust of the brand. That’s the relationship.

Liam:

Thank you so much for coming on. It was a pleasure and an incredible conversation.

Courtney and Liam get into:

Why you can’t “muscle” your way into retail success

The biggest mistakes brands make when expanding into physical stores

Why most retail problems aren’t store-level, they’re enterprise-level

The gap between digital and in-store customer experience

Why people, not data, are still the biggest driver of performance

If you’re thinking about retail expansion or are already in it, this is a must-listen.

00:00 Intro

01:45 Why You Can’t “Muscle” Retail Success

04:00 It’s Not the Stores, It’s the Strategy

06:20 What a Bad Store Experience Actually Feels Like

08:10 You Can’t Measure Retail Like Digital

08:45 What Actually Drives Performance in Stores

10:30 The Biggest Mistakes Brands Make Expanding to Retail

14:20 Why Opening More Stores Won’t Fix the Problem

18:40 The Gap Between Online and In-Store Experience

22:00 What Great Retail Brands Do Differently

26:30 The Role of People in Retail Success

30:00 Final Thoughts on Retail Growth