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Speaker 1: Is a joy to be with you with Jeff Gannett.

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Speaker 1: Of course on a day where people que, they run

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Speaker 1: in the celebration is upon us your super Bowl. What

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Speaker 1: are they buying today for Black Friday?

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Speaker 2: So they're buying everything on their gift list, and they're

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Speaker 2: buying that's really generally in luxury, so fine jewelry, they're

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Speaker 2: buying cashmere, they're buying outwork for the entire family, hostess

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Speaker 2: gifts in our home store, but they're also home prep.

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Speaker 2: We've got great deals as we always do for Black Friday,

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Speaker 2: going all the way through the holiday season. So we

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Speaker 2: are ready. We've got all of our key items, you know,

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Speaker 2: loaded to bear. Here we are in Harold's Square. It

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Speaker 2: was a good opening. We had a great day online

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Speaker 2: yesterday during Thanksgiving.

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Speaker 1: I mean you said that on your earnings, which what

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Speaker 1: what but a week ago? Yes, but this gets earlier

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Speaker 1: on earlier Black Friday. The competition. How important are the

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Speaker 1: next few days and the run up to the holidays.

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Speaker 2: Oh, it's still very important. So you know, when you

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Speaker 2: think about kind of Black Friday deals really started it

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Speaker 2: right after Halloween is when they started. But this is

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Speaker 2: still a pilgrimage. You've got you know, America is traveling

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Speaker 2: and they are in homes, and they're coming into storages

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Speaker 2: just like this one today. They're online. They've been online

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Speaker 2: all the way through, so it's very very important. So

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Speaker 2: we look at kind of Black Friday through Cyber Week.

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Speaker 2: Now we go into a lull, it's like ten days

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Speaker 2: where people kind of reset, and then those last ten

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Speaker 2: days become increasingly important. So it's one of the three

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Speaker 2: stages right now that we are at. The kind of

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Speaker 2: the Christmas shopping is the when we're in right now.

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Speaker 1: The first what, of course, your earnings showed so clearly

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Speaker 1: is that it's about inventory management in many ways at

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Speaker 1: the moment, and you've been managing to ace that how

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Speaker 1: are you ensure you got the right thing at the

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Speaker 1: right time for a consumer that basically they're all trying

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Speaker 1: to understand right now.

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Speaker 2: So obviously the consumer's under pressure, but they still love gifts,

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Speaker 2: and so we want to make sure that we've got

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Speaker 2: all the right gifts and we've got all the right

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Speaker 2: stock content in them. So I just walked this entire

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Speaker 2: store to really understand where we are in all of

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Speaker 2: the content across all of our categories, and we're in

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Speaker 2: great shape, and that's really in tribute to the amount

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Speaker 2: of work we've been putting in an inventory control.

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Speaker 1: And when it comes to online versus in store in retail,

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Speaker 1: this is how you've been shifting the company. In particular,

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Speaker 1: people aren't perhaps having the footfall in mals, they're coming

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Speaker 1: to one off stores, they're going to smallest all experiences,

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Speaker 1: but e commerce has just been the focus. How are

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Speaker 1: you managing to be at the right time, in the

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Speaker 1: right place for an omni channel purchase.

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Speaker 2: So really the strength of Macy's and Bloomingdales and bloom

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Speaker 2: Mercuries that we're omni channel and we're omni category. So

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Speaker 2: what you have is you have customers that are shopping online,

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Speaker 2: they want to come into a store and try it on,

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Speaker 2: and they maybe are transacting on the couch later that night.

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Speaker 2: So the opportunity to make it as convenient for the

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Speaker 2: customer as possible, however and whenever they want to shop.

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Speaker 2: So that's our beauty and doing that with a national

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Speaker 2: footprint with a great website is what we depend on.

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Speaker 1: And of course why you've got such a great birdside

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Speaker 1: perspective because you do have Bloomingdale's for the higher and

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Speaker 1: more luxury purchaser and then more income breadth. When it

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Speaker 1: comes to Macy's, what are we seeing in terms of

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Speaker 1: the consumer. Are they going to be spending more? Are

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Speaker 1: they going to be putting back?

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Speaker 2: So you do have customers that are under pressure, and

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Speaker 2: so when you think about the inflation is still high.

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Speaker 2: It's abating from the change at the inflation rate from

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Speaker 2: last year, but it's still higher than it was last year.

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Speaker 2: And customers have got a limited budget, some of it

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Speaker 2: they're spending and inexperiences in in our discretionary categories. So

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Speaker 2: we want to make sure that we've got the right

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Speaker 2: price points across that entire spectrum. But you still give gifts,

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Speaker 2: and this is where Macy's and Bloomingdale's and Bloomercrey shine.

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Speaker 2: So when you have this gift somebody on your gift list,

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Speaker 2: we're going to have the right content for you at

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Speaker 2: the right price point. And we spend from when Black

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Speaker 2: Friday ends to where we are right now. We've been

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Speaker 2: spending a year getting ready for that, and we do

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Speaker 2: trial runs in Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day to

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Speaker 2: make sure we've got the right gifts.

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Speaker 1: You're ready, You're ready. People are worried analysts might be

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Speaker 1: worried that you're kind of managing decline at the moment.

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Speaker 1: What would you say to a comment like that.

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Speaker 2: Look, I think that if we weren't an apartment store today,

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Speaker 2: we would invent one. So the idea about having multi

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Speaker 2: categories being able to do that in multi channels, we

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Speaker 2: now have been able to get new categories and as

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Speaker 2: a result of Marketplace, which is now online at both

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Speaker 2: Bloomingdal's and in Macy's. So I bet on department stores,

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Speaker 2: and obviously I made my career doing this, and it

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Speaker 2: is a you know, it's still very very relevant. You know,

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Speaker 2: we're obviously looking at where traffic is moving from on

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Speaker 2: mall to off mall. We're obviously testing that in both

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Speaker 2: Bloomingdale's with the Bloomy's form and with Macy's with Macy's,

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Speaker 2: and so we're going to be ready for where the

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Speaker 2: customer is evolving, and we've got very strong assets to

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Speaker 2: be able to do that, both on mall and obviously online.

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Speaker 1: Evolving into a world where we're all using chatbots and

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Speaker 1: artificient intelligence at front and center. And these are sort

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Speaker 1: of areas of investment.

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Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, because when you think about AI and machine learning.

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Speaker 2: Think about when we have forty million customers at Macy's,

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Speaker 2: four million of bloomingdals, we know them very well. So

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Speaker 2: to have all that data and be able to start

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Speaker 2: to personalize content and values for those customers is where

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Speaker 2: this is all going. How do you make your brand

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Speaker 2: more relevant? And that is at a customer level. It's

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Speaker 2: no longer broad based promotion. It's the opportunity to be

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Speaker 2: able to I know, Caroline, and based on what you buy,

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Speaker 2: what you might be interested in them, and to be

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Speaker 2: able to serve that up and the way you want

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Speaker 2: it served up is really the secret of success for

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Speaker 2: an omni channel retailer going forward.

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Speaker 1: You of course just mentioned throughout your career this is

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Speaker 1: what you've been doing. For those who don't realize you

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Speaker 1: worked at the Macy's Brown for more than forty years

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Speaker 1: and this is your last Black Friday, and of course,

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Speaker 1: CEOs that's twenty seventeen. You have been full of as

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Speaker 1: a turnaround focus, the polarist, the way in which you

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Speaker 1: have thought about personalization E commers and whether, of course

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Speaker 1: the COVID in and of itself, do you feel that

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Speaker 1: you've got the plate the Macy's where you want it

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Speaker 1: to be as you look towards as being your last

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Speaker 1: Black Friday.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Look, when I reflect back on my career and

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Speaker 2: certainly in my time in CEO, I didn't accomplish everything

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Speaker 2: that was on my list, but look, the focus on

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Speaker 2: relevant content, on amazing values, and on customer experience is

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Speaker 2: clearly the path forward. And I couldn't be more excited

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Speaker 2: about my successor who was more than ready to be

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Speaker 2: able to do this. He knocked the cover off the

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Speaker 2: ball with respect to Bloomingdale's and what he was able

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Speaker 2: to do there. How he was able to kind of

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Speaker 2: help turn around the strategy of Bloe Mercury. He's now

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Speaker 2: going to do that for Macy's Inc. So he's got

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Speaker 2: a good game plan and he's going to make it better.

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Speaker 1: Jeff Kennett, we thank you so much for spending time

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Speaker 1: with us on what is your Last Black Friday? But

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Speaker 1: not still got a few more days in and of

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Speaker 1: course the job.

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Speaker 2: He's here until

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Speaker 1: February as the CEO and CEO elect Tony Spring