Introduction

Shoptalk Fall 2026 will take place on September 29–October 1 at the Music City Center in Nashville, Tennessee. Shoptalk Fall brings together retailers, consumer brands, technology companies and other industry participants to discuss business models, technologies and consumer trends affecting retail and e-commerce.

The Coresight Research team will be in attendance and looks forward to meeting other attendees at Shoptalk Fall 2026. Coresight Research CEO and Founder Deborah Weinswig is scheduled to participate in the Shoptalk Fall Key Takeaways session on October 1.

In this essential guide to the event, we highlight notable sessions for attendees across Shoptalk Fall’s three primary content themes: Retail Excellence, Brand Storytelling and Understanding the Customer, as well as selected Mainstage and Studio programming. All times in this report are Central Time (CT, the local time at the event).

To ensure you don’t miss out on critical insights during the conference, Coresight Research will provide coverage of Shoptalk Fall 2026 on coresight.com.

Your Guide to Shoptalk Fall 2026: Coresight Research Insights

More than 150 speakers will participate in sessions covering AI and digital commerce, customer engagement, brand storytelling, physical stores, merchandising and operations, and more.

Prominent retail, brand and technology speakers across the agenda include the following:

Tuesday, September 29:

• Hal Lawton, President & CEO, Tractor Supply | 11:15 a.m.–11:35 a.m.
• Tara Simon, President, The Americas, and Lisa Sequino, President, Makeup Cluster, The Estée Lauder Companies | 11:35 a.m.–11:55 a.m.
• Sara Foster, Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Favorite Daughter | 11:55 a.m.–12:15 p.m.

Wednesday, September 30:

• Greg Schwartz, Co-Founder & CEO, StockX | 1:40 p.m.–2:00 p.m.
• Patrick Nommensen, President, Strategic Initiatives, TikTok Shop, and Hudson Leogrande, Founder & CEO, Comfrt | 2:00 p.m.–2:20 p.m.
• Christine Chang, Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Glow Recipe | 2:20 p.m.–2:40 p.m.

Thursday, October 1:

• Anne Mehlman, Brand President, and Carly Gomez, Chief Marketing Officer, Crocs | 9:10 a.m.–9:30 a.m.
• Kelly Cook, CEO, and Elina Vilk, President & Chief Business Officer, David’s Bridal | 9:30 a.m.–9:50 a.m.
• Marc Mastronardi, President, Equinox | 9:50 a.m.–10:10 a.m.

Alongside the three recurring content stages, Shoptalk Fall will feature smaller-format Studio programming. Tactical Labs will focus on practical business and technology topics, while Town Halls, a debate, a hands-on session, and other interactive formats will address emerging questions across marketing, consumer behavior, AI, and technology. On October 1, the Studio program will include a series of Ask Me Anything sessions with retail leaders and experts, including Jason LaRose of Bombas, Dana Steinfeld and Molly Kennedy of Maesa, Rob Gaige of Reddit, Marie Driscoll of The New School and Scott Devlin of The Vitamin Shoppe.

These sessions join Shoptalk Fall’s Meetup and Tabletalk programs, which provide prescheduled, 1:1 or small-group opportunities for attendees to connect alongside the conference’s stage programming.

Notable Sessions Across Three Major Themes

Below, we present the three major themes and related notable sessions shaping Shoptalk Fall’s 2026 agenda, as well as insights from the Coresight Research team and its published reports and data.

1. Retail Excellence

Consumers use retailer websites, marketplaces, social platforms and physical stores within the same shopping journey. AI tools are adding another route for product discovery and comparison, while retailers continue to invest in personalization, delivery and other services intended to make e-commerce more convenient. Retailers must therefore consider how product information, inventory and customer experiences are presented across a growing number of touchpoints.

The development of AI shopping agents places additional importance on accurate and structured product data. Retailers and brands need to consider how their products are represented when shoppers begin outside their own websites and apps, while maintaining reliable pricing and availability information. They must also determine where automation can simplify the shopping journey and how digital experiences connect with stores.

At Shoptalk Fall, sessions relevant to this theme will examine the evolution of e-commerce, new approaches to digital discovery, AI agents in the customer journey and the relationship between stores and e-commerce. Other sessions will consider which emerging technologies are likely to have practical value for retailers.

Mainstage keynotes from Hal Lawton, CEO of Tractor Supply, and Greg Schwartz, Co-Founder & CEO of StockX, will also explore themes of e-commerce and unified commerce excellence.

Coresight Research Insight: The physical store has traditionally been a “black hole” of data, aside from basics such as transactions and traffic, while almost everything around e-commerce transactions has become measurable. That is changing as AI is enabling stores to capture and make sense of “messy,” unstructured human actions and interactions, whether shopper behavior in the store (via computer vision) or conversations with store staff (via AI-powered feedback apps). This is partly fueled by efforts to make in-store retail media more measurable, but it ultimately helps make the overall marketing and brand value of stores more measurable.

Meanwhile, AI is becoming increasingly embedded in the consumer shopping journey. According to Coresight Research survey data, 52.3% of US consumers who had heard of AI/GenAI had used GenAI to shop, planned to use it within the next six months or would eventually like to use it, as of July 2026. Among consumers who had used GenAI to shop, 74% reported being very or somewhat satisfied with the AI-assisted shopping experience.

Adoption is also progressing on the retailer side: 49% of US retail companies had paid subscriptions to AI models, platforms and tools as of May 2026, according to Ramp. These findings point to AI moving beyond experimentation toward a more established role across product discovery, evaluation and purchasing, increasing the importance for retailers of building commerce experiences that can serve both consumers and AI-enabled shopping tools.

Related Coresight Research reports:

• Agentic Commerce Playbook: A Step-by-Step Framework for Retail Implementation and Scaling
• Retail-Tech Landscape: Online Shopper Convenience
• CEO Brief: Agentic Commerce—How To Stay Visible When AI Agents Become the New Shopping Funnel
• Analyst Corner: Agentic Commerce Demands a New Retail Playbook—Executing with STORE
• Is AI Infrastructure Demand Peaking? Meta’s Capacity Signal, Model Delays and Agentic Commerce: AI Insights with the IMPACT Framework—July 2026

Shoptalk Fall Sessions

Schedule	Session	Selected speakers
Tuesday, Sep. 29 3:25–3:45 p.m.	Track Keynote: The Next Evolution of Commerce	Jamil Ghani, Worldwide Head of Prime, Amazon
Tuesday, Sep. 29 3:45–4:05 p.m.	Track Keynote: The Next Evolution of Commerce	Parinaz Firozi Head of Growth & Agentic Commerce Partnerships Anthropic
Wednesday, Sep. 30 9:50–10:30 a.m.	Designing New Approaches to Digital Discovery	Christopher Pond, Chief Growth Officer, BRUNT Workwear Sonia Biddle, Chief Product Officer, Depop Allison Tepley, Head of Global Audience Marketing, Reddit
Wednesday, Sep. 30 4:15–4:55 p.m.	Case Studies: How AI Agents Elevate the Customer Journey	Gaurav Dixit, VP, Digital Customer Experience, Lowe’s Rakesh Srinivasan, SVP, Data & AI, The Estée Lauder CompaniesFeliz Papich, SVP, Digital Technology, Experience & Insights, Crocs
Thursday, Oct. 1 1:20–2:00 p.m.	The Store-Ecommerce Growth Connection	Nate Checketts, CEO, Rhone Arianne Parisi, Chief Digital Officer, Kohl’s Luke Motschenbacher, Chief Retail & Services Officer, Best Buy
Wednesday, Sep. 30 9:50–10:30 a.m.	Overhyped! Blunt Takes on Hot (or Not) Technologies	Rebecca Maffei, Chief Information Officer, Fashionphile Laura Cantor, VP, Marketing & Ecommerce, New York & Company Joe Yakuel, Founder & CEO, WITHIN

2. Brand Storytelling

Retail and consumer brands can reach shoppers through a growing range of media and entertainment formats. Video, social platforms, product integrations and collaborations can support awareness and discovery while also creating more direct routes to purchase. This is making the relationship between brand marketing and commerce more immediate.

Brands still need to determine which formats are appropriate for their audiences and objectives. A product drop or entertainment partnership can create attention and urgency, while video and social shopping can shorten the path from content to transaction. The effectiveness of these approaches depends on audience fit, execution and the ability to assess both engagement and commercial outcomes.

At Shoptalk Fall, sessions relevant to this theme will examine brand storytelling, video monetization, product integrations and the use of product drops and collaborations to drive awareness and sales. Other sessions will consider changes in media habits and the role of video and social shopping in product discovery.

The show will also feature relevant Mainstage Keynotes, from Sara Foster, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of apparel brand Favorite Daughter (in addition to their brand, Sara and her sister Erin Foster also are successful actors and producers, with hits including the Netflix show “Nobody Wants This”). Additionally, the Mainstage will feature a conversation with TikTok Shop and the Founder & CEO of Comfrt, a brand that was “born on TikTok.”

Coresight Research Insight: Along with above-the-line advertising, we view stores as being where brands are traditionally built; they serve an essential brand-marketing purpose, whether they are monobrand or multibrand stores. The store is a place to tell a brand’s story and immerse new and existing customers in its universe. The Coresight Research BEST framework for retail excellence provides a model for retailers to implement a consumer-centric approach to physical retail across brand-building, experience, service and technology integration. The framework encourages retailers to turn physical locations into expressions of the brand, deepen engagement and drive traffic through experiences, differentiate themselves through service offerings and use technology to support these goals, close the in-store data gap and compete more effectively.

Meanwhile, retail media is becoming an increasingly important component of retailers’ broader advertising and monetization strategies. Coresight Research estimates that the global retail-media market will reach $203.9 billion in 2026, as networks expand beyond traditional sponsored placements toward full-funnel advertising, in-store media and more sophisticated measurement. AI-enabled targeting and first-party data are also enabling retailers and brands to connect media investment more closely with shopper behavior and transactions. As commerce, entertainment and media continue to converge, brands will need to evaluate new formats, including video, creator partnerships and product integrations, not only on their ability to generate attention but also on measurable commercial outcomes.

Related Coresight Research reports:

• BEST at Retail: Evolving Physical Stores for the Attention Economy
• Retail 2026: 10 Trends Driving Retail Media
• Achieving Social Commerce Success with Authentic, Interactive and Engaging Content
• Retail-Tech Landscape: Online Shopper Convenience

Shoptalk Fall Sessions

Schedule	Session	Selected speakers
Tuesday, Sep. 29 3:25–3:45 p.m.	Track Keynote: Brand Storytelling That Delights and Performs	J. Michael Prince, President & CEO, U.S. Polo Assn.
Tuesday, Sep. 29 3:45–4:05 p.m.	Track Keynote: Brand Storytelling That Delights and Performs	Michelle Crossan-Matos, Chief Brand & Experience Officer, SharkNinja
Tuesday, Sep. 29 4:15–4:55 p.m.	Monetizing Video: New Approaches to Endorsements, Product Integrations, and More	Bo Moon, VP, Platform Business, Gaming, Commerce & New Service Innovation, LG Stephen Nesle, Chief Marketing Officer, Bob’s Discount Furniture Evan Moore, SVP, Commerce Partnerships, NBCUniversal
Wednesday, Sep. 30 4:15–4:55 p.m.	Leveraging Product Drops and Collabs to Drive Awareness and Sales	Joss Hastings, VP, Global Marketing, Disney Pixar & Softlines, The Walt Disney Company Vanessa Enns, VP, Integrated Marketing, MERIT Beauty Tamara Szames, DVP, Insights and Strategy, Holt Renfrew

3. Understanding the Customer

Consumers are responding differently to changes in prices, economic conditions, technology and shopping channels. Retailers and brands therefore need to understand not only what consumers purchase but also how priorities vary across customer groups and how those priorities change over time. Price and value can be important, but convenience, product relevance and the quality of the shopping experience can also affect decisions.

Customer data and direct feedback can help companies identify these differences. CRM, loyalty programs, crowdsourcing and customer communities can provide information on preferences and engagement, while demand data can support assortment, inventory and supply-chain decisions. Retailers and brands need to determine which signals are broadly representative and which require more targeted responses.

At Shoptalk Fall, sessions relevant to this theme will examine customer listening and fandom, consumer sentiment, value-conscious shoppers and demand sensing. Other sessions will consider how retailers adapt to changing market conditions and use customer insight to inform merchandising and operational decisions.

Shoptalk Fall’s keynote lineup on Thursday, October 1, features three very different companies, Crocs, David’s Bridal and Equinox, all of which excel at understanding their customers, speaking to them authentically and being highly responsive to their needs.

Coresight Research Insight: Our August 2026 US Consumer Survey Insights shows consumer sentiment, which we measure weekly, diverging across income groups. This underscores that changes in confidence or spending affect shoppers in different ways, and those can be tied to specific customer profiles. This supports the use of customer segmentation when setting value propositions, promotions and communications.

“Know your customer” may be a longstanding mantra in retail, but one weak spot can be comparing shoppers with those of competitors. Our new Who Shops Where report provides our flagship yearly analysis of US shopper demographics across dozens of major US retailers, from food to fashion. Our data underline that companies that may be seen as sector peers (for example, Shein and Temu or Kohl’s and Macy’s) are often competing for markedly different shoppers. Importantly, retailers should also “know their competitors’ customers” to recognize their relative positioning and to address their own positions of strength and weakness among consumers.

On loyalty programs, meanwhile, our research found that a net 39.5% of surveyed US consumers with a loyalty-program membership reported spending more with a brand or retailer since joining its program. Loyalty data can help retailers understand and segment customers, but programs must provide sufficient ongoing value to encourage participation and continued engagement.

The Coresight Research Playbook on managing retail supply chains in the agentic age examines how AI can support faster and more resilient decision-making. Demand sensing can help retailers respond more quickly to shifts in customer behavior, but effectively translating demand signals into inventory and supply decisions still requires clear processes for reviewing and acting on AI-generated recommendations.

Related Coresight Research reports:

• Pressure on Sentiment, Momentum in Value Retail: US Consumer Survey Insights
• Who Shops Where: 2026 US Shopper Demographics
• US Retail Loyalty Programs: Decoding Consumer Behavior To Build Lasting Relationships
• Playbook: Managing Retail Supply Chains in the Agentic Age

Shoptalk Fall Sessions

Schedule	Session	Selected speakers
Tuesday, Sep. 29 3:25–4:05 p.m.	Insights on Customer Sentiment: Demographics, Psychographics, Geographies	Cate Khan, CEO, Trendalytics Jenna Landi, Senior Director, Global Brand Research, Pinterest Jacqueline Flam, SVP Beauty, Drug & OTC, NielsenIQ
Wednesday, Sep. 30 9:50–10:30 a.m.	Listening to the Customer: CRM, Crowdsourcing, and Cultivating Fandom	Jeannie Yoo, CEO, Draper James Rachel Jonas Gilman, CEO, Mane Jessica Schinazi, CEO, Away
Wednesday, Sep. 30 4:15–4:55 p.m.	Teen Shoppers’ No-Cap Views on Brands and Retail	Kate Hardcastle MBE will interview a panel of Gen Alpha kids (ages 13–18) live on stage, sharing their unfiltered perspectives on brands, shopping, and retail
Thursday, Oct. 1 12:30–1:10 p.m.	Demand Sensing for Agile and Resilient Supply Chains	Steven Radewych, SVP, Supply Chain Operations, Spin Master David Huskisson, SVP, Supply Chain & Transformation, The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company

Additional Sessions to Watch

Shoptalk Fall’s Ask Me Anything program, running 12:00 p.m.–2:00 p.m. on Thursday, October 1, will feature a series of short sessions in which retail leaders and experts respond directly to attendee questions.

Schedule	Selected speakers
12:00–12:30 p.m.	Jason LaRose, CEO, Bombas
12:30–12:50 p.m.	Dana Steinfeld, Chief Blue Sky & Innovation Officer, Maesa Molly Kennedy, SVP, Marketing, Maesa
12:50–1:20 p.m.	Rob Gaige, Head of Global Insights, Reddit
1:20–1:40 p.m.	Scott Devlin, Chief Information Officer, The Vitamin Shoppe
1:40–2:00 p.m.	Marie Driscoll, Adjunct Professor, The New School

Notes and Methodology

Data in this report are as of September 1, 2026.

Companies mentioned in this report include: Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), Anthropic, Away, Best Buy (NYSE: BBY), Bob’s Discount Furniture, Bombas, BRUNT Workwear, Comfrt, Crocs (NASDAQ: CROX), David’s Bridal (owned by CION Investment Corporation [NYSE: CION]), Depop (owned by eBay [NASDAQ: EBAY]), Draper James, The Estée Lauder Companies (NYSE: EL), Fashionphile, Favorite Daughter, Glow Recipe, H Squared Research, Holt Renfrew, Kohl’s (NYSE: KSS), LG, Lowe’s (NYSE: LOW), Maesa, Mane, MERIT Beauty, NBCUniversal (owned by Comcast [NASDAQ: CMCSA]), The New School, New York & Company, NielsenIQ (NYSE: NIQ), Pinterest (NYSE: PINS), Ramp, Reddit (NYSE: RDDT), Rhone, The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company (NYSE: SMG), SharkNinja (NYSE: SN), Spin Master (TSX: TOY), StockX, TikTok Shop, Tractor Supply (NASDAQ: TSCO), Trendalytics, U.S. Polo Assn., The Vitamin Shoppe, The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS) and WITHIN.