Ray Gaul is the President of Retail Cities Global Inc, a global business intelligence advisory company established in 2020. Retail Cities assists suppliers, retailers, and service providers in understanding the big picture in retail, specializing in having global reach and ability to quickly gather specific details in multiple cities/countries using experienced practitioners. As President of Retail Cities, Ray works with a network of over 150 independent retail experts, each with twenty plus years of experience running retailers, calling on retailers, commenting on retail, or servicing the industry. Prior to managing Retail Cities, Ray was SVP of European Retail Insights for Kantar, based in London, a position he held for seven years. Ray worked at Kantar opening retail intelligence offices for Kantar in Boston, London, Shanghai, New Delhi, and Bucharest. Ray specializes in delivering insights on the future size of prize for different retail concepts, European grocery discounters, and disruptive new business models.
Recently, in an exclusive interview with Digital First Magazine, Ray shared his professional trajectory, insights on the future of the retail landscape, personal hobbies and interests, future plans, words of wisdom, and much more. The following excerpts are taken from the interview.
Hi Ray. What inspired you to start Retail Cities, and how has your vision evolved over time?
I had some colleagues in India and Romania that were getting downsized in 2016 – against my recommendation. They asked me to help them start a company and I tried but while still doing my day job. It failed, obviously. I revisited the reasons it failed while I was forced to down tools for six weeks during Covid-19 lockdown in April 2020. The main idea was to provide a platform for independent retail experts all over the world in the version 2.0 of the business plan. In October 2020 I saw a chance and I took it. We incorporated in October 2020. The only change in the vision since then has been how we create product bundles that enable clients to get rapid responses from our experts. We continue to evolve in that arena. It is difficult. So many of our clients have a slow ‘day-based’ advisory culture with lots of involvement from their procurement departments. They are gradually catching on to the benefits of the Retail Cities rapid reaction approach.
How do you see the retail landscape evolving in the next 5-10 years, and what opportunities or challenges do you anticipate?
Middle managers have always been important in retail but their tasks and skills have evolved dramatically over the years. We expect this to accelerate. It used to be that the best advice to a graduate looking to become a senior leader at a retailer was to spend a ton of time in store-level roles. I’m not sure that would be the advice that many senior leaders give their incoming graduates these days.
How do you stay up-to-date with the latest retail marketplace trends, and what sources do you rely on for information?
That’s such a hard question! Obviously, we all make three investments: Time, money, and insider perspective. I used to believe that spending a lot time and money on the best news sources was the way to get a complete picture. Now, more than ever, I try to make sure our experts are well-connected with people close to the news. This means reading interviews rather than press releases on one level. I think the best publications are the ones that build interviews into their editorial calendar.
What are some common misconceptions about the retail industry that you’d like to dispel?
The one that got me fired up recently is ‘inflation’. Many politicians accused leading supermarket chains of profiteering. We have done some studies on this and the science is pretty clear: very few retailers were profiteering during the inflationary spike. I’d like to ask the politicians how many metric tons of grains, cooking oils, and other foods their governments purchased for the army and for the civil defense in the period after Russia invaded Ukraine. I wonder if they ever look at how that surge in demand impacted prices in global markets?
What personal or professional philosophies have contributed to your success, and how have you applied these principles in your career?
When I was in high school I was captain of the swim team and we had many fewer swimmers than our chief rivals. Every year we tried to get one or two more swimmers – not the hero swimmers – to score some points. We fell short three years in a row losing to our chief rival by just a few points each year. Since then I’ve always believed that having the ability to get one or two more people on a retail topic each year is the way to grow an insights business. I very much focus on making sure we have a strategy to grow the number of perspectives in our organization each year.
Who has been a significant influence or mentor in your career, and how have they helped shape your professional journey?
At Coca-Cola an executive named Robert Ireland went out of his way to help me understand the problems that big companies face when trying to motivate their teams. I would visit him on a scheduled basis and he would always focus on giving me an important perspective that would help me deliver better insights. Sadly, he passed away after a very public battle with Blood Cancer. His legacy lives on through his daughters who have a campaign to encourage everyone to do cheek swabs for DNA to help the DKMS non-profit match terminal patients with potential donors.
What are some of your passions outside of work? What do you like to do in your time off?
I travel for work and so you would think that I get sick of it, but I don’t. I like to travel, even locally, especially if I can find a place off the beaten path with an interesting history.
Which technology are you investing in now to prepare for the future?
We’ve relied on PowerPoint for most of my career, but I think we’re seeing the end of that era. We’re playing with short-form videos and video-indexing using AI and other labor-saving tools.
What are your long-term career aspirations, and how do you see yourself evolving as a leader over the next five years?
I want to continue to build Retail Cities into a powerful resource for clients and our network of independent retail experts. I know the only way we will achieve that is through joint ventures or possibly Mergers & Acquisitions. I’m very focused on learning how to manage those transitions as a leader and looking to engage mentors that can help me in that respect. I saw a lot of that when I was at WPP and Kantar but I was seeing at a distance. I now need to learn how to be managing it from the inside – but there’s no rush – baby steps first!
What advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to make a meaningful impact?
Make sure you spend time with your family and closest friends. Allocate time to keep them informed as you will need their help both emotionally and financially if you will be a true entrepreneur. It is very easy to get lost in the work and forget your family and friends. If you do that, I’m almost certain your relationships will sour but the business will fail too.